Wow. I can't say I've never laughed at a comedian making insensitive jokes, but this guy doesn't even have jokes.

It seems like people really want their kids to grow up the way they did. I was nearly constantly exposed to Looney Tunes growing up, including Speedy Gonzales - and I liked Speedy, too. When you're six you don't really think about how offensive a cartoon character is, and that's the problem. People seem to think "I grew up watching Speedy, and I'm not a racist, why can't my kids watch Speedy?" when whether you grow up to be racist or not doesn't change the fact that Speedy is pretty insulting.

I am a latino (from Peru) and I am not insulted by Speedy Gonzales. Isn't it time that we stop being offended for other ethnic groups? I read this blog regularly, but sometimes enough is enough. Stereotypes are funny for a reason, because they hit close to home. The important thing is to make sure stereotypes (or cartoons) influence any decision we make regarding someone from a different race. That is what kids have to be taught, because knowing "racism" and actively fighting it is much better than growing up around people that pretend to their kids it doesn't exist, and get outraged when someone that is not their race gets "insulted". What makes you the defender of the poor, doesn't-know-better latino (or black, asian, indian, etc)?

Sincerely I find all of this a bit patronizing, and to me that is way more offensive than Speedy Gonzales

'Cause it's NOT racist when someone of that group says it. Duh, did everyone forget this simple principle?

-_-

To me, "Speedy Gonzalez" is not like the black stereotypes in Looney Tunes (you usually see a big shoe, a striped stocking, a big behind and a "black" accent, not even a whole person.). As a child, I was nicknamed "Speedy Gonzalez" because I ran everywhere. I was a little black girl.

I'm not saying I'd remake it today, but I don't find it terribly offensive. The mice are portrayed as faster and smarter and more resourceful than Sylvester, the plodding gringo cat. I'd have been ecstatic if cartoon characters based on blacks were portrayed as flatteringly (I know that may not be saying much.).

I don't care for Lopez's humor. I also dislike Carlos Mencia.

What's wrong with Heckel and Jeckel? It's been a while, well, decades, actually.

iirc, Speedy's actually got a fairly sizable Latino fanbas.

Also, what's wrong with Heckle and Jeckle? I'm looking at the Wikipedia entry and there doesn't seem to be anything offensive about them...

I agree with Americo - I think it's high time for us to stop over analyzing cartoons and overreacting when it comes to small things. We can't go on playing catch-up, or rather playing fix-it for sins of the past. George Lopez seems to be working off the goal of making everyone have a good laugh and learn to laugh at themselves, too. He isn't being rude to Latinos - or any other group - he is simply being honest. There are reasons that stereotypes exist, and though they can definitely be used to hurt, they can also be used to put people at ease, as Lopez does. Learn to laugh and let it go.

Does something have to be outrageously offensive in order to believe that someone's opinion about certain offensive qualities is valid? Where do we draw the line on something being offensive "enough" to declare that it's racist?

I think (please note that, this is just my lone opinion and nothing more) when any character is portrayed in a certain way to be a token representative of a group that spans multiple countries and individual cultures, then no matter what it is bound to be offensive to someone on different levels. I mean, I am Puerto Rican and in no way does Speedy Gonzalez represent me. I guess to some extent he does not offend me. But what I do dislike is the unspoken fact that he is *supposed* to represent me as a Latina. It sort of reminded me of a memory from gradeschool, when I had a lunchbox that said "Soy Latino!" on it....and a classmate asked me what it said, I translated it, and they told me 'You're not Latino cuz you're not Mexican!" I guess that is getting off-topic but I just felt like putting that out there.

The real problem (in my understanding) is the use of tokenism, which obviously (but unfortunately) isn't going away anytime soon.

The Boston Globe used to have a column, "Ask the Globe" I believe it was called, where one could ask questions ranging from incredibly intelligent to completely inane. One question I remember was "if pitted in a race together who would win Speedy Gonzalez or the Road Runner?" The answer: "You better hope Speedy does because road runners, in real life, eat mice."

Anyone who thinks that the stereotypes Speedy Gonzales presents "aren't particularly harmful" would do better to watch The Birth of a Nation or any World War II propaganda film (including American ones--especially American ones, in fact). You'll see the same ideas used in cartoons and comedy shows to dehumanize and justify mass murder of the same groups. And these films are just the tip of the iceberg.

Even the most seemingly benign, humorous stereotypes have been and continue to be used to help justify the most extreme forms of racial oppression. Fried chicken, squinty eyes, big noses, turbans, sombreros, it's all there. People have died for this shit. Disappeared, lynched in public, herded into camps, perpetrators let off the hook.

This is why all stereotypes are harmful eventually. They don't help us examine ourselves, they help us simplify and belittle others. Something that helps us examine ourselves would be called "embracing difference" and it would probably look nothing like Speedy Gonzalez.

I thought Latino wasn't a race? Isn't Speedy a Mexican mouse?

That George Lopez is involved makes me more worried about racism than if he wasn't.

All we need now is someone bumbling in and making a comment about "political correctness gone mad." Cripes.

Look, Crab is correct in his assertion that stereotypes are rarely used as a self-critique, but rather to insult someone. I'm fat, and when someone tries to make jokes about me being greasy, gluttonous or stupid (the first two aren't true at ALL, by the way), they aren't altruists, trying to to take me on on some quest to give me a hard look at my inner self. All they're trying to do is insult me and belittle me for their own personal amusement.

I loved Speedy Gonzales as a kid, I really did, but I can still see where the author is coming from. Mexican people "stealing cheese from the American border" would not be something I'd like to see as a major plot point in a film, especially since immigration is such a hot button topic these days Mexican immigrants being that subject's preferred targets. I would dread being a Mexican family trapped in that theater, and I'm not even Mexican.

Imagine if Speedy were a "big-lipped opossum with stereotypical sambo mannerisms who stole watermelon and chicken from an adjacent plantation, to be voiced by the late Bernie Mac." I see this as no different, but I doubt we'd even be questioning the morality of it if that were the case.

An honest question, not an attempt to be argumentative or anything: I am confused by the mention of Heckle & Jeckle. A commentator on the original blog was also confused by the mention of Heckle & Jeckle, and the only response that person got was an unqualified assertion that every animated crow was a racial stereotype. I will READILY admit that the crows in Dumbo, for instance, are painfully obvious racial stereotypes, but I'm really not feeling it with Heckle & Jeckle, even after spending half an hour watching their cartoons on Youtube. They're not depicted with anything I personally recognize as a racial stereotype; they're just coloured with black ink. Heckle is depicted as having a vaguely Brooklyn accent, Jeckle as being English; one could perhaps point to them as (rather mild, in my opinion) examples of stereotypes of Brooklynites being con-men and Englishmen being effete, but otherwise I honestly don't understand. I would ask for elaboration on the other blog, but the last comment there was over a month ago and this seems to have more traffic.

The interesting thing about George Lopez's comedy is that it, like many other cultural manifestations, contains some elements that are progressive and empowering and others that are retrograde. They're not squarely in one camp or another.

It's telling that no one has mentioned that a huge part of Lopez's act also contains scathing critiques of the American racial order. It's pretty obvious no one here is even a casual fan of his. His 1996 album "Alien Nation" is full of hilarious condemnations of racism. Even his current stuff has a lot of social commentary.

Finally I want to point out that Lopez is very popular among Latinos but almost unknown or ignored by whites. Meanwhile, white comedians who occasionally or routinely engage in stereotyping or mocking of non-whites (Daniel Tosh, Jeff Dunham, Chelsea Handler just to name a few) are wildly popular with whites.

To me, this means something, and it's one of the biggest reasons why I don't consider Lopez's stuff overly offensive and certainly not racist. Stereotypes become harmful when they contribute to the dominant social order but if dominant, mainstream (aka white) audiences aren't tuning in, how harmful is it? A better question is, what is it about Lopez's comedy that is only attracting Latinos (a particular type of Latino, too. Yuppie, suburban, upper-middle class Latinos aren't feeling him)?

I think it has something to do with the aforementioned criticism of American society. Listen to his albums. He complements the stereotypes with empowering messages.

Having said that, I'm also disappointed that he decided to reincarnate Speedy Gonzalez. Like Garcia said, the universe Speedy inhabits is already tainted and a "new and improved" character won't do much good.

i flipping luv speedy gonzales : n d tng i cant understand is y is it so racist to most(i except/ study / read about many demographics ?but i mean many ppl sound lyk diz wen dey r a immigrants in America for a long tym(which means speedy sounds Mexican and American)?

an not only shud Latins/Mexicans be offended ;but so shud Americans to because speedy(is a American created show) n is shown n many country's n sort of depicts Americans as always stealing something(after all-- many country's do say America is stealing ther culture away from them)?

so i juz dnt get y speedy d cartoon or amine or wutevre u wanna call it is sooo bigotry (wish i cud watch it, but dey dnt air n my area;hexx dey dnt air nothing anymo wher iam,haha )? but anyway ;i get it but dnt get it ... so im gonna go eat n steal me some cheese or sumtng from my raggedy refrigerator wher i live(wich is kind of new but breaks down alot or shud i say thers always something wrong wif it) ...li's(laughing nwards)....