“The Goonies is populated by recognizable types: the sometimes-cowardly fat kid (wearing both plaid pants and a Ha-waiian shirt), the wise-cracker (appropriately nicknamed ‘‘Mouth’’), the rich and arrogant jock (with the equally rich and arrogant father), the ditzy cheer-leader and her bespectacled best friend, and the shy, stuttering boy whose unwavering belief in the impossible guides their unlikely quest. We rooted for them all, but Data, the Asian immigrant kid exhibiting tendencies toward both the mad inventor and the secret agent, was our childhood favorite.”
People like characters they can identify and relate to in their own life’s.
“For decades, Asian American scholars have turned their attention to American popular culture in order to examine, and often con-demn, its mobilization and amplification of stereotypes at particular historical moments of war, crisis, and moral panic.”
Stereotypes seem to occur most often during times of war. This seems to be done to make fun of whoever it is America is fighting against.
“In this context, young people, urban dwellers, gays, ‘‘Hispanics,’’ women, and other social groups all became ‘‘segments.’’”
These people also become targets in films and the everyday life. People will pick on these groups of people because they are different and don’t fit in with some people’s agendas.
“Over the last thirty years, cultural exchanges and effective politics between marginalized populations have produced the particularly rife site of Afro-Asian relations—from the iconic fighter Moham-med Ali’s principled political stance against the war in Vietnam (‘‘No Viet-namese ever called me a nigger,’’ he said) to Bruce Lee’s underdog popularity with black working-class audiences, both of which can be understood (at least partially) in the historical context of the Vietnam War but also in that of domestic liberation struggles.”
These are cross currents of different races coming together to unify people together through a common theme.