Is Photoshopped diversity racist?

As I'm moving to the greater Toronto area in exactly six days, I take a personal interest in the kinds of FUN available to Torontonians this summer.  Apparently, the city wants you to know that Fun in Toronto involves this black guy, who was photoshopped into the cover of the Toronto summer guidebook:




As astute reader Amy notes, he himself looks kind of uncomfortable with the whole thing.  Understandably, I'd say.

Is using the wrong racist stereotype racist?

Talking Points Memo has a piece on the National Review's weird cover depicting Sonia Sotomayor as a caricatured Buddhist monk.  As far as I'm concerned, depicting a Latina as an Oriental is just as confusedly racist as depicting a Puerto Rican as a Mexican piñata.

Are "Africentric schools" racist?

Reader Jacqueline submits the following:

Toronto District School Board opens an Africentric elementary school.  Following months of debate, the TDSB decided Tuesday to go ahead with the controversial plan.  Macleans reports:

Amid the hoopla following Tuesday's decision, many questions remain about how such a program will address deep-rooted problems inside the TDSB, including the oft-cited statistic that 40 per cent of the city’s black students aren’t graduating (compared with roughly 25 per cent of students overall). Is a black-focused school—which would be open to students of all backgrounds, and draw heavily on African experience and knowledge—really the answer to these problems?

I'm honestly torn on this one, folks.  I mean, on the one hand, it's an imperfect solution to a serious problem—as are all desperate measures.  On the other, if I had kids, I'd kind of want to send them to this school.  I think it would make them awesome.

Is this camera racist?

Thanks to Wendy for the tip on Nikon's "blink detector," apparently uncalibrated to Asian eyes:





From Buzzfeed: “As I was taking pictures of my family, it kept asking 'Did someone blink?' even though our eyes were always open.”

Playboy: racist?

She-She writes:

Ida Ljungqvist, Playmate of the Year, is being touted as the first naturally born African woman awarded such an achievement, if it can be called one.  Is it racist that some say that she is not African looking enough?  Is it racist that that Playboy picked an African woman who could be substituted for any white playmate and then advertise her as African?  She could be Pamela Anderson's little sister.

So many possibilities.  Ah, Playboy.

Are hibachi jokes racist?

Courtesy of Sheyda:




Racist, or simply apocalyptic?  You decide.

Is stereotyping dogs by breed nationality racist?

From Laine, via Japan Probe:

On last week’s episode of “Shimura Zoo,” a test was carried out to determine the ways different dog breeds react to disappearing food.

Comedians Taka and Toshi introduced the familiar stereotype of Western people displaying their emotions more than Japanese people and having “big” reactions to everything, and wondered if the same thing was true about dogs from those countries. To find out, they got a few dogs and checked their reacted to having a bowl of food suddenly disappear.

Apparently, the Japanese breeds respond civilly to food, while "the poodle confirms stereotypes of the French by giving an 'elegant' reaction to the disappearing food" and "the Italian dog [Italian greyhound] reacts violently, just like the Italian people shown in the soccer riot footage included as an example of their national character," confirming that like their human counterparts, European dogs are ridiculous assholes.

Is it racist?

Bonus question: Is the site name "Japan Probe" pornographic?  And, if so, is it racist?