Active Topics | Member List | Search | Help | Register | Login
The John Byrne Forum
Byrne Robotics > The John Byrne Forum << Prev Page of 6
Topic: What IS this Fascination with LOSERS? Post ReplyPost New Topic
Author
Message
Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16406
Posted: 10 July 2020 at 12:05pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply

 Wallace Sellars wrote:
...frustrating conversations I have had with people who refuse to watch
episodes of ALL IN THE FAMILY or ARCHIE BUNKER’S PLACE
because “the show is racist,” missing that a major point of the series is
to show how wrong the lead’s bigoted perspectives are...

Exactly! I rewatched the series in adulthood (and now own all of it on DVD) after having not seen it since I was younger, and when doing so I realized how it truly was one of the greatest sitcoms ever. Sadly, given to its premise, it is actually still very relevant today. Substitute "Nixon" for "Trump," and update the fashions, and it still plays more or less in a contemporary setting.

ABC did the recent live shows, which I was happy to see as it exposed a new audience to the show. It also, I hope, showed that the program was not in support of racism and bigotry, but was meant to denounce it, to those who have been ignorant about that point.


Back to Top profile | search | www
 
Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16406
Posted: 10 July 2020 at 12:14pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

 Rodrigo Castellanos wrote:
....
Now I can't get the image of a show about two German boys riding and old Mercedes-Benz nicknamed "The Adolf Hitler" with a swastika on the roof out of my head.

Would make a good SNL skit.

...

Funnily enough, when I read JB's post , I imagined a "MAD" styled parody of it! One suggestion, though: Instead of "The Adolph Hitler," maybe call the vehicle "The General Rommel"?


Back in the 1970s and 1980s, I don't really recall any controversy over the use of the Confederate flag. It is odd that for so long people have passed off the Confederate flag as merely a symbol of "Southern Pride" and for years and years, the majority of the rest of America just went with it.

I don't believe the people who put together "The Dukes of Hazzard" were trying to be racist, just using lazy shorthand for "good ol' boys" by the inclusion of that flag during a period of time when, for whatever reason, most people seemed ignorant or dismissive of what that flag truly represented.

Back to Top profile | search | www
 
Andrew Davey
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 27 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1435
Posted: 10 July 2020 at 12:24pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

In the early eighties when I was in my teens, I was transplanted from suburban NY to the south. Some of my new peer group (all good people from my perspective) did at times exhibit southern pride including a respect for the Confederate Flag that confused me, especially with what I had been taught in school. One rationalization I had years latter was that this may have been a reaction (or rejection) to the southern stereotype they saw in the media (TV, books, movies, etc.). I suspect none of them would hold that same understanding in the lens of our current times/events.
Back to Top profile | search e-mail
 
Rodrigo castellanos
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 03 July 2012
Location: Uruguay
Posts: 1434
Posted: 10 July 2020 at 1:10pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply

Funnily enough, when I read JB's post , I imagined a "MAD" styled parody of it! One suggestion, though: Instead of "The Adolph Hitler," maybe call the vehicle "The General Rommel"?

Brilliant!


Back to Top profile | search
 
Jim Burdo
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 19 April 2020
Location: United States
Posts: 335
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 5:55am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

 Andrew Bitner wrote:
And FFIW, we should have hanged Robert E. Lee and the other generals, along with Jefferson Davis, as traitors. 
The assassination of Lincoln by Booth likely damned the nation to a never-healed schism, as Lincoln would have managed reconciliation, while his successor did his best to ignore it.

So much for "with malice toward none, with charity for all". The mass execution you want would probably have caused their troops to take up guerrilla warfare, which would have really caused a schism lasting today.
Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 6:23am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

Lincoln wanted no punitive measures taken against the South. Forgive and forget.

John Wilkes Booth didn't only kill Lincoln, he killed any hope of Lincoln's plans for reconstruction. He created a focus for the North's vengeance.

Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 8:20am | IP Logged | 7 post reply

...southern hospitality...

••

When I think of "southern hospitality" I think of DELIVERANCE.

(Which is not entirely fair. I have traveled in the South, and except for the ever-present shadow of History, I have found the people delightful.)

Back to Top profile | search
 
David Miller
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 16 April 2004
Posts: 2997
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 11:11am | IP Logged | 8 post reply

It’s fair enough. My family used to live in South Carolina, and on three
separate visits, I witnessed white people shouting racial epithets from
passing cars at African Americans pedestrians. Some hospitality.
Back to Top profile | search | www e-mail
 
Marc Baptiste
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 17 June 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 3655
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 11:19am | IP Logged | 9 post reply

David,

Exactly the point being made by many in the defunding law enforcement thread!  Those who are NOT black or brown might have a bad case of tunnel-vision when they speak of how "delightful" southerners are.

And I speak with some anecdotal authority, I was born in California, but my mom and all her relatives were born in Texas and long before that, Mexico.  I have visited the south many times.

Marc


Edited by Marc Baptiste on 11 July 2020 at 11:21am
Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 11:52am | IP Logged | 10 post reply

California? Guess that makes you a surfer dude who spends all his time smoking pot.

After all, we’re painting with the broadest brush here, yes?

Back to Top profile | search
 
Eric Sofer
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 31 January 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 4789
Posted: 11 July 2020 at 12:28pm | IP Logged | 11 post reply

I suppose that there is a really interesting divergence between "The Dukes of Hazzard" and "Hogan's Heroes."

The Dukes were about two good ol', fun lovin', mischief makin' boys who were trying to live in the antebellum south, but a bit more liberal than the government (i.e., Boss Hogg and his boys.) So Boss Hogg worked at displacing NOT the memorabilia of the deep south, but the challenges to his authority. And the Dukes were fine living in the "modern" south, save that I never saw them forced into situations where they had to deal with racism or such. (N.B. - I was, by far, not a regular fan of the show, so I don't know if it ever came up or not. And quite honestly, I wouldn't blame the producers if they never had any episodes of that nature.) 

Hogan's heroes were in that horrible situation - a POW camp during World War II. I don't know that any of his gang were ever identified as Jewish.* Certainly a show that might offer offense and scrape at painful scars. But at every turn, every plot, the show was designed to MOCK Nazism and Nazi officers.  There was no sympathetic note or turn that allowed in the slightest that the Nazis were in any way acceptable. It was a hell of a risk - but between being a comedy and being a mockery of all things Nazi, it turned out to be a gamble that paid off.

Today, I doubt that either would have a chance on American TV. But at the time disparate eras they were shown, it was easy to tell whose side each show was on.


*Per the MeTV web page about unknown facts about Hogan's Heroes: "Klemperer (Klink), Banner (Schultz), Leon Askin (Burkhalter) and Howard Caine (Hochstetter) were Jewish, and all but the latter had fled the Nazis during WWII. Additionally, Robert Clary, who played the cooking French corporal, LeBeau, had been interned at a concentration camp. Klemperer stated at the time, "I am an actor. If I can play Richard III, I can play a Nazi." The actor insisted that Hogan always won out over his captors."


Edited by Eric Sofer on 11 July 2020 at 12:29pm
Back to Top profile | search
 

If you wish to post a reply to this topic you must first login
If you are not already registered you must first register

<< Prev Page of 6
  Post ReplyPost New Topic
Printable version Printable version

Forum Jump
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot create polls in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum

 Active Topics | Member List | Search | Help | Register | Login