Running Diary: MTV After Hours

[Charlie Nakatestes, Japanese Golfer]

Ignorant, perhaps. But I think that was intended. Racist, no.

[Joymonster]

Originally posted by cholo:
  Was I the only one that thought that review came off very ignorant and......   :eek:    racist?
 
 Perhaps too strong of a word and maybe the deadpan sarcastic wit of vansmack just flew over my head, but that's the impression I got.

Ignorant: yes
 Racist: no

[Joymonster]

Originally posted by cholo:
  Was I the only one that thought that review came off very ignorant and......   :eek:    racist?
 
 Perhaps too strong of a word and maybe the deadpan sarcastic wit of vansmack just flew over my head, but that's the impression I got.

Ignorant: yes
 Racist: no

[vansmack]

Originally posted by cholo:
  Was I the only one that thought that review came off very ignorant and......   :eek:    racist?
 
 Perhaps too strong of a word and maybe the deadpan sarcastic wit of vansmack just flew over my head, but that's the impression I got.

It may have flown over your head.  
 
 It was not intended as a racist piece and I am about the furthest thing from a racist.  I was poking fun at MTV's blatant direct marketing at african americans from their choice of commercials to run and videos to air at 3 AM, the one time they actually choose to air videos.  As far as the lack of artistry in rap videos, it's pretty obvious by watching so I won't explain my stance there.
 
 But as Rhett pointed out, my ignorance was intended because nobody on this board wants to read a serious article about what one observer thinks MTV is trying to do with its marketing and video choices.  Hell, I didn't think anybody wanted to read my humorous attempt at it either, but I was bored and felt like having some fun.
 
 I'm sorry if it offended and please don't take my deadpan sarcastic wit literally at all.  As usual, I was taking the piss for the most part.

[Charlie Nakatestes, Japanese Golfer]

What commercials directly target-market an African-American audience? Probably if I watched more tv, I could hazzard a guess.
 
 My wife was convinced that you must have been stoned when you wrote it. Probably if I had smoked more weed back in my youth, I could hazzard a guess at to the truth of that belief.

[Celeste]

Originally posted by Rhett Miller:
  What commercials directly target-market an African-American audience?

The ones for phone services that will give you a phone even if your current service was turned off because of your "cousin"...

[vansmack]

Originally posted by Rhett Miller:
  My wife was convinced that you must have been stoned when you wrote it. Probably if I had smoked more weed back in my youth, I could hazzard a guess at to the truth of that belief.

I'll deal with your first inquiry in minute as it will take a bit more to write and apparently nobody gets my humor so I will have to be delicate.  Think Colt 45 and other Malt Liquors.  Now they do the same with soft drinks, fast food (less blatantly) and clothing (much more blatantly).  Racial profiling is only illegal for the police - companies are paying millions of dollars to market to audiences based on race and gender.  Do you think it was only a coincidence that after Denny's got into trouble for negatively profiling african-americans as customers, that their commercials started predominantly featuring african-americans?
 
 Anyhow, never smoked a day in my life - not a cigarrette or weed.  I was suffering from cabin fever intensified by Live Wire (the new Mountain Dew).
 
 It was stream of consciousness that was intended to be humorous.  That's all.

[vansmack]

Originally posted by Celeste:
  QUOTE]The ones for phone services that will give you a phone even if your current service was turned off because of your "cousin"...

That's a prime example of a commercial that came on repeatedly during MTV After Hours.

[Celeste]

Originally posted by vansmack:
  Racial profiling is only illegal for the police - companies are paying millions of dollars to market to audiences based on race and gender...

Do you think it should be illegal to advertise to target markets?

[Charlie Nakatestes, Japanese Golfer]

Why would somebody's phone service be turned off because of their cousin?

[Celeste]

Originally posted by Rhett Miller:
  Why would somebody's phone service be turned off because of their cousin?

I think that it is more common for African Americans to have larger extended families than caucasians and the suggestion is that one of many "cousins" may have come in and run up the phone bill, or that perhaps the person holding the account blamed a "cousin". Blacks often seem to have alot of "cousins".

[vansmack]

Originally posted by Celeste:
  Do you think it should be illegal to advertise to target markets?

Absoltuely not.  And that's the joke I was making - MTV did not think that the consumer market that I fit in would be watching the first 45 minutes of the MTV After Hours Show.  It wasn't until Metallica came on, the MTV news piece, and the ensuing commercials that I felt MTV, Viacom and Comcast Cable thought maybe I was watching.  Why?  I'm not sure, it but it was absolutely intentional.  
 
 It's no different than the disproportionate amount of Tampax commercials that come on during Surf Girls.  When I make a joke about that, some people laugh, but nobody thinks it's sexist.  Everybody just says, you're not the target market for Surf Girls (not blatantly at least).  If I notice a similar pattern and make a joke about it using race, some people think that's racist.  The truth is, it's the same thing so I laugh when people accuse me of racism for pointing it out, especially when I do so in a joking manner.

[sueandnotu]

The thing is, I don't really believe that hip hop videos are necessarily going primarily for the black demographic.  Hip hop record sales are overwhelmingly propped up by white suburban kids, and the black hip hop culture has merged with white youth culture so much that the plain fact is that in mainstream music, hip-hop is what's cool for everybody.  Go to any club where 50 cent is playing and see the white girl to black girl booty-shaking ratio.  You just can't divide it up that way anymore.  Which is why I get very annoyed at all these Bringin' Down the House movies.  The square-white-guy saying "Shizzle to my nizzle" is just not funny anymore, if it ever was.  Youth culture isn't black/white so much as greyish now.  So, that was my biggest reaction to your review: they aren't targeting the black market.  They're targeting the youth market.

[vansmack]

Originally posted by Celeste:
  I think that it is more common for African Americans to have larger extended families than caucasians and the suggestion is that one of many "cousins" may have come in and run up the phone bill, or that perhaps the person holding the account blamed a "cousin". Blacks often seem to have alot of "cousins".

Common misnomer.  Religion is a bigger indicator of family size than race.  And I would make a Catholic joke here to prove my point lest somebody not get it and take offense....

[Charlie Nakatestes, Japanese Golfer]

I don't know about religion, but these figures
 http://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/race/black/tabs96/tab06-96.txt
 
  seem to indicate that 11.3% of white households have more than 4 people, whereas 20.1% of black households have more than 4 people in them. Seems like blacks do have larger households.
 
 
 

Originally posted by vansmack:
   

Originally posted by Celeste:
  I think that it is more common for African Americans to have larger extended families than caucasians and the suggestion is that one of many "cousins" may have come in and run up the phone bill, or that perhaps the person holding the account blamed a "cousin". Blacks often seem to have alot of "cousins".

Common misnomer.  Religion is a bigger indicator of family size than race.  And I would make a Catholic joke here to prove my point lest somebody not get it and take offense.... [/b]