Yellow Peril

[Dominus Atheos]

This is a new ad put out by a conservative organization:

[Duckie]

I like the idea of the chinese protesting to stimuli when they had the largest stimulus by far and come out pretty well for it

Also I'm pretty sure that politically china's the exact antithesis to sticking to your principles given how the country started communist and is now, well, only describeable as "China".

[Terralthra]

Already posted.

[Lord MJ]

This movie has been out for several months now.

[Duckie]

Well, yeah, I knew that too, but one might as well discuss it anyway.

[Dominus Atheos]

This movie has been out for several months now.

Has it? Well it's news to me.

[Terralthra]

The post date is on the youtube page. October 2010.

[bobalot]

This video is retarded.

China uses Keynesian economics, public ownership of public infrastructure, state enterprises, weak intellectual property laws, forced technology transfers, tariffs and currency manipulation to power its economy.

On top of that, during the GFC, it had a MASSIVE stimulus program. It also has an enormous investments into "Green" technologies and renewable energy.

NONE of these things are being proposed by Conservatives to solve the United States problems.

[Lusankya]

It might be retarded, but it's still quite a well made ad. Most people in the west know stuff-all about China, and the ad certainly does a good job of playing upon people's underlying fear of the unknown. The Chinese professor exudes just the right mix of power and arrogance to make him seem like a threatening figure.

Although I do have to say from experience, that REAL Chinese professor are far more uncle-ly than the guy in the ad. It's not a very realistic portrayal.

[bobalot]

It might be retarded, but it's still quite a well made ad. Most people in the west know stuff-all about China, and the ad certainly does a good job of playing upon people's underlying fear of the unknown. The Chinese professor exudes just the right mix of power and arrogance to make him seem like a threatening figure.

Although I do have to say from experience, that REAL Chinese professor are far more uncle-ly than the guy in the ad. It's not a very realistic portrayal.

True, I should have been more clear. Its message is retarded.

[Lusankya]

I must say that I do giggle every time I hear him say, "Why do all great empires fall?" without prefacing it with "Except for China."

[mr friendly guy]

One - this is old.

Two - The Chinese are doing the same things the conservative ad says is bad - ie changing their health care system, stimulus package etc. So why doesn't the Chinese "empire" also fall like the American empire since they are also doing the same government "wasteful" spending?

And Chinese empires have risen, fallen, and risen again, and fallen and then risen etc etc. But I bet if he mentioned things like the Tang dynasty the American audience would have just given a blank look.

[K. A. Pital]

China-bashing is not uncommon. It's the new trend since America lost their Cold War rival. Of course, it is a bit harder to bash China when shops are full of Chinese goods, but conservatives do a jolly good job at that. It was far easier with Russia - America didn't buy consumer goods from Russia, only titanium and other raw materials. And people don't know about that stuff.

This is a well-made ad, I must say. Cringeworthy as it is, like all American media racist shit they've been putting out for decades. The quality only underscores the point. You could basically run this in cinemas instead of the new Yellow Red Dawn, I believe the audience would be the same, and the box office too.

[mr friendly guy]

This of course begs the question, why would you star in a commercial show, where essentially your ethnic group was potrayed in a racist manner. Sinister Chinese professor just telling his students how China owns the US. Geez that was subtle. I will give it a bit more credit, as its a bit more subtle than the Chinese commander killing an American civilian in yellow red dawn, and the conservative reviewer going, nah its not racist, the Chinese soldiers are being potrayed as competent.

[Lusankya]

I remember reading a bit more about it when the commercial came out. Apparently the producers of the ad just told the actors playing the audience members that it was a "conservative" advertisement, and didn't go into any details about the actual content of the ad. A fair few of them look Indonesian or Korean too, so they a) wouldn't have any idea of figuring out that the ad was being racist against China and c) aren't actually members of the ethnic group that the ad is being racist against.

In any case, I imagine more than a few of the actors figured that the ad was attacking China as a nation, rather then the Chinese as a race, and that as poor, starving actors, it was quite easy to rationalise this point of view when being given an actual paid acting spot (which is hard enough to get if you're a white American, let alone an Asian-American).

[bobalot]

This of course begs the question, why would you star in a commercial show, where essentially your ethnic group was potrayed in a racist manner.

Two reasons:
1) Money
2) See reason 1.

Seriously though, half then ads in Australia with an ethnic product or food has some person over exaggerating their ethnicity or accent in an incredibly racist or cringe worthy manner.

White people in Australia think it's hilarious and anybody who says otherwise is just being PC.

[Zed]

White people in Australia think it's hilarious and anybody who says otherwise is just being PC.

Ofcourse it's being politically correct. Unfortunately, people seem to like being politically wrong.

[mr friendly guy]

I remember when Mel Gibson produced that Vietnam war movie where the heroic Americans take out so many Vietnamese troops yada yada. This was of course previewed on Australian 60 minutes. My Vietnamese friends would dismiss it with statements like there were more Vietnamese to replace the ones that were lost (which is true). I sarcastically remarked maybe they can do a Vietnam war movie where the Vietnamese win, er I mean the Americans reprioritize their strategy.

What has that got to do with my little tangent? Apparently one of the actors who played the North Vietnamese commanders had a habit of potraying Vietnamese in what the government considered an unflattering light. I have to agree with that assessment. The Vietnamese were the baddies while the anti semite Gibson potrayed the hero. The actor was also a citizen of Vietnam, and the government got him on some charge.

I also remembered the North Korean baddie in the James Bond movie (the name eludes me at the moment, but its the one with Halle Berry) was originally slated to be played by a different Korean actor. However he found the script objectionable for IIRC racist potrayals so he declined the role. So at least some people will stick to their principles. Hey I will also stick with my principles and avoid the last airbender and I am going to avoid yellow red dawn. It sort of helped that the first movie had shit reviews, and the second movie had a shit review was liked by a conservative for his China bashing elements, which tells me all I need to know.

White people in Australia think it's hilarious and anybody who says otherwise is just being PC.

Last year on Hey Hey revival or whatever, some doctors blacked up to do a Michael Jackson impersonation. I thought that was in poor taste, and American judge Harry Connick Junior gave it a fucking zero and said right out why he found it offensive. A lot of Australians thought he was being a cry baby. Quite ironic given the current situation.

[Zed]

White people using make-up to look black isn't nearly as offensive if you're not living in a culture with a long tradition of blackface, though.

[Gandalf]

This of course begs the question, why would you star in a commercial show, where essentially your ethnic group was potrayed in a racist manner.

Two reasons:
1) Money
2) See reason 1.

Don't forget that parts for miniority actors aren't as common, so in order to keep working as an actor, one may have to play objectionable roles until good work comes along.

[PainRack]

of course, the possibility is that there are probably chinese, or even China chinese who do believe in conservative principles and spend and tax is bad for you.
Saying its Chinese bashing won't seem so bad if as an actor, you don't vehemently disagree with the message involved.

Also, wasn't there someone posting in testing that some of the actors involved didn't know the message and was later repulsed by the latent chinese bashing?

[mr friendly guy]

A fair few of them look Indonesian or Korean too, so they a) wouldn't have any idea of figuring out that the ad was being racist against China and c) aren't actually members of the ethnic group that the ad is being racist against.

You mean like this guy.



The darker skin tone kind of stands out, and while some ethnic groups in China, namely the Zhuang has darker skin than their Han chinese neighbours, this actor strikes me as not Chinese, or at least of mixed parentage.

Of course given that some Western news media couldn't tell the difference between Chinese police and Nepalese police I wouldn't be surprise if the average conservative viewer couldn't tell either.

[Lusankya]

Yeah. That's the guy I was thinking of who gives off "Indonesian" vibes. It's a combination of the skin, the nose and the hat. Chinese guys hardly ever wear hats, and when they do, they usually wear hats more similar to Koreans' hats* rather than ones like that.


*modern Korean hats being New York Yankees baseball caps, for those of you who don't know.

[Bellosh101]

Strangely enough, I also saw this ad on LA-area TV yesterday. My understanding was that this ad was meant only to play during the midterm elections last year.