Thursday, May 6, 2010

African-Americans in the past and racism ignored

I wanted to mention this long before but I forgot. That I found it strange that when Aisha and Katie traveled to colonial or western times, the fact that they were African-American was not mentioned. From approximately 1776 to 1865, slavery of Africans in the United States was legal. But of course, Power Rangers is meant for children and to not upset anyone, they probably avoided it. But it is part of history and it could have been a nice history lesson. And for Katie, they could have sent someone else to the past.


"Return of the Green Ranger" Part 1, 2, & 3
I don't have pictures of Aisha in the past. Aisha, Adam, Rocky, Kim and Billy were sent to 1795, colonial Angel Grove, California. No one took a second look at Aisha or said anything about her. And also the fact that there were no other African-Americans other than Aisha there.


"Wild West Rangers" Part 1 & 2
Kimberly was sent to 1880, when the Reconstruction was still prevalent and segregation was not passed by law, but was around. She meets Aisha's ancestor, Miss Alicia. She, again, was the only African-American and no mention of her skin color. But that's good isn't it? Maybe they were Northern and progressive.


"The Legend of the Clock Tower"
Katie landed in the past, somewhat between 1760-1800 in Silver Hills. She stood out but probably not because of her color. She was the only African-American there. They should have picked another Ranger to go to that era, it was just awkward.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

they do not want kids to know about racism...plus katie needed an episode

zPutty said...

Why shouldn't they ignore it? Why not express to today's children that being a different color is no big deal, and that it shouldn't have been a big deal then? What if it had leaked out that they had decided not to air the episodes because they could not accurately portray the racism of the time? I think they handled it very properly.

Anonymous said...

I agree with zPutty. Well put!

SirStack said...

Who says in PR's fictional universe, where the British colonized California, where alien beings live all over the planet, where humans live in space colonies, that racism exists? "Stop The Hate Master" showed that hate exists, it just moved onto different levels, such as how much money a family makes. But the only racism that exists in the PR universe is really that of Mystic Realm people against Troblins.

sdp said...

Well to play devils advocate, it makes no sense when you try to analyze it and a big error. Then again the PR universe is filled with things that make no sense or don't belong so its not out of the question.

Personally I definitely think it was a good idea to not even mention it, no need to.

Anonymous said...

I believe California during the age of racism and slavery were more tolerant than the south.