How a Phrase From 'Full Metal Jacket' Movie Became a Racist
In this modern era, there are so many new technologies that affect our daily life. Most of the technologies affect how we socialize with others. The most significant change that happen because of new technologies is the change in communication. People from around the world can comment anything about their opinions and response to what the user post. Because people can comment freely, that is why there are positive comments and also negative comments. These negative comments can absolutely hurt peoples feeling especially the user.
The main topic of this essay is online racism. Racism itself means a discrimination directed against someone with a different race based on its belief. Racism can be at any forms such as jokes and comments that can offend or hurt the victim. So, online racism basically means a racism act that takes place online. I'm going to make an accent on a case that happened in Chicago - it shows how media industry can be a cause for committing online racism, or not more as a cause rather an idea how to do so. Such comments or posts can hurt peoples feeling because people think that there are races that have a higher degree than the others. That is why people make fun of different races.
This case happened to an Asian American jobseeker where a Chicago recruiter sent her an email containing racist phrase that was taken from a film “Full Metal Jacket”. Connie Cheung who is Chinese American was applied for a position as an office management assistant on LinkedIn in June 25, 2019. A day later, she was contacted by James McMahon who is a recruiting manager at the Chicago Search Group. The email that is sent to Cheung contained the phrase 'Me love you long time' which is considered to be racist and sexist. This original phrase is actually from a film in the 1987 called 'Full Metal Jacket'. This phrase was spoken by a character who was a Vietnamese sex worker, and later it was sampled by a rap group called 2 live crew. Because of this Cheung experienced a frustration to Facebook. That means words can hurt people.
This email only contains one sentence that is quoted from an old film 'Full Metal Jacket'. This case has proven that the impact of online racism to victims can be dangerous. It can cause mental problems like depression and frustration. Even though she has never watched 'Full Metal Jacket', she recognized the phrase because someone has said the phrase to her when she was in high school. That means she has experienced racism for a long time. On June 27, Cheung's friend contacted Haugh which is the president of the Chicago Search Group to defend Cheung. Then Haugh responded 'With all due respect, I am focused on bigger problems than your friend being offended by a movie. Sorry, but just don't have time for this. Best luck to you!! You may want to google libel laws before your crew posts things publicly. Our attorneys are on call....'.
After this email, McMahon told NBC News that he apologizes for what he has done to Cheung and her friend. He realizes that he was wrong because the email he sent was offending and might hurt someone. For this case, there is no exact cause. McMahon tells that this was actually just humor that he then realizes that it was inappropriate. So, the purpose of people doing racism online are mainly wanting to make fun of someone, thinks that their race is better than the others and want to make people feel bad. Unfortunately, sometimes media industry, especially movies, can be a so called motive to commit such form of online bullying.
