So, for some reason I got to thinking about that Nickelodeon show Doug. About a bald kid and his wonder mutt; he’s the new kid in town and sometimes he dresses up in his underwear. I can’t remember Doug ever being an enjoyable show, but I sure watched it enough. It’s one of those shows that you can just zap on in the background and sort of ignore, but sort of follow at the same time. And that’s where the problem is. Doug has slowly and slyly seeped into our subconscious to undermine society.
Here’s the problem with Doug. Doug is a multicultural cartoon show, but only multicultural in the fact that the characters are all different colors. Green, blue, purple, and every shade of the rainbow. Nickelodeon’s Doug was the United Colors of Benetton of poorly animated programs, however, something sinister lurked. Think about it. The underlining meaning of Doug is that, while other nationalities do in fact exist the only one that matters is white. Other cartoons usually just don’t have minority characters, mostly because they simply don’t have the budget to animate a bunch of different looking background characters.
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However, Doug tried to make a statement. If you look at it, every supporting character around Doug is some wacky shade except, of course, for Doug Funnie, who is a regular white kid. The main character is white in world full of colorful yet ancillary characters. What does that tell our children? It tells them only the white race is deserving of a spotlight. Only the white race is worthy of being the star of the show. All other skin tones must remain in the background. No, only Caucasians are worthy… and hyper intelligent dogs, of course. Also, take a notice of the coupling on Doug. Every parent is coupled with someone of the same color (or very close proximity) and they produce children of the same color. So, in the TV series Doug, races never mix, the colors never blend. With that logic, Doug would never get with Patty simply because they’re not a matching set.
Which brings us to Patti Mayonnaise. Patti Mayonnaise is the tan California blonde type. Is the message from the cartoon Doug that the only girl worth lusting after is a leggy blonde? Even her very name speaks for the cartoon’s racism. Mayo is the whitest of the condiments. A white condiment for an all American white boy. Why couldn’t Doug have a crush on a green girl with pink hair? Why couldn’t he fall in love with Traci Mustard or Katti Ketchup? So, what this Nick Toon essential says is the only boy worth chronicling is white and the only girl worthy of our attention is blonde.
On a personal note, Doug’s arch enemy is Roger Klotz. Roger Klotz just so happens to be a yellowish green. Is this to say that Roger, beneath his bully shell, is yellow, or cowardly. Or is it to say the people with yellow skin are to be despised? Does the creator, Jim Jinkins hate those that are yellow, specifically me and my Asian brethren. Is Doug saying that Asians are bad because of a lack of discipline. Does Doug think China needs to be controlled? Jackie Chan might agree, but I take offense to Jim Jinkins line of thought. And as silly as it is to spin these connotations, remember that Doug most likely had a team of executives making decisions. People thought about this stuff, people had meetings about this. There’s a reason why Roger Klotz wasn’t black, because there’d be an uproar. They could have easily picked a color that’s completely arbitrary. Roger could have been orange. Or blue. Or hot pink. But they picked yellow and added the smallest tint of green. Is that enough?
To find the source of Doug’s racism, let’s take a look at his creator, Jim Jinkins. Jinkins was born in Richmond, Virginia, which just so happens to have been the capital of the Confederate States of America. He went to college in the deep south, home of modern racist thought. Other projects after Doug include JoJo’s Circus, about a white circus clown who is the master of a variety of circus animals. In a interview, Jim Jinkins stated that he used bizarre color combinations for the characters because he felt skin tone shouldn’t make a difference. However, if skin tone truly doesn’t make a difference then why did he make Doug Caucasian?
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I always thought that Doug was white and everyone else was every color else just so the cracker kids watching the show had someone to relate to. At least Hey Arnold had the black friend, but he lived in a urban setting. Doug isn’t racist by his own means, he just doesn’t know any better.
Did it ever occur to the person writing this that maybe it was just a fun kid’s show? Maybe the people who write entertaining material for children aren’t all psychotic like Walt Disney? I’ve never seen people for their color and I never saw anything that went on in Doug as racist. There was no indication of anyone’s race. His best friend was blue and the girl he liked was brownish orange. He didn’t avoid getting together with her on account of her race, the show was about kids who were younger than the typical dating age. He had a crush and was shy. It happens.
Please stop pointing fingers at southern artists because they’re from the south and that automatically makes them racist in your mind. Some of the most open-minded and brilliant people in history have been from the south (Mark Twain, the entire late abolitionist movement, etc.) To assume that a southerner wrote a racist cartoon with as little basis as this is as, if not more ignorant than what you’re accusing him of.
The funny part is, the people who are all OMG HE’S PULLING THE RACE CARD! are probably the one’s who do it themselves.
(Personally, this cracked me up. Great job again, Wolf Gnards)
By the way, I’m from Mississippi, apparently the most racist state in the history of minority bashing, according to some.
“Let’s see…America’s in an economic crisis, genocide plagues African countries, there are bombings due to race and religion daily, but I’m going to pick apart a Nick show created in the early 90s because I’m an attention-seeking whore.”
Sounds good to me. This is just another reason why you should stop focusing on the COLOR of your skin and concentrate on having THICKER skin, weakling.