spittake I’m going to try that next time out. (Because they ALWAYS sit right behind or in front of me. It’s one of my mutant powers.)
Perhaps my niece & nephew are the exception, not the norm. My niece is 10 my nephew is 7. Niether of them kick the seats in front of them, they fidget, sure but they don’t do that.
Don’t want to be a ‘Facist’ myself, can you tell them it’s grammar.
If only they had used Japanese cars, Pretty fly for the Hondi tagline could have shifted some units.
Man, the twins were funny. I’m so tired of this PC crap. If you have a sitcom chances are the main character is gonna be a dumb white male but that’s perfectly fine because “Hey he’s white and a dude”. You take that same archetype and put it on ANYONE else and it’s the worse thing to happen since Imus’s comments(which were totally uncalled for but that’s a completely separate issue).
Pretty fly for a Hyundai is a T-shirt I’d wear.
Don’t fret, spelling and grammar nazi I not be
Actually, no, it’s not fine. By the time the 90’s rolled around I was sick of the stupid father archetype. The wife & the kids had to ooutsmart dumb dad! And, no the twins aren’t funny. If anything they are annoying.
It’s obviously not fine, but it’s not rallied against. That was my point. And the twins were amusing.
It may not be railed against in publications regularly or as loudlly, but trust me, I’ve had that discussion many times with many people. It’s not more acceptable than any of the rest. And, no they are not amusing.
I was in a theatre with 100-200 people, trust me they were chuckling. They’re amusing. For instance when they’re making fun of Leo after they and Bumblebee go off on their own
There may have been individual morsels of humor from them – that is, a couple of specific one-liners that were amusing – no one is saying that there weren’t. What’s being argued is that the characters themselves, whose sole purposes were to be archetypal “stereotypical comic relief” characters, were not funny to many people. I don’t doubt that your audience was chuckling, because there are still a lot of backwards people (imho) who support and enjoy such stereotypes. Just because the jokes reached a certain audience doesn’t mean the writers/director should be let off the hook for their tackiness, though.
To be fair, a lot of people don’t see it as any different than, say, the Swedish Chef.
Right, and I guess I can understand that on a certain level. I think any differentiation arises from this: it would be rather difficult to interpret the Swedish Chef as derogatory – can the same be said about the twins? I don’t know.
Ever show it to a Swede?
I’m a quarter Swedish! 
Seriously, though, my grandma’s full Swedish side of the family always used to jokingly do the Swedish Chef thing back in the day (we were all Muppet Show fans). None of us found it offensive, but I suppose it’s possible we’re thicker skinned than some.
That’s the bulk of it right there. I don’t get worked up over terms like “Paddy Wagon,” for example. The trick is that you’ve got to judge how worked up others will get, and since outrage is a political currency these days, there tends to be a lot of it.
There’s a big difference between cultural histories of Swedes, Irish, and African-Americans in American society. Swedes were never much of a repressed minority (I’m willing to be corrected on this point though), and while the Irish certainly were in the past there is very little remaining discrimination against them in the US. OTOH, racism involving African-Americans is still a problem in this country. Is it as bad as it has been in the past? Certainly not, but it is still undeniably an issue. I have yet to see Trans2 so I can’t comment on whether the certain robots were presented in a way that could be deemed offensive. However, comedy based on mocking the sound of the language (i.e., Swedish chef) vs. playing towards negative anti-intellectual ethnic stereotypes (as some have interpreted Trans2) does not seem to be comparable.
That’s it in a nutshell. As long as a group feels (or rather, is legitimately) discriminated against, some things are beyond the pale.
It’d be nice if everyone grew up like I did, where most of us were mutts and we’d come up with novel discriminatory labels for ourselves (e.g. I was a McSki) but that was amusing precisely because it didn’t matter.
Pike said eralier that if I was offended that it must be bad ( paraphrase) Pikes’s joke was good and I went with it, but truth be told I was not offended. I was just saying that if I was that black guy with by kids watching a “family” movie that showed them another example of racial sterotype, I would have been. I was just saying that this was the wrong movie for this kinda thing.
Now in the case of Pike. He said his GF was black. That would be a hard thing , for me to sit thru the twins next to someone I loved ( not wanting to throw the L-bomb for you) watching them be legit offended. I wouldn’t have been as offended by the twins, but more embarassed. Hopefully it went ok.
on the subject:
I don’t really understand people who turn all PC and get offended by things that aren’t directed at them. It seems to me that most of the people that live in PC land are not even the people that belong to the groups that are being cracked on. I understand acknowledgeing racism or things that you think that would be offensive to others, but actually being hurt by it, or burning calories to be offended by it is alien to me. Don’t people have other things to spend their time on. Example: I don’t think anti-semitism is good, but I don’t burn to many calories worying about all the flacck they gave mel gibson, because I am not jewish. if I were jewish, I would talk a lot of crap about him probably, but maybe not. We have a war on- and better things to worry about.
example: I heard a black activist, the guy from Georgetown that is on Bil Maher often- Micheal Eric Dyson. I usually like him. He is trying to say that those of us that won’t accept micheal jackson as anything other than a child molester are doing it out of racism. Thats crap.
That is my problem with the PC crowd. They see evil where it isn’t. They TRY to dray a line between small things and overall racist evil. Like if you laugh at Blaxeing saddles you’re david duke. I don’t buy it.
Humor with a racial overtone and true racism are different. I know that some sociology graduate student will say that these jokes lead to lynching but I don’t buy it. I love Sarah Silverman and I don’t “watch my wallet” around jews as she loves to say… cause I am smart enough to recognize humor and not take her comedy as a life lesson.
I think that when we are discussing “racist” humor… one should think about the intent. Jokes are made to make some people laugh. Sure the group being crapped on isn’t laughing as much… but everyone else is. If you really believe the point of the joke is that the writer is hopeing that the subject will get their feelings hurt, that’s bad. I can’t think of a comedian that has ever done that. ( unless you want to count cracking on christians or republicans - that seems to be open season of late). But the writers are just trying to entertain, and that kind of humor makes most people laugh ( unless they guilt themselves out of it.)
Andrew Dice Clay was a bufoon character who spewed sexism and racism and only people with an IQ of 6 and teenage boys that shouldn’t have seen the act anyway, thought that he really was a cool guy to be emulated. It was funny… much like Cartman. You have the bufoon character say the offesive things… hence showing how stupid, shocking, and inapproprriate the ideas are. ( kinda like Clint in Grande Torino)
But sometimes it’s just that group’s turn to be cracked on. Watch Katt Williams, or Lisa Lampaneli, Sarah Silverman, or Don Rickles. If you watch that, you will see a group or 5 being cracked on during any show. It’s part of the game. As long we spread the fun and don’t make the joke all about slamming one group all night… it’s just comedy.
In the end, if your tired of this kinda comedy… change the station, don’t rent the dvd but don’t get high blood pressure over it.
All that being said. This is the kind of comedy for mature adults… not a 6 year old out to watch big robots with mom and dad. It has no place in the Transformers movie. I din’t get offended… I just gave the makers of the movies poor marks for doing it.
No, you can toss the L-bomb. I probably don’t do it enough. 
Actually, this one was a closer shave IMHO than JarJar. The odd thing is that I honestly think JarJar was in no way intended to be problematic. The twins? I’m not as sure.
I don’t really understand people who turn all PC and get offended by things that aren’t directed at them. I understand acknowledgeing racism or things that you think that would be offensive to others, but actually being hurt by it, or burning calories to be offended by it is alien to me.
I know what you’re saying, but you have to remember that what is or isn’t acceptable is a social decision, ultimately. (e.g., all the jokes that end with “too soon?”) That’s pretty much what I was saying above. And, as you acknowledge, I tend to cringe more when I’m sitting next to someone I’m expecting to cringe.
OTOH, I remember the neighborhood gang holding a pow-wow and the question we had to work through was, “Did God leave the blacks in the oven too long?” We went back and forth on this, but ultimately allowed that while the blacks were in there too long, the whites were in there too little, and the asians were properly cooked. (It’s probably no coincidence that asians were the one absent population in our neighborhood.)
Andrew Dice Clay was a bufoon character who spewed sexism and racism and only people with an IQ of 6 and teenage boys that shouldn’t have seen the act anyway, thought that he really was a cool guy to be emulated. It was funny… much like Cartman. You have the bufoon character say the offesive things… hence showing how stupid, shocking, and inapproprriate the ideas are. ( kinda like Clint in Grande Torino)
Yeah, there’s a lot of humor in being the wrongest guy in the room. I use that with The GF frequently.
(it doesn’t always work like you’d think.)
All that being said. This is the kind of comedy for mature adults… not a 6 year old out to watch big robots with mom and dad. It has no place in the Transformers movie. I din’t get offended… I just gave the makers of the movies poor marks for doing it.
It was a PG-13 movie!! Why the hell were there so many 6-8 year olds there? Hello, parents?
I didn’t know that there was a Jar Jar contraversy. ( beyond him being stupid). What is the deal there? I am assumeing you mean because the voive actor is black and the character was stupid? I don’t get the issue there. I think that teh voice acator is probably more responsible for his dumbness than Lucas. I have seen PM a few times and never got that he was supposed to be a black sterotype. i am dumbfounded that I have missed this. I hate that f’er.
Is this a personal issue with you or is this a “generaly accepted” critizism of the character?