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the latest
waddle: good morning, wordpress - 10:36 a.m. , 2009-07-03 elaborate murder attempt - 2:56 p.m. , 2009-07-01 building a tractor in the basement - 10:42 a.m. , 2009-06-19 ask no questions tell just a few lies - 3:17 p.m. , 2009-06-09 my long lasting flavor really lasts long - 1:10 p.m. , 2009-06-04
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I am so sick of Italian-Americans complaining about The Sopranos (no link necessary: what, have you been living in a hole?), and about the so-called negative stereotyping and blah blah blah. I am of Italian-American extraction (it's true. I was not born but extracted, like a juice. Check the records.) and I have these things to say about that. First of all, you know all of America is just jealous. We've had a long cultural love affair with gangsters. So just relax and enjoy it already. On a more serious note, I understand the fear of misrepresentation. The Sopranos-protestors complain that the show gives the impression that all Italian-Americans are gangsters. Well, no, it gives the impression that these particular fictional Italian-Americans are gangsters. But as long as everyone is three-dimensional, and the characters are carefully written, the issue is less urgent. For example, what if a sensitive, intelligent movie was made about a black man in prison, and his struggles to stay human in that environment? What if, in order to survive, he had to engage in thug-like behavior? Would that "send the message" that all black men are incarcerated thugs? No. To summarize: cartoonish caricatures bad! Complex characters good! (I got kind of sick of my soapbox there. Much easier to reduce everything to a pithy slogan.) Go see the puta-pons this Saturday at The Beat Kitchen. I cannot, but you should. You won't regret it. Does anyone remember virtual reality? It was all over the news there for a while, in the 1990s. Maybe we are ready for the second wave, of more mundane virtual reality. Not so much Virtual Sex or Virtual Shooting at Aliens, but more like Virtual Turkey Sandwich or Virtual Standing in Line at the Bank. ----cybermimi cybersmartypants back/forward |
