Would you consider the episode "Bridal Gossip" prejudice?

[CosmicHooves 2,705]

In Season 1 Episode 9 the show introduced the character Zecora.

When she came into town everypony avoided her.

Come to find out, this was because of the following:

 

•the way she looked

•how she talked (in rhymes)

•where she came from

 

Do find this to be a bit prejudice?

Just a little?

[GenderIsAnIllusion 2,178]

Not really....... They simply feared her..... But after she was proven to be friendly, and not dangerous no pony was prejudice against her.

[Red Cedar 1,408]

In Season 1 Episode 9 the show introduced the character Zecora.

When she came into town everypony avoided her.

Come to find out, this was because of the following:

 

•the way she looked

•how she talked (in rhymes)

•where she came from

 

Do find this to be a bit prejudice?

Just a little?

image.jpg

Yes, it was prejudicial.

 

That was the entire point of the episode.

[Princess Lona 382]

Depends on your definition of prejudice. It wasn't until just now reading this topic that I realized the nature if the word. "Pre" meaning "before" or "prior" and "judice" derived from "judge". The word "prejudice" literally means the judgement of a person or entity before having any actual close encounter with them to provide material to make an informed judgement. So yes, the townsponies and most of the main characters were exercising prejudice in that episode, but it's okay now because they learned their lesson.

Edited August 13, 2014 by Princess Lona

[Old Fluttershy 349]

They did like all other people would have done. They simply feared what they didn't understand.

But if we are talking about prejudice as mentioned above then yes they did.

[Felix 1,363]

Depends on your definition of prejudice. It wasn't until just now reading this topic that I realized the nature if the word. "Pre" meaning "before" or "prior" and "judice" derived from "judge". The word "prejudice" literally means the judgement of a person or entity before having any actual close encounter with them to provide material to make an informed judgement. So yes, the townsponies and most of the main characters were exercising prejudice in that episode, but it's okay now because they learned their lesson.

Couldn't have said this better myself. Completely agree with you.

[CosmicHooves 2,705]

Depends on your definition of prejudice. It wasn't until just now reading this topic that I realized the nature if the word. "Pre" meaning "before" or "prior" and "judice" derived from "judge". The word "prejudice" literally means the judgement of a person or entity before having any actual close encounter with them to provide material to make an informed judgement. So yes, the townsponies and most of the main characters were exercising prejudice in that episode, but it's okay now because they learned their lesson.

Best answer so far!

Thank you for explaining that.

[Shanks 10,817]

Yes, the entire point of the episode was not to make snap judgments about others and resort to stereotyping and rumor mongering. The ponies judged a book by its cover, in Twilights case literally by dismissing the book that was later revealed to contain the cure for poison joke as "weird".

[Old Fluttershy 349]

I have to give props to Twilight in this episode. She was the only pony that didn't judge Zecora by her looks.

And at the end I can see why she would start to believe the rumors, after all I was convinced (almost).

[Zygen 6,066]

Yes, the ponies were prejudice towards Zecora, by definition they were.

 

But that of course was the point of the episode, so it wasn't really an odd thing, simply a part of the episode.

 

And they learned their lesson, and we got to see more of awesome Zecora, so I'm pretty content ;p.

[ghostfacekiller39 23,879]

Nope. 

For this, you'd have to assume all ponies in the show are white and that Zebras are the african-americans of the show based on racial stereotypes, making you no better than the writers for somewhat assimilating those cultural stereotypes into Zecora's character - of course, for me, they get a free pass because they also made Zecora a total badass (The Yoda parallel from "Magic Duel" anyone?) as well as, like many other characters from the show (Rarity namely) one that had those tropes while breaking the stereotypes associated with that kind of character, as well as that kind of person in real life. So, that'd be a no.

 

You're acting as if she's one of these two - 

 

 

Secondly, they were scared because she was mysterious and approached the town in a dark cloak in a menacing way - again, going to bring up "Magic Duel" and point out that Trixie also approached the town in a creepy, menacing way that would've left some ponies dazed and frightened had they witnessed it - and quite frankly, they didn't even know she was a Zebra until Twilight brought it up. If, going to play along with the assumption that *every* Zebra is the equivalent to a black person on earth and that *every* pony is a Caucasian (that I won't believe for a second) - they knew that she was a Zebra beforehand, that would've made it prejudiced. But they didn't - they were still frightened of her, and it took Twilight, who had never been around for this regular occurrence beforehand, to point out the race of the creature.

 

They didn't even know she was a Zebra before Twilight came along and told them that, ergo, nullifying any shot at them being scared of her for her "race," which I don't believe for a second that all Zebras are like African tribes people and are the equivalents to the african-american race for mankind.

 

Quite frankly, the act of racism is being put on those who claim this is racist by assuming that it was because of her race, which was unknown to the citizens of Ponyville for the *longest* time, as well as the assumption that just because Zecora gives off an African-American vibe, that makes every single Zebra like her and, ergo, makes ponies the equivalent to white people, which I really don't believe for a second.

 

No races. Zecora is one of those characters that we see in this series that has tropes, but also manages to break the stereotypes those tropes bear, doing so more than any character except for Rarity. 
 

[Silver Letter 1,832]

Of course it was prejudicial. The ponies unfairly judged Zecora due to her appearance.

[Heliodor 156]

You really don't think Zecora is some kind of catchall stereotype? When she's basically the walking definition of the Magical Negro trope? Please... the reason Zecora is still a problem is because she's isolated from the other ponies and only shows up when someone has a problem they need magically fixed. Also the rhyme thing, like she can't even talk like the other ponies? They can fix Zecora by making her a part of the community. As if now she's still a stereotype and yes, she experienced prejudice from the other ponies.

[Eloquence 2,076]

Of course they were prejudiced, that was the point of the episode. If what you meant was to ask if it was racially prejudiced, well, that's another story, and since people have been discussing race as it relates to her, I'll go ahead and give my two cents.

 

First of all, destroy the idea that "race" as we know it exists in MLP, because nothing bothers me more than people (by which I mean both writers and readers) trying to force things like sexism and racism into fantasy worlds where those issues as we experience them have no logical reason to exist. Also abolish the idea that ponies are meant to be "caucasians" just because they're the species the story focuses on. Don't even think it for a second.

 

Now that we've taken care of that, let's look at Zecora. Heliodor (who I can't tag because i'm on mobile) brings up the fact that she's isolated. This is true, she is isolated. However, i would argue that this has nothing to do with her being a different species, as she A. lives in the Everfree forest, B. is a minor character, and C. is presumably older than the mane six, meaning it wouldn't make much sense for them to be palling around all the time. Don't get me wrong, she has been used as a blatant plot device several times, and I would LOVE to see aspects of her character further explored, like her backstory and her relationship with Apple Bloom, but it wouldn't make sense for her to be around all the time.

 

As for her being a "stereotype", though she is from Africa and is clearly influenced by African culture, I actually think her character is handled rather well. First of all, she is supposed to be foreign, from an entirely different culture, so it makes sense for her behavior to reflect that. Second, there is no internet or air travel in Equestria, meaning that cultures are more separate and thus more distinct. Third, she was inspired by traditional cultures in which magic plays an important role, and in a world in which magic is such a fundamental part of life, that role would understandably be more pronounced.

 

This was really long winded but the point I wanted to make is that, while Zecora was treated with prejudice in her debut episode, I think that calling it racial prejudice would be a false equivalency and that viewing her character as racist doesn't, as I see it, have much in the way of support from the show itself.

 

I also just wanted to talk about best zebra, because her character is really fascinating and expands the lore of her world in a really interesting way.

[TeaCrumpet 27]

Of course they were prejudiced, that was the point of the episode. If what you meant was to ask if it was racially prejudiced, well, that's another story, and since people have been discussing race as it relates to her, I'll go ahead and give my two cents.

 

First of all, destroy the idea that "race" as we know it exists in MLP, because nothing bothers me more than people (by which I mean both writers and readers) trying to force things like sexism and racism into fantasy worlds where those issues as we experience them have no logical reason to exist. Also abolish the idea that ponies are meant to be "caucasians" just because they're the species the story focuses on. Don't even think it for a second.

 

Now that we've taken care of that, let's look at Zecora. Heliodor (who I can't tag because i'm on mobile) brings up the fact that she's isolated. This is true, she is isolated. However, i would argue that this has nothing to do with her being a different species, as she A. lives in the Everfree forest, B. is a minor character, and C. is presumably older than the mane six, meaning it wouldn't make much sense for them to be palling around all the time. Don't get me wrong, she has been used as a blatant plot device several times, and I would LOVE to see aspects of her character further explored, like her backstory and her relationship with Apple Bloom, but it wouldn't make sense for her to be around all the time.

 

As for her being a "stereotype", though she is from Africa and is clearly influenced by African culture, I actually think her character is handled rather well. First of all, she is supposed to be foreign, from an entirely different culture, so it makes sense for her behavior to reflect that. Second, there is no internet or air travel in Equestria, meaning that cultures are more separate and thus more distinct. Third, she was inspired by traditional cultures in which magic plays an important role, and in a world in which magic is such a fundamental part of life, that role would understandably be more pronounced.

 

This was really long winded but the point I wanted to make is that, while Zecora was treated with prejudice in her debut episode, I think that calling it racial prejudice would be a false equivalency and that viewing her character as racist doesn't, as I see it, have much in the way of support from the show itself.

 

I also just wanted to talk about best zebra, because her character is really fascinating and expands the lore of her world in a really interesting way.

 

I hope you don't mind me jumping off of this to talk a bit about race Eloquence, since I think you covered a lot of the issue of the direct OP question and sadly I have little to add to the direct question at hand since most have answered it already. In addition there have been quite a few video dedicate to this question Emerald so I would direct you to watching them to get a bit more in-depth in understand some of the issue with Zecora;

 

Videos:  

AnY thoughts:

Litterbox reply to AnY's thoughts: http://ponyslitterbox.wordpress.com/2014/07/21/in-defense-of-zecora-stereotypes-as-a-problem-of-absence-not-presence/

The MLP Analyis Reddit page with Zecora results: http://www.reddit.com/r/MLPAnalysis/search?q=Zecora&restrict_sr=on

 

Now as I said, I wanted to talk a little about race since a lot of people like to point out the MLPs fantasy world issues with race should not be compared to our own. While Zebra, Buffalo and the like have influences of cultures from our world, we should not see them as Africans or Natives of the Americas. This is something I totally agree with, but I do think that the MLP verse does have issue with racism, ethnocentrism and racial superiority which they don't hide all too well. Here is a small list of moment we can touch on in this conversation.

 

- Look at the founding of Equestia we all know the HH story and see how the tribe each saw themselves superior to the other and only at the last minute did they come together. From the JotTS we learn two things:

 

One: That the ponies decide to have the alicorns rule them since they saw them as creature who had all of the trait of each race (we can take this as the three group assurance that instead of coming together like a counsel they wanted someone who would not one up any of the other race to rule them) and

 

Two: That there is a tribe of Zebra who lived in the Everfree and thus most likely Zecora came from one of those tribes and yet due to the legend of the Everfree no pony seem to have made much contact with them. I do wonder how since the Sister castle was in the EF, how the Zebra tribe were not integrated into pony society more before the NMM incident since Luna had befriend them early on. There are many reason why that could be, but it does put both side into question as to why the ponyvillians seem so surprise as having a Zebra with in their mites since one coming from the EF should not be all that surprising (late and lazy world building be damned the writers know better)

 

Now while Zebras and Ponies are rather close in race (they can breed, creating a sterile Zorse, more or less a mule hybrid), I think we need to look to how other race have been treat to get a better feel of how the ponies react to those outside of their "race"

 

 

 

Close ponyish races:

 

Buffalo: Natives of the land who did get respect only after the ponies stopped thinking only about themselves

Saddle Arabian: Seen as exotic and ones to be respected (note there more or less Celestia size earth ponies)

Brezzies: Loved by all, and seen as creature the ponies personally have to help, for reason more self-gratifying

Seaponies: All aboard the hype and love train since both in the book and comic they seemed to get on very well; though the sea ponies seemed not to be overly warm toward the group until Fluttershy had a little talk with them in the comic.

 

 

Non-Pony Races

Diamond Dogs: Both in the show and comics they are seen as stupid and possibly villainous depending on your views on why they stole Rarity.

Griffins: All around jerks, even Gustav is seen as somewhat pompous in comparison to the other pony like characters in the MMMotFE episode, and we could go on for days about Gilda and how she was shown in GtBO.

Dragons: Outside of spike, murderous beasts that are horde grabbing roughen.

 

Now I think we can see the pattern of races portal here.  The father away from pony the worst off the race is portrayed, while the closer they are to a pony the better off they are shown. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see how the show writers wish for us to feel about each of these races, however I do think it does point us into the direction of the fact that ponies do have both a racial and ethnocentric bia to them for better or worse. 

[Eloquence 2,076]

@@TeaCrumpet,

 

I don't mind at all

 

You make some very interesting points. Actually, you reference some things I wasn't even aware of, for instance I had no idea that the Everfree forest was home to a tribe of zebra. I definitely agree that we've seen ponies and other creatures display a sort of xenophobia, and that this behavior is more pronounced the further apart different creatures are. This has even been addressed in the show itself on several occasions much more openly than what I would expect from children's media. I think the question here is now whether or not this bias is meant to represent racism in our world, and if so how much. I don't think it's completely analogous, and to further the point I made in my post, I think it's actually grossly eurocentric to consider the pony race to represent "white people" (not that I'm saying anyone here is doing that, but people do it with lots of fantasy races and it bothers me).

 

I also wish we could see other countries besides Equestria more in-depth, because I think it would give a lot of other species better representation and make them more fleshed out, but that's a ramble for another day.