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Well, we knew this was going to happen and yet I'm still moved to a sad shaking of my head at the myopic nature of humanity. Predictably, a black interest Site in the form of Black Looks has jumped on Resident Evil 5 and its foreign setting, getting its digs in early before other self-segregation organizations take a piece of the attention cake. See, because Resident Evil 5 DARES to have black people in it, it is obviously racist, according to one reactionary writer: The new Resident Evil video game depicts a white man in what appears to be Africa killing Black people. The Black people are supposed to be zombies and the white man’s job is to destroy them and save humanity… This is problematic on so many levels, including the depiction of Black people as inhuman savages, the killing of Black people by a white man in military clothing, and the fact that this video game is marketed to children and young adults. Start them young… fearing, hating, and destroying Black people.
[Hit the jump for more on this. Thanks to TheGoldenDonut.]
This is just ... ridiculous. Ridiculous proof that racism will never go away because certain people, both black and white, refuse to be objective and are unable to see a game set in Africa/India/Brazil without instantly, guiltily or selfishly assuming its all about race and "shooting them thar darkies." Racism isn't a one-way street, and it's attitudes such as the one above that are more "problematic on so many levels," than a game that has the guts to set itself in a location outside of white America. Do I even need to tear this person's pathetic post apart? Not really. It doesn't take a genius to see that the game isn't about "destroying black people," it's about destroying zombies/ganado who for once happen to be black. It does, however, take a really self-centered, perhaps even racist individual, to see it as "the white man killing MY people," and this clearly what the writer sees in Capcom's game. I can pretty much be secure in my assumption that she has never had a problem with the fact that all the enemies save one in Resident Evil 4 were white. Scarcely a black face among them. The blog about Resident Evil 5 looks like it was written by a straight up racist. She seperates white and black people, distinguishing between them. She ignores the previous games where enemies were mostly white because it doesn't fit in with her blinkered world view. She accuses what she believes to be non-black games developers of ulterior motives and she writes for a Site that's all about black interests. Were the roles reversed, she'd be called a bigot and I wish to call her one now. Oh, and I noticed something else that might be worth pointing out -- please read her little blog post again. Notice anything in particular? It's subtle, but it's there. That's right. She capitalizes the word "Black." Not "white." Bloody racist.
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It's people like this who keep racism alive and strong.
Tsk tsk
She's unimportant in life.
There's actually a whole article up at The Village Voice's website about this right now:
http://www.villagevoice.com/blogs/runninscared/archives/2007/07/zombies_in_afri.php
It takes less of a "Oh my God, racism!" approach and more of a "Okay, let's think about this for a sec" approach. Cultural anxieties and whatnot. Check it out.
Pretty sad and stupid. RE4 has spanish zombies and i think RE0 to RE Veronica had white zombies. Where were the protesters then? Ppl like her are the ones who keep racism alive.
did you notice that the author says
"R_N,
Yes… I am more comfortable with the zombies being white. In fact, ALL zombies should be white from this day forth."
in one of the comments.
*cough* racist *cough*
So wait, did Spaniards miss out on RE4? Quick, fire up those blogs!
jesus christ, i hate interest groups...
Ha, I love this comment to the original blog:
"Just thought you might want to knowm this game is made by the Japanese, not Americans."
I'm surprised she didn't respond with something like, "Well, they're KIND of white, just with funny eyes."
Yes, I love blind racism based on a 3 minute trailer! People in the gaming community have no idea what the story is, so I love that she assumes the white man is there to kill black people to save the world.
I at least expected this later, when actual questions could be raised about the main character's mission (which would still have been ridiculous), but this is awful.
Well, I don't think she deserves a front page blog about some shit she wrote, especially a blog by Sterling. This place is for Manhunt, and Manhunt only! And Dynasty Warriors.
According to Wikipedia the term (or belief) in zombies originated with Caribbean people of Black and African descent.
I'm Spanish and I was TOTALLY outraged when I played RE4!
Haha, I can't even type that and keep a straight face! Honestly when I played RE4 I felt the complete opposite because I thought it was awesome that it took place in Spain. :)
wait wait....
So this SOLO white guy gets attacked by GROUPS of black infected zombies....... and the SOLO white guy is racist for defending himself??
gotta love the ignorance of some random blog people.... i guess they will be happy with the extra site hits.
She's just a troll trying to make a name for herself. It happens.
The only thing that's racist about this game so far is how everyone and their mother see's black people and a run down village, and automatically think its Africa.
I don't know which to pissed off more about.. The fact that I am a gamer and I get the point of the game .. or the fact that as a black person.. we get upset about this when there are a hundred more things to protest about that actually mean something...
I hate people who use the race card to make themselves look better or get their way. I feel for the people who really have to deal with racism as a real problem in their life, but I don't feel for the people who see racism in every nook and cranny in their live.
The author of the post needs to seek professional help for her paranoia.
As a black guy:
This is total bullshit, ignorant people should go play in traffic, and I hate stupid people. That is all.
Sorry there's a total of about 4 white people living in Africa...
I hate people like that. Embrace realism for once.
someone should point her to this
http://www.adl.org/videogames/default.asp
Once the recently deceased becomes a zombie, it technically no longer a person - therefore Chris Redfield will not be killing "black" people. He will, however, be slaughtering a shitload of zombies - just the way we like our Resident Evil fix.
Marketed towards children and young adults?
Pfffffffft!
ha ha ha ha!
i'm offended when one person tries to speak for an ENTIRE social group
"Race" shouldn't be a problem, cause, you know, all of us (black people included) are humans (the same race). Zombies on the other hand are a different race but as I have yet to see any complaints from the zombie community on this subject I must conclude that they're okay with it.
In Resident Evil 4, it was all Spaniards and no one complained...
I hate political correctness. =^[
robotplague is actually totally right there. The whole zombie mythos originates from black cultures. To be offended by black zombies is to be offended by black culture.
Ha. Win.
I would be more concerned with games like this:
Lest we forget: it's about africans being infected by a killer-virus. No AIDS references?? Close the pool!
The fact that we're even talking about this is sad.
Mr Sterling, I applaud your moral character. However, this post was not about a) Dynasty Warriors, b) Manhunt, or c) trying to answer the age-old question of just who the f*ck you are. I'll have to dock you 2 Cool Points.
I was watching National Geographic the other day and there was this show on African tribes people, and I couldn't stop thinking , "Man, this show is so racist! Why don't they ever show white African tribes people! This is bullshit!" Then I called the NAACP. They are looking into it.
Is Chris Redfield working for the Westboro Baptist Church? Or is he out to finally exterminate Al Sharpton?
Come on.
Unless the dialogue in the game starts sounding like this:
"OH NOEZ DAT KRAKKA IS GONNA DUN KILL US NOW!!"
"You Darkies dont stand a chance, you were too worried about your precious cornbread and "colly greens" to see our true motives!"
"YOU! IT WAS YOU DAT KILLED JOHNNY COCHRAN, NOT A BRAIN TUMOR! IT WAS DA WHITE MAN!"
"yes, and now you blackies dont stand a CHANCE in court!"
Well then I call racism on Gears of War, how dare the Cole Train run around killing all those poor white locusts.
Blatant hate-monger.
Man, the comments on her blog are the funniest things I've seen next to YouTubers:
"New weapon confirmed for RE5: “Fried Chicken”
Details on Capcom’s upcoming game Resident Evil 5 are sparse, but a new weapon has been confirmed. Fried Chicken comes in either cases of 3 or buckets of 10 which are scattered throughout the game, or sometimes dropped by defeated enemies. A piece of Fried Chicken can be thrown like a grenade or dropped. Any enemies in the vicinity (who can see or smell it) will immediately be attracted to it, and converge upon its location, dropping whatever they are doing at the moment.
If there are multiple enemies in the area, they will viciously attack each other."
Locust are white? I had no idea
She's just trying to get attention, no rational person would believe that this game is maliciously racist.
Ya know, this wouldn't bother me as much if I didn't think their was a chance this could actually affect the games eventual release or final content matter. That would suck.
I knew this was coming up as soon as I saw the preview. I defend the game whenever I get the chance. That woman is a racist. Pure and simple. She is like the Jack Thompson of "black interests".
I'm sure this greedy, extortionist, racist, anti-semitic douche bag will be speaking out against it next.
Why do people have to pull the race card every time black people are depicted in anything that isn't in "black interest"? A zombie is a zombie no matter what color IT is.
God fucking dammit now I'm pissed.
Guys, don't you see? The white man infected the Black people of that poor village so as to turn them into zombies, as a excuse. So the white man can kill those Black people and claim that he was saving the World. How can you people be so blind?
I'm spanish, and I never had a problem with RE4. Ya, so they ppl i were killing were my from my family's origin, big deal. It's a video game. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to kill a bunch of white tourists that Sadler just happened to kidnap and then change just for the events of the game. It's the setting, and more so, a video game. Get the stick out of your ass and enjoy the game.
I'm spanish, and I never had a problem with RE4. Ya, so they ppl i were killing were my from my family's origin, big deal. It's a video game. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to kill a bunch of white tourists that Sadler just happened to kidnap and then change just for the events of the game. It's the setting, and more so, a video game. Get the stick out of your ass and enjoy the game.
Pools closed :-(
Yeah... whats the problem? its just a damn video game for christ's sake
The 'towards children and adults bit' shows just how misinformed the general public can be. Perhaps they should do some research first. Resident Evil has always been an adult game and always marketed as such, even way back on the PS1. Perhaps she should wikipedia RE first before sounding off. Is that so hard?
As a black person and gamer, the RE series is my fave. I'm not offended by RE at all. All Capcom need to do is include a multicutural zombies (this would be difficult to do if its based in part of africa) and a black playable character (it possible there might be one, considering the location). No one ever said all africans were black, because they aren't.
Zombie like Contagion don't choose who it infects. If it's living, it game for contamination. Frankly, we've seen pictures of the zombies, but I can't wait to see what Capcom do with the zombie animals.
It was good enough for the blogs, so it's good enough here.
<simpsons>
Zombie eat brains...but zombie cannot swallow this injustice!
</simpsons>
I agree that this woman's a bigot but I would like you point out that saying a game is racist doesn't make a person a racist. It might make you an idiot/dumbass for thinking so, but not a racist. I think the terms gets misused by people on both sides of the aisle.
Racism implies superiority over a particular group of people. Being wrong and mentioning race doesn't automatically mean racism. Just like saying something incorrect about a console doesn't automatically make you a fan boy. You might be, but it doesn't always. Point is, blanket statements of any kind are bad.
I read this on gamepolitics earlier. Fucking hilarious. Playing the race card so early... what are they going to do when the game actually comes out.
And as some people have pointed out, RE5 is clearly not the game you should be going after if you're looking for racism. There's a few out there, but RE5 is not one of them.
there is lots of good discussion going on about this over at kotaku and i'm glad to see that brains are being used here as well. this person is certainly stretching and i'm hoping the real world just ignores all this crap. that is what should really happen.
Being a Zombie, I've thought the RE games where racist from day one. I'm just sorry that it's only after black Zombies are put in is the game called out for the hateful smut it is. Zombies everywhere need to recognize it's trash like this that forces Zombie youth into the "stereotypical Zombie" role.
@ MrJunko:
As much as I hate defending Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church, the guy certainly isn't a racist. He actually was a strong proponent of civil rights and did a lot for the movement before he was disbarred for being a batshit insane homophobe.
Personally, I hope its super racist. Like the end boss is named Slappy Waddymellon and you have to stop him from raping white women. As luck would have it, earlier in the level you picked up a fried chicken gun and malt liquor grenades. The end FMV could be Chris lynching every person he couldnt ship back to his southern plantation to pick cotton for him.
Resident Evil 6 could be full of jewish zombies. A headshot wont kill them, youve got to blow the yarmulke straight off their head, the source of their evil jew zombie powers.
Seriously, if we're gonna be racist, it should be old time racism. None of this vague shit.
Hear Hear, well said Jim. We all saw this coming and it's great everyone is uniting against this absolutely idiotic viewpoint.
Some people, like this misguided lady, don't seem to understand that in this day and age that pretty much everyone in the developed world are treated as equals; so why should it matter if the zombies are black instead of white for once?
In Resident Evil 4 I killed 914 white people and liked it so much that I have beat it twice, and working on a third time. Clearly, I hate all white Spanish people and hope for their demise by my hands. Unless it's okay to kill white people as long as you are white and the same for the blacks, of course. This may sound racist, but I want to be able to kill spooks in video games! Crackers are getting boring.
First of all, it is just a game! Second, Zombies can be any race. They don't have a choice of who to infect. They infect whoever is in the area, like in Resident Evil 2 and 3. Third, being racist about this game means that you shouldn't play it. Period.
@ Mxyzptlk
True enough, I just wanted to use a "fresh new hate group" The KKK is so 1866.
Although chances are hed probably bash the fact that someone in the game is a homosexual, and well, Im sure he doesnt selectively hate people. If you hate, you hate just about everyone.
I could understand the claim if it was a different type of game, like an over-the-top law enforcement action title where we've seen some borderline racism before, but it doesn't really apply to the zombie/survival-horror genre. The idea of the zombie infestation taking over western countries/cities has been done to death, and the new setting is just the writers' attempt to take a unique approach to a genre that was running out of ideas.
Personally, I think setting the game in Africa is really refreshing, and sets up some potentially great story and gameplay mechanics we haven't seen before. But more on-topic, it could conceivably be used to make statements against racism or for other issues like foreign aid to African countries, etc. if the developers decide to tackle political issues with the game. It's ridiculous to think that it will instead be used to promote racism.
"Start them young… fearing, hating, and destroying Black people."
Resident Evil 5: White Supremacist Propaganda Edition
I wanna play RE5...does this make me a racist now?
@Ritalin twitch
Hilarious comment; the imagery gave me a good series of lols. Capcom should contact you immediately about developing stories for them.
lawl@easily offended people
Someone's gonna have to kiss Jesse Jackson's ass and 'poligize. I should send her copies of RE 1-4 and see if she likes a cracker murder simulator made by Japanese people. "DIE CRACKA' GODTAMN!" I can hear it now.
Interesting, so I wonder if she thinks GTAIV is okay, because this upcoming version has no playable black characaters, like San Andreas?
I'd just also like to note that the only black playable charcaters, to ever grace the RE series was one in RE Outbreak. This isn't such bad a thing. I feel the RE series has a broad cast of characters throughout. We've seen Kenneth J Sullivan (RE1) end up as black zombie food, and Officer Marvin Branagh end up as a black zombie in RE2. Knowing this, I think black characters have had a good run in the series. Better to be represented than not.
Its true though, I don't recall any spanish folk complaining about RE4 at all. Seeing the proximity of Spain to Africa, I can see where Capcom might be going with the RE story, for purely geographical reasons and remoteness of the T/G Virus to be exposed, unknown without contest. If its okay for white zombies in RE4, it should be okay for RE5 to have black and white ones.
Should be interesting what Capcom have to say, but I'm sure we're are all behind them, we love RE5 and want it more than MGS4.
@cbebop007
You disgust me you W.A.S.P.
Capcom should HAVE KNOWN this was gonig to happen from day 1.
i bet if RE5 had latin zombies we'd laugh and all...
but NOOOOOOOO
not its a big mess...
expect a RE5 delay and palette swap. hahaha!!
i hope they make them Peruvian...
cause we party and drink and
dont give a fuck.
Hate to say I told you so, but I knew someone would pull this. It's sad really. I just hope it doesn't affect the release over here.
but, but . . .
nevermind guys, I'll tell you later . . .
also black zombie cocks . . .
As soon as Al Sharpton is finished defending Vic, He'll shift on over to this idiotic cause.
Also, Chocolate zombie rain cocks.
As soon as the trailer was release, I was thinking "Oh god, some one is going to pull the race card".
I mean, you could claim racism on GTA, because the protagonist kills opposite races. The thing is, Why does it matter? As long as the story is good and the gameplay is solid it shouldnt. Techinically, they arent even human. So whats the big deal? I am a minority myself, but I dont use that as a clutch to get what I want. These whinny people are annoying and make life alot harder/complicated then they should be. Leave your racism in the past, and lets move on and play some games.
she's just a stupid bitch fukin whore lolllll