SuAside said:
nah,
Outcast wasn't black. (check 1:21 and on)
(and also note the 'belgium' pun, since the game was actually made there)
I don't know what display resolution you favour, but I really can't read those remarks (and your sig) without copy-pasting it (or getting a headache)
I do think the guy displayed at 1'10" is black?
Speaking about Belgium, I find the situation here quite funny/ironic. Black people are rarely into "ghetto culture", as opposed to Maghrebian people (e.g. from Morocco). Problems with black people are quite rare in the Flemish speaking part.
I live in an area with a lot of black people, they tend to keep their problems indoor, and don't mess with others.
I also have a problem with how RECENT hiphop portrays black people in America. The big names in their ethnicity have fought hard to reach certain goals, which hiphop seems to be destroying altogether.
Most people tend to forget what those few great black people accomplish - don't get me wrong, I don't think that few black people are capable of reaching much - their sheer numbers and cultural background just doesn't favour them. Hip-hop just overshadows those few, thus adding to bad rep.
It seems like a vicious circle to me... Some whites used to hate blacks, blacks felt like they had few opportunities, they grouped into what where to become ghettos, had fewer opportunities because they had little "examples" in those ghettos, thus taking down education value, making the next generations less educated, giving them even less examples - it's really a downward spiral.
They keep on blaming society and whites, I think it may be as simple as getting out of those damn ghettos. And stop honouring the ghetto way of life with hiphop.
I think all this was exactly Von Drunky's intention: To let us think about how blacks are portrayed in modern media. From that point of view, I can see that GTA just adds to the "hiphop bad rep".
Whites who live in countries without much gangsta-culture (Poland?
) may be inclined to think that blacks only live in Ghettos. Blacks in other countries may use that as yet another example that all blacks should be into hiphop.
Now, what is the extra value of GTA? Maybe, we can use it to reflect on the ghetto way of life. It shows the gaming crowd what being a ghetto gangsta nigga is about: Protecting the family, letting the GF shoot other nigga's from the back of your bike, capping some other thugs, ...
Dumb people could think "see, those niggas are just no good". Smart people may see this as a wink to the hiphop world. Cynical people may say this just fuels the bad situation more.
About some other posts in this topic:
Blacks in Vampire/gothic environments: Anyone remember "Blade", with Wesley Snipes? I'd say that there could be some people that take that movie as an example, and wouldn't be amazed to see a black vampire punk. Although most goths I've met were pale whities ^_^
Blacks in Fallout: Indeed, as Darklegacy stated, the Cafe of Broken Dreams encounter gave some more insight.
Sorrow and the Genocide, Great rulers, warlords examples: Look at Africa? It's filled with genocidal warlords, who kill their own people, let their soldiers rape everything that walks, and add in spreading aids. I don't get the point here?
There -are- a lot of influential blacks. It's only, they're not so largely represented in the West... I can imagine that makes it harder to reach the top in higher quantities.
About JA2: The top merc in the entire game, Gus Tarballs, is black. You could say "that displays yet another stereotypical black badass" - no, JA2 has RPG elements, he's not only badass, he's smart and has got some skills too
Gaming in general: Indeed, this is sometimes thought through too much by -some gamers-. I think that most devs just make a game of something they picture. I can imagine that they, like me, don't fantasize about being -some black dude- in -some environment-. Why? Red this topic again.
From an educational point of view, it would be really nice to give the black people some more icons to look up to. Being politicians, scientists, fictional characters (books, games, movies) - that are outside the ghetto and/or hiphop setting.
I would like to say that none of these statements should be envisioned as bad towards black people. I judge people as they are, regardless of colour. Because whites are just larger in quantity, I know one hell of a lot more of white jackasses than black ones
The words "gangsta", "nigga" and so one are references to the hiphop community. Bad rep to this words is added by people who are racists, or have racistophobia.