After listening to the media presentations in class and seeing the trends that others observed in films, television and magazines, I began to watch images and advertisements more closely and critically. Several weeks ago on my blog, I discussed how I picked up on the blatant racial stereotypes depicted in one of the “Bring It On” films when a wealthy White cheerleader enrolls in a high school of predominantly Black students. Although a couple weeks ago I detected these explicit racial stereotypes, it was not until the presentations that I became aware of the large trends that seem to touch every facet of media from magazines to reality television to video games.

I started to notice the skewed ratio of many White faces to few Black faces to virtually no Latino, Asian, or Arab faces on the television programs and commercials viewed everyday in my household. I explained this observation to my parents while watching Saturday Night Live when I noticed that two to three successive clothing commercials featured fair-skinned, blonde-haired and light-eyed females. My parents questioned why the particular advertisement that I criticized was itself perpetuating racial stereotypes. I not so effectively tried to defend my position by discussing that while the one singular advertisement may or may not have a huge influence, the slanted ratio of five advertisements featuring White models versus the one advertisement featuring a Black model contributes to the cycle of racism as Peggy McIntosh notes that her invisible knapsack includes that she “can turn on the television…and see people of my race widely represented,” (166).

My parents then asked about my magazine analysis project and whether this skewed ratio that I referred to appeared in magazines such as Hip Hop Weekly or Ebony that target Black Americans as the primary audience. The ratio of photographs of Black models versus White models was completely reversed in these magazines, and this discussion with my parents made me look at media through a new critical lens. Because I was looking at media expecting to see the White-washed ratios, I failed to noticed how segregated the races continue to be in many forms of media. With this realization, I began to perceive some different trends in the media; for example, one of the previews before the film Revolutionary Road (which featured an entirely White cast) was for Tyler Perry’s Madea Goes To Jail, an upcoming movie with a leading cast of all Black actors. While I still think that the White-washed ratio of photographs in magazines such as Vogue or Sports Illustrated and commercials on television continue to contribute to the “smog” of aversive racism that society breathes, it has been interesting and important to note the striking segregation that still exists in the media.