When watching the world through the silver screen, many don’t notice how our minds are being subjected to social change. We are all being brainwashed through those mediums we call ‘entertainment hubs.’ How? Well, when watching a children’s show, or even a Disney movie, are all the characters the same? I never noticed how racial stereotypes could be implemented so early on in the human brain until recently.
Watching Aladdin earlier today, I’ve noticed the start of the movie was of eastern music and then when the lyrics started, it all made sense. The movie is portraying Arabs as those who are greedy, living in tents and are in tolerant. The lyrics go:
“Oh I come from a land, from a faraway place
Where the caravan camels roam
Where they cut off your ear
If they don't like your face
It's barbaric, but hey, it's home
When the wind's from the east
And the sun's from the west
And the sand in the glass is right
Come on down
Stop on by
Hop a carpet and fly
To another Arabian night
Arabian nights
Like Arabian days
More often than not
Are hotter than hot
In a lot of good ways
Arabian nights
'Neath Arabian moons
A fool off his guard
Could fall and fall hard
Out there on the dunes”
In other shows also racial stereotypes and profiling has a big impact on our minds as human beings. We have become used to it being a normal thing when trying to understand the characters in a film or show, that we forgot we are being racist. Lets take on another approach. The comedy movie “Harold and Kumar” stars two males, both equally American, yet what they go through is simply due to their ethnicity. Harold goes through an episode where Asian’s are considered to be smart and would do anything besides have fun. That is not true, but many think it is. Kumar, on the other hand, gets a ‘random’ security check at the airport and is perceived to have possession of illegal drugs and weapons. Watching all this in the movie, many just laugh at the irony, but we never notice how it is not funny when it happens in real life.
In sociology, we learn that there is a reason to why things exist in the world. We learn how people can be treated differently due to certain characteristics or features. We learn that it is not always aware of how much sociology is around us. I bid this day very productive, I learnt that sociology has shaped my life and learning it as a subject, only opened my eyes to things I never imagined are happening to me. You should take a step back and look at your life that way too.
