Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Is Entertainment Industry biased against Nordic people?
Elikal
Member UncommonPosts: 7,912
See, as someone who is blond and blue eye Nordic type, I always felt it a bit a sting that assumingly 90% of all heroes of computer games, movies, TV shows and comics are dark haired types, mostly brown eyed. I mean, sure so what, you may say. But somehow don't we all somewhere want to find us in stories?
The vast majority of comic heroes is dark haired, Batman and ALL his many sidekicks, Superman, Wolverine, Wonder Woman. Same in movies, Harry Potter, Frodo, whoever you want. And games just the same. Commander Shepard, Hawke, most of the official versions of computer games were black haired or dark brown haired guys.
And Nordic types? Yes, Duke Nukem, Aquaman and Anakin. Great. Dumb, useless and evi.
I am really tried with this anti-Nordic stereotypic that blonde people are shown as dumb and arrogant and 90% of heroic characters are black haired as if Nordic type people would not exist!
Pft.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Comments
Maybe it's because most people have darker hair and brown eyes and they want relatable heroes.
get outta here
Elikal are you really THAT bored?
Blame Fabio.
He-man? I would count Conan as rather nordic type as well...
Not tonight dear...I have a haddock!
Jonny Quest.
what about bald people?? surly its bias to not have bald super hereos too.... if we are worrying about hair colour what about the hairless?? i mean really...
does hair really matter? or eye colour??? will being blond, black, blue, purple really make you leap tall buildings or shoot straighter??... i think not unless you got some radioactive hair piece
yep. in fact I think they get together and talk about it.
I self identify as a monkey.
All this dark haired hero stuff is all backlash because they grew up watching Luke in Star Wars and he had blonde hair. :-p
As a Nordic type myself I don't really care, though it does occasionally get annoying when women swoon over the "tall dark and handsome" stereotype ;-)
It's the Gingers I feel for.
Most bald people are old, and yes indeed we have some anti-old people in entertainment as well, only wanting to show young people in films. But we have Mace Windu and Captain Picard.
It is always the same. Those who are not discriminated mock those who are. Just try to imagine it the other way around, and EVERY single superhero, movie hero and game hero were blond. Would you NOT feel at least a bit awkward?
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Wasn't Achilles in Troy blond with blue eyes?
*shrug* Do you think only earth shattering super important topics like starvation in Somalia are worth debating?
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Luke Skywalker
Thor
Aquaman
Super Girl
The Greatest American Hero ; )
Hayden Panetierre ; )
"Blond guys aren't dumb. They're evil. Like in The Karate Kid and World War Two."
—Bart Simpson, The Simpsons
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Dark and broody characters are popular. It's harder to sell that as a fair complexioned blonde. There's no global conspiracy to undermine the nordic peoples.
And Duke is a gaming legend. Don't knock the King.
Athena came, sent by the white-armed goddess
Hera, who loved and watched over both men.
She stood behind Achilles and grabbed his sandy hair.
Homers, The Iliad, Book I, lines 205-207
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
True. Red haired mostly face a similar negative sterotyping.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blond#Folklore_and_mythology
According to Francis Owens[38] Roman literary records describe a very large number of well-known Roman historical personalities as blond. In addition, 250 individuals are recorded to have had the name Flavius, meaning blond, and there are many named Rufus and Rutilius, meaning red haired and reddish-haired, respectively. The following Roman gods are said to have had blond hair: Amor, Apollo, Aurora, Bacchus, Ceres, Diana, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Minerva and Venus.[38] For example, the physical appearance of Emperor Nero, descended from an aristocratic family, is by the historian Suetonius described as: "... his hair light blond,... his eyes blue..."[39]
Details of the "bikini girls" mosaic at Villa Romana del Casale, Sicily, 4th century AD.
According to Victoria Sherrow, Romans preferred to dye their hair dark in the early period of Ancient Rome; at one point in time blond hair was even associated with prostitutes.[40] The preference changed to bleaching the hair blond when Greek culture, which practiced bleaching, reached Rome, and was reinforced when the legions that conquered Gaul returned with blond slaves.[40]
In the Middle Ages, blonde hair was usually associated with a seductress;[40] for example, until the late 14th century depictions of Eve are usually blonde, while the Virgin Mary is usually brunette.[40]
In European fairy tales, blonde hair was commonly ascribed to the heroes and heroines. A notable example is Rapunzel with her long golden hair. Benign mythological creatures such as fairies and elves were often portrayed as young and blond. This may occur in the text, as in Madame d'Aulnoy's La Belle aux cheveux d'or or The Story of Pretty Goldilocks (The Beauty with Golden Hair), or in illustrations depicting the scenes.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
What exactly qualifies as nordic? Fair hair and pale eyes?
Blame the Nazis. Their attempt to create blond haired blue eyed supermen has rendered that the stereotype of evil instead of good.
So long, and thanks for all the fish!
Skyrim? Thor? Just two off the top of my head, I'm sure there are others. Definitely not as prevalent as dark hair/eye types, but the Germans kind of ruined the concept of the blonde-haired, blue-eyed good guy with the whole Master Race thing.
Same reason why you don't see the inverted soul patch mustache anymore, unless you count those Hanes commercials.
Heroic blondes that I can think of include Thor, Kara Zor-el (Supergirl), Beowulf, 2 of the female leads in the show Heroes, (Claire and ???), ILLya Kuryakin (Man from UNCLE), Blonde Phantom (look it up), Sue Storm (Fantastic 4), Green Arrow, (justice League) Angel (X-Men) to name a few.
Sure, there aren't hundreds of them, but truthfully, 95/100 blondes you meet get their coloring from a bottle and not through their national heritage.
Are there negative stereotypes against blondes, absolutely, but I don't see a huge conspiracy.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Orly
"Only in quiet waters do things mirror themselves undistorted.
Only in a quiet mind is adequate perception of the world."
Hans Margolius
I feel OP is on very thin ice with this thread. I think I could make half a essay about blue eyes/fair hair characters in video games. But really... Why base nordic characteristics only on these? There are many ancient bloodlines of Scandinavians with dark hair/dark eyes.
Nordic people are famed for their Viking ancestors, and for being tall. You see plenty of these characteristics, that are not dumb and evil in games like Guild Wars and Elder Scrolls. They are in many strategy games. Too Human was based around Norse Mythology. A great animation came out a while ago called How to Train Your Dragon.
If anything the spirit of the nordic myths lives in pop culture in a major way. It's only a matter of time before they try to do a big hollywood adaptation of it, like they have done with greek mythology.