Dear everyone that likes Punch Out: YOU ARE NOT RACIST.
No matter how much over privileged youtubers who suck at the games, wanna say you are. Punch Out really isn't even that racist (at least not the wii version). It's literally just goofy stereotypes (which aren't always bad anyway??? Tropes are a writing tool and are meant to be expanded on anyway. It literally gives the fandom more power over the canon). Also, half the time, it's the white people who are getting made fun of. Like boohoo bitch, Aran Ryan's got red hair, womp womp.
Like this attitude is literally why this franchise has been dead for so long bruh
sorry anon but this is genuinely so fucking funny I can tell ur not a POC or you’re just someone whos really young.
Won’t go too far about this topic but all I’ll say is, YES punch out has racist characters and is a racist game, but that doesn’t automatically make fans racist. HOWEVER, just because you simply acknowledge that the game is built on racist stereotypes, doesn’t automatically mean you’re NOT racist. It’s about how you go about these stereotypes, not just because “well everyone is a stereotype so it’s automatically okay!”
To answer anon, yes Punch Out does make fun of white people, but that doesn’t really automatically make it better to make fun of minorities. (Also even Irish and Italians weren’t considered “white” at some point in history, they were also treated as minorities. So the Aran Ryan point flops sorry anon)
The thing about goofy stereotypes not “always being bad”, anon you’re missing the point. While not all stereotypes are bad, that still doesn’t make stereotypes good either. (Example: Piston Honda is depicted as an honorable fighter yes, however he is still a parody on WWll Japanese soldiers and kamikaze fighters. In MTPO, he literally wears Japanese propaganda and speaks in broken English.)
Also to combat the whole “the game makes fun of white people”, it should be noted that Punch Out has pretty racist depictions of Asians and Black people. (I’m just gonna list some of them out like a speed run):
Dragon Chan has a pretty racist design, having very prominent buck teeth which is a common stereotype for Chinese people. He’s also conventionally the only boxer to use martial arts in his fighting style.
Great Tiger is pretty orientalist and is about as accurate to Indian culture as Aladdin is, mixing up Indian and Arab/Middle Eastern culture when they are separate cultures. (And before you mention his Wii depiction, yes that version is also pretty inaccurate. They literally gave him a flying magic carpet which is more of a Middle Eastern thing than Indian.)
Old art of MTPO depicted Mike Tyson as a racist caricature (yes he’s a bad person, but the point stands that an actual person was depicted in black face because of the time the game came out) Some also argue that Kid Quick’s design is also racist.
To conclude, I don’t think you’re a bad person for liking any of these characters. (Some of the characters I listed as being pretty racist stereotypes ARE actually my faves lol) But I think it’s important that people do acknowledge that Punch Out IS racist, and acting ignorant to it honestly makes you look worse than if you were actually racist. Like I said, if you acknowledge this and take the time to accurate depict these characters and their respective cultures, then you’re fine. At the end of the day, this is a silly boxing game with hot buff guys, who gaf.
posting this for future reference but please don’t send shit like this 🫶
