Why were African Americans represented so poorly in DBZ

[xmysticgohanx]

That's great and all, but...this thread is almost four months old. If you've got something to say about a topic and there are no active threads about it, it's better to just start a new thread rather than revive a really old one.

What's the oldest a thread can be?

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

That's great and all, but...this thread is almost four months old. If you've got something to say about a topic and there are no active threads about it, it's better to just start a new thread rather than revive a really old one.

It would be redundant to do that though.

[Gaffer Tape]

Old posts, but I figured it's worth pointing out that Toriyama said he imagined Yajirobe as Japanese (saying why he chose his name), and if you look at his eyes, they are drawn differently from most other characters, with lines representing the folds. Kuririn's eyes were drawn the same way in his earliest appearances, although eventually his eyes were drawn the same as Goku's. So yes, Toriyama has drawn some "Asian" characters with different eyes.

That's kinda playing exactly into my point, though (assuming I still remember what my point was). Those racial traits exist, and some characters in Dragon Ball are given those racial traits, yet you don't see anyone being up in arms condemning Toriyama over using them, even though those same traits have been used as the basis for undermining Asians.

[SingleFringe&Sparks]

Old posts, but I figured it's worth pointing out that Toriyama said he imagined Yajirobe as Japanese (saying why he chose his name), and if you look at his eyes, they are drawn differently from most other characters, with lines representing the folds. Kuririn's eyes were drawn the same way in his earliest appearances, although eventually his eyes were drawn the same as Goku's. So yes, Toriyama has drawn some "Asian" characters with different eyes.

That's kinda playing exactly into my point, though (assuming I still remember what my point was). Those racial traits exist, and some characters in Dragon Ball are given those racial traits, yet you don't see anyone being up in arms condemning Toriyama over using them, even though those same traits have been used as the basis for undermining Asians.

Maybe because Yajirobe's imagry isnt the only way asians were portayed as in the show? There was variety to balance them out. There was Yajirobe and there was Chi-Chi or Tien (Yes I say Tien by his eye shape). With contrast to Popo, there was Nam and Uub. With the white characters, all of them were portayed in actractive, all of them...(Cyborg 18 most notibly) yet with Black characters, they all were goofy looking with elastic-band lips and pathetic presences. There is no alternative for blacks, they were all portayed to be stupid in the series, most likely unintentionally but still. DBZ has a lot of black fans. It would be nice if Toriyama made up a respectable black character in balance. The closest to the image that black fans liked was the old-dub's portayal of piccolo.

[Herms]

What's the oldest a thread can be?

I think the rule back in the Daizenshuu EX days was a month or so, but it seems the current forum rules don't specifically address necro-posting. If a thread is more than two months old it's best to leave it alone, and just start a new thread if you feel like discussing that subject. The big exceptions being threads about ongoing projects and whatnot (where it's common to resurrect the thread if there's some new update), perennial threads like the "show off your latest DB purchase" one, the threads about each podcast episode, etc. Basically, any case where there's only supposed to be one central thread about a given topic, as opposed to ordinary 'hey, what do you think about X?" threads. Or if a thread is asking some factual question and nobody ever actually answered it, it'd be OK to post if you've got the answer (but if the thread is really old, there's a good chance whoever asked won't still be around to see your answer).