Recap: Monday’s Tyra show on interracial relationships
by guest contributor Nina
So on Monday I actually watched the Tyra show (which I never do I swear!) and I have to say, it was quite awful. Sure she focused on interracial dating, but other than having people in the audience stand up and verbalize their prejudices towards interracial couples on the stage, and have the couples defend their relationships, there was no depth at all. In fact I think she gave people more names to call those in mixed race relationships. I had never heard of the terms Rice Queen/Potato Queen that are used in the gay community. Thanks Tyra.
Then she had two women go on blind dates. A Korean woman who thought all Asian guys were nerds dated a Filipino. Uncomfortable! And a black woman dated a white man-and this was the worst since they had her take him to a soul food restaurant in a predominantly black neighborhood, and got shots of the patrons giving them the evil eye and the white boy asking how to eat oxtail. The show made me cringe.
But I got to thinking, what is the best way to do a show on racism and prejudice? Perhaps this would be a good Race Changers assignment. Clearly Tyra was not adept at handling this. If you saw the show I would love to hear your thoughts/comments. I reaize that many will say, what can you expect, it’s daytime TV. But should we let the media continue to dumb down important issues?
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
S wrote:
O.K. Go ahead and label me a Tyra Hater.
I knew she would handle it badly, but I didn’t think she would turn the audience loose on the guests. That was just wrong! Seriously, it reminded me of how executions were done by lining the offenders up against a wall and commanding the fire squad to “Fire!”. It was bad.
Shows like this should be set up as a discussion panel, and people should be pre-screened to find the ones who will speak truthfully and can hold an adult conversation without name calling.(Thus, getting rid of the ones who fit better on Jerry Springer) Tyra should have ASKED IMPORTANT QUESTIONS and have them explain in detail why they feel that way, what the real cause was. Yeah, wishful thinking.
I am STILL waiting for a good show on this topic. I thought FOR SURE Oprah would handle it…boy was I wrong. So of course, when I heard Trya LaDrama Banks was going to do it, I thought, “Oh, Lord. He we go!”.
Next.
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 11:26 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
wow! I’m surprised that people expect anything from this show!
Yup, the term rice queen has been out there for a bit.
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 2:45 pm ¶
mr guy wrote:
If you’re going to do a show on IR you HAVE to have mostly negativity or else you won’t get ratings.Most people don’t want to see normal IR relationships.They want drama
!
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 5:10 pm ¶
pd wrote:
i didn’t expect anything from Tyra. I take a glimpse at the show every now and then and its always dumb.
i turned it on when a gay asian male from the audience (a former potato queen) was criticizing another asian man on stage for being in a relationship with a white man. had the nerve to ask him “why do you hate yourself?” could this show be more cliche?
you asked if we should let the media continue to do these imporant issues injustice, but how exactly do we keep less intelligent media forums (talks shows like tyra, simpleton radio personalities, etc.) from doing such a thing? we may see the way Tyra dealt with the issue as lacking complexity, but there’s a lot of people out in the general public whose minds can’t handle complexity. hence why they watch that show, but don’t listen to addiced to race podcasts.
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 5:53 pm ¶
Y. Carrington wrote:
Don’t ask Tyra shit. She don’t know nothin’.
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 8:40 pm ¶
Kenda wrote:
I don’t understand Tyra. I can’t figure out if she’s really trying to cover the “tough” issues or if she’s just trying to get ratings. I’ve always thought something seemed fake about her so I tend to think she’s going after ratings.
Posted 11 Oct 2006 at 11:14 pm ¶
Adele wrote:
This was the first “Tyra” episode I’ve watched and I have to agree with most of you when I say that it was just awful (and not to mention awkward!). I can’t decide which show dealing with the IR dating topic was worse, Tyra or Oprah.
Both these shows made a joke out of the topic. While Oprah spent the good part of her hour focusing on stupid (and embarrassing) stereotypes, Tyra used the hour she had to make her guests uncomfortable. As others have mentioned, there was a serious lack of depth on both shows. Everything seemed so incredibly shallow and silly.
My advice to Tyra would be to stick to modeling and leave the important issues to those better equipped to handle them.
Posted 12 Oct 2006 at 3:17 am ¶
Anonymous wrote:
I’m watching the show now. I’m disappointed that my relationship isn’t represented: Asian man/Black woman. The anchor of the relationships are White men and Black men. Where are the Latinos and Asians (and I don’t mean gay, nothing wrong with gays but, I’m talking about straight relationships)? Since the show, I’m wondering what others think of my interracial combination? Or are they thinking about anything at all about us? Are there any preconceived notions about Asian men and Black women dating? I know the only thing I get are mean looks from White women. I really don’t know why that would be the case.
Posted 16 Oct 2006 at 11:29 pm ¶
Howard wrote:
Don’t worry about it Anon, they just can’t comprehend anything beyond their “educated” stance of interracial dating = black + white.
Posted 19 Oct 2006 at 4:38 pm ¶
kim wrote:
I agree, It is time for us to put something positive in the media about IR relationships.
Posted 21 Oct 2006 at 11:40 am ¶
B.Anony wrote:
Agreed. The show lacked depth. One critical point that I feel must be made to the young black male dating the white female. He told of the ‘mall incident’ in which a black female basically told him that he’d lost his race. He said, “I wanted to kill her”. For that comment you wanted to kill her!? He then went on to say that he thought that’s what we fought equal rights for…so you can date outside your race. No junior…the fight was and continues to be for: Justice; recognition for the backs broken to help build America; equal opportunity for employment to take care of families; the right to proper education; the right to vote; the right for all items written in the Constitution to apply to all races; and, the right to know that given the same opportunities the sky is the limit for anyone living in the great country of America. So no, oppression was not fought for in order to give you the right to date outside of your race. Sobeit if that is your choice, but please do not liken it to a struggle so pervasive and one from which such deep wounds still seethe.
And the young Korean lady. How sad that people like her run from themselves and are so quick to type-cast and negate an entire race—albeit their own.
Posted 23 Oct 2006 at 12:18 pm ¶
jp3rd wrote:
Tyra is a moron for even doing a show about something as insignificant as IR dating. She just provided a medium for nosey people to express opinions about other peoples business.
I mean never mind the millions of children who’re products of IR relationships, screw how they feel. This was a very shallow show as all her shows are, she needs to stick to modeling and shut the f**k up.
Posted 24 Oct 2006 at 9:19 am ¶
phylicia moten wrote:
Will I’m a young black girl that has a white boyfriend and I found that tyra showed what we have too take and life at a young age I have people look all dam hard so I think it just really show the bad side of interracial dating . And maybe she was thinking that if she would show the bad side that people would just stop having so much judgement on interracial dating
Posted 24 Oct 2006 at 8:42 pm ¶
Jimmy wrote:
I happen to be the gay asian that was on the interracial episode. What’s so cliche about the Asian guy in the audience?
Anyway, we broke up. Check out my blog: http://www.xanga.com/mrjchen
Posted 08 Dec 2006 at 7:57 pm ¶
Sheila DeLude wrote:
I was the asian girl on that Tyra episode. We had very little drama compared to the other couples. I do have to agree with you that watching the episode back on TV, I realized that the episode gave more fuel to the flame. It seemed to make a big deal out of things and that didn’t help our cause much.
Posted 30 Dec 2006 at 9:32 pm ¶
kim wrote:
To the Anon up-thread:
I was recently steared toward a book called Fade, author Elliot (t?), on multicultural relationships, with, according to the blurbs at Amazon, a lot of discussion and interviews with couples that reflect the author’s experience: many p.o.c. interracial pairings are interviewed, versus the black/white mainstay the media gives.
Maybe you’ll want to look into it.
Posted 30 Dec 2006 at 10:34 pm ¶
kim wrote:
The URL to the book at Amazon (author LEWIS, Elliott)
http://www.amazon.com/Fade-My-Journeys-Multiracial-America/dp/078671882X/sr=1-1/qid=1167516024/ref=sr_1_1/104-8214317-4360726?ie=UTF8&s=books
Posted 30 Dec 2006 at 10:36 pm ¶
Amanda wrote:
I love the tyra show and i think that it is very educational. Tyra is a great talk show host and i think that everyone should give her some credit.
Posted 04 Jan 2007 at 11:35 am ¶
tiffany wrote:
Some of it was pretty bad. Now everyone is going to think all black people eat chitlins and oxtail. The part with the black woman/white man was just ridiculous!!! It made it seem as though all black women and white men are very culturally different esp. when it comes to food, and that’s just not true!!!
Posted 13 Feb 2007 at 12:11 pm ¶
Cassie wrote:
Hi! I’m doing a research paper on interracial relationship stereotypes and labels. Do you have any ideas on books or other literature that would help me?
Thanks!
Cassie
Posted 07 Feb 2008 at 12:16 am ¶
monique harrison wrote:
i love the tyra show. but give me a couple mil and 1 years contract and im sure i could do better. im actually making an advice column so im here if people need me. yes i do write the advice and emails myself so feel free to ask me questions!!
-monique
Posted 27 Jun 2008 at 10:17 am ¶