MovieChat Forums > Beauty and the Geek (2005) Discussion > No Black geeks?

No Black geeks?

posted 17 years ago by rubenrox4
22 replies | jump to latest

Why have there never been any Black geeks in the history of this show? I know many a Black male who fit the same mold and educational background as the contestants on this show. This is a clear indicator that many reality show producers are proponents of playing up stereotypes on their shows. When you see an Asian Male on one of these shows, he is an academically adept,yet socially inept,dweeb. If there is a Black male, most of the time he is a street-savvy "player" who can't even structure a sentence correctly. If there is a Black female, she is a belligerent, confrontational drama queen. Evidently, audiences eat this up which is why shows such as Flavor of Love(which I admit, is a guilty pleasure of mine), are still on the air. I just wish people would wake up and realize how detrimental these types of images are.

"American Gangster. Best movie of 2007!"

[–] chadbob829 17 years ago

hnnnDid I do thaaaat???

[–] Zenitram 17 years ago

Who knows why; maybe theres not enough black geeks auditioning? Maybe the ones who do don't make strong enough impressions. Anyways, a black geek will be on sooner or later.

[–] jerrydignan 17 years ago

First, this reminds me of one of the many hilarious lines from 30 Rock, when Frank asked Twofer "So are there any other black nerds, or is it just you and Urkel?"

And as for this:

"If there is a Black female, she is a belligerent, confrontational drama queen."

That is absurd. Granted, Randi is completely ghetto (love the upper arm tat too....looks like a gang thing), but she's been the only one on the show I can remember being a stereotype. Granted, the Amber (was that her name?) was confrontational, but I think that was more a part of her being a b*tch than her being black. And how about Jasmine from last season? She was one of the sweetest, most adorable beauties they have had on the show. Also, if I'm not mistaken, isn't Tiffany at least half black (Egyptian father, right?). And I don't remember much about Shay, which means she must not have been outrageous. Ditto Tori and Jennipher.

As for why there haven't been any black geeks, I'd guess there haven't been too many that auditioned, and of those that have, they obviously didn't have an interesting enough personality.

Quit playing the race card. It's tired.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] BigFatLou 17 years ago

EgoFilmArts, how exactly do you know that only 15 black geeks applied? Do you have statistics or something, or are you just making a rash assumption?

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] lexom-returns 17 years ago

(1) My guess would be 500 white geeks applied, 170 Asian geeks applied and 15 black geeks applied. So are we going to put a black geek on the show just to fill a racial quota or are we just going to choose the best "characters," regardless of race?

That's hilarious. It's a reality show. The "best" geek? Are you kidding me?! Completely arbitrary (and unfounded) "guess" aside, some of those guys on the show already, once they got the makeover, as the girls themselves attested, were attractive and socially adept enough to get dates. On the flip side, some of the "beauties" weren't even beautiful.

One of many reasons why your logic is preposterous...

[–] BigFatLou 17 years ago

You're ridiculous jerrydignan. Of course some of the specifics of the argument are incorrect, but to claim that TV producers don't play to their demographic when casting is ludicrous. The man's not playing "the race card" at all - he's just telling it as it is.

[–] BigFatLou 17 years ago

Oh, and by the way jerrydignan, Egyptian people are not necessarily black. In fact, most of them are simply Arabic.

[–] lexom-returns 17 years ago

they obviously didn't have an interesting enough personality.

How is it "obvious?" Were you there?

Funny how not "playing the race card" requires infinitely more assumption-making.

[–] BigFatLou 17 years ago

I personally think that black geeks are smart enough not to get drawn into a lame show like this.

Haha. Seriously though, I agree with you rubenrox4. They are playing to stereotypes, which makes me feel a trifle uncomfortable. To digress a little, there are many amazingly beautiful women who are extremely intelligent. Contrariwise, many ugly men are dumbasses.

Stereotypes indeed.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] lexom-returns 17 years ago

Agree w/the OP 100%. I'm a kind of nerdy brotha myself. I thought for sure last season they'd have a black male geek, especially because when they switched it up and had auditions, they showed a clip of this hilarious black geek. I don't remember the specifics, but he had a gimmick on par with "larking." I knew for sure he'd be on the show (after all why did they show him???!!) but lo and behold....

It's pretty clear that the show in this regard is upholding stereotypes and thus reinforcing them in the process.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] BigFatLou 17 years ago

Not all black people are cool. They're just like every other group of people; some are cool, and some are not.

[–] Icecutter 17 years ago

why no asian beauties? I thought they'd have like at least one exotic asian beauty or wateva

[–] RothGirl94 17 years ago

And the arguments start again...
Lol there should have been a black geek but there wasn't.If your that bothered people write to the network/whatever

PUCK YOU MISS-- Jonah You Rock My World

[–] King-Stannis-Baratheon 16 years ago

Keep in mind that there is a trend which depicts white males as geeky, weak, and cowardly. While there are still negative black male stereotypes on television, they also receive the "cool" label. Asian males, of course, have always been screwed over by the media, but the white males will be thrown on the trash heap with them soon enough.

[–] Mary_Read 16 years ago

Because there's barely any stupid Asian beauties. All are smart, especially in math, were valedictorians in high school and are also at the top of their game in college.

[/stereotype]

[–] MisterZed 16 years ago

I think the reason is that most of the beauties are white, so if they had a black male geek on the show, then the chances of him being partnered with a white female would be quite high. While there's nothing wrong with this, it's my understanding that such a partnership is still considered fairly taboo in the US, and might alienate some of the more conservative viewers?