New technologies often allow people to free themselves from their real live, but since the separation of virtual life from real life (non-virtual) is hard to establish, many of the bad things that real life has are often taken into the virtual world. Some people will believe that the virtual world offers them the opportunity to create and enhance their identities online, while others will believe that the virtual world helps them destroy and recreate their identities, but the reality is that whatever there is in real life, might also be present in virtual life and this is true for racial stereotypes.
In her book, Lisa Nakamura describes cybertypes “as the distinctive ways that the internet propagates, disseminates and commodifies images of race and racism" and cybertyping as act of representing ourselves and our race through the use of new technologies (Cybertypes, 3). From this definition, we can conclude that cybertypes are racial stereotypes within virtual communities and cybertyping is our self representation of race in our virtual life.
The purpose of a virtual life is to improve real life, right? But how do we use new technologies to improve the lives of minorities when we have the online version of discrimination or redlining going on?
There is an erroneous belief that access to new technologies alleviates the digital divide, but this is often not true to minorities. Sometimes even if minorities and women have access to technologies they could still face some setbacks (Cybertypes, 10). The problem here is not that minorities do not have access (well part of it is, but not all), the real problem here is that new technologies are often dominated by the white middleclass men, meaning that the purpose of new technologies is often geared towards their benefit. Now why for their benefit? Well… there is no one willing to state that new technologies were made for the middleclass white males, but if we look around, we will see that many new technologies force you to choose between two genders only (what about transgender?) and do not offer the choice of choosing your cybertypes (racial identity) and social status assuming that everyone is the same, in case that everyone could be a white middleclass male. If it does let you choose your cybertypes; it is very possible that the racial identity, to which you are supposed to identify to, is often represented in terms of negative stereotypes. Just look around the web for programs that allow you to choose your own cybertypes and you will see that the representation of your race, if it is not white, will more often than not, give a really bad representation of you. Do all Hispanics have to have a dark hair… can’t they also have red hair? Do all Asians have to know martial arts and be skinny and with dark straight hair? Can’t an African American have light skin and if so, will he still be an African American? And further more… what about those with mixed races?! Do they have to choose between the “best” of the two… or three… or more that they carry?
Identity Tourism
One of the main purposes behind new technologies is to allow the user to “free” themselves from their real life and to allow them to explore a different life. This not only means that the user is disembodied from the real world and that he/she can travel within the cyberspace, this also implies that the user can experiment with new identities in many different ways. Through the use of new technologies in cyberspace, the user can change their gender, age, social class, education, jobs, race, and whatever else that he/she might chose to do so. The exploring of such options is called identity tourism. Social networks, games and any other technology that allow us to interfere with others require that we choose an identity or character. However, it is important to mention that the real identity behind the avatar, the user profile, or the character is not known and since we only know what the individual choose to tell us or show us about them, the character might not resemble the physical properties of the real individual behind the character (Race in/for Cyberspace). Analyzing Street Fighter II World Champion Edition in Terms of Identity Tourism
Street Fighter II offers players the opportunity to choose among the following options to provide identity tourism
Gender: Street Fighter II offers players the choice of selecting among twelve characters. However 11 out of those 12 characters are males and only 1 of the 12 is a female. Therefore, this game provides male players with a very slight possibility of touring among genders (if they want to try out the opposite gender they can only choose the one female character that is available), but for female players, it allows them to tourism gender with 11 options of male characters.
Race: Street Fighter II definitely provides players with the opportunity to tourism among different races.
- Ryu: Japanese (NTE)
- Ken: ¾ Japanese, ¼ Caucasian (NTE)
- Edmond Honda: Japanese (Street Fighter II)
- Blanka: Brazilian (NTE)
- Guile: Caucasian (Street Fighter II)
- Chun-Li: Chinese (Street Fighter II)
- Dhalsim: Indian (NTE)
- Zangief: Russian (NTE)
- Balrog: Caucasian (Street Fighter II)
- Vega: Spanish (Street Fighter II)
- Sagat: Thai (Street Fighter II)
- M Bison: Russian (Street Fighter II)
Specie: It is possible to say that Street Fighter II allows the players a slight opportunity to choose among “species” because this game has what might be considered a mutant human being among the twelve characters available. Blanca, is considered to be human because he was born human, however his time in isolation from civilization and with other species have allow him the ability to control and generate electricity from his body, which is not necessarily a human trait (NTE).
Works Consulted:
Nakamura, Lisa. “Cybertypes: Race, Ethinicity on the Internet and Identity.” New York: Routledge, 2002. 1-31. Web. 20 October, 2010 http://paulmuhlhauser.org/475/Readings/Cybertypes1.pdf
Nakamura, Lisa. "Race in/for Cyberspace: Identity Tourism and Racial Passing on the Internet.” The Cybercultures Reader. David Bell and Barbara M Kennedy. New York: Routledge, 2000. Print
NTE. “Street Fighter Characters”. Love to Know Video Games. Web. 21, October 2010 http://videogames.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Street_Fighter_Characters
“Street Fighter II”. Wikipedia. Web. 21, October 2010 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Street_Fighter_II
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