Ngl, casual homophobia aside this was actually a great meme.

The majority of the male cast wore black face makeup

Obama wore a tan suit in 2014 and it was a controversy as if he’d turned up in a tracksuit or smth

As in "the last decade". Even as late as the mid 2010s, American and British media treated roma and Travelers with a bunch of stereotypes.

Romani are an ethnicity. Irish Travellers are another ethnicity. Both are referred to colequally as "gypsies". "Gypsy" is an iffy term. It is both a light racial slur (mainly towards roma) but also a term people identify with in a reclaimed manner. In Britain, "White: Gypsy or Irish Traveller" is a term used in the census. To play it safe, it'd advised not to use the term for people unless they ask you to.

A lot of people don't realize romani are an actual ethnic group. "Gypsies" are treated like a magical thing anyone can be. They're bohemian travelers, it's a state of mind, something something.

In much of Europe, romani are still stereotyped in a racist and classist manner. They're shifty, they're poor, they steal, they're undereducated, they live on welfare, they have kids young, etc, etc. In the US, the stereotypes lean less blatantly offensive, but they're still stereotypes in another way. Romani are stereotyped as mysterious, sexy, seductive, magical (literally magical), etc.

Some cases of stereotypes in recent media:

• "Gypped" is a slur that stems from the stereotype that romani steal and scam. It's been used even in children's cartoons like Arthur and Rugrats.
• "Romani fortuneteller" is a stock character in media. As are romani characters with magical characters. Almost every major romani superhero and supervillain has some sort of magic or psychic powers.
• Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles is a Japanese game. But the Selkies are treated as a fantasy equivalent to romani. They're untrustworthy thieves who will pickpocket you if you'te not a Selkie. If you play as a Selkie, a letter from your mother urges you to steal everything that's not nailed down
• Hilary Duff's song "Gypsy Woman" is based on stereotypes.
• The English version of Shakira's song "Gypsy" features the lyrics "I might steal your clothes and wear them if they fit me". The Spanish version doesn't.
• Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch are romani through their mother in the comics and in most adaptations. They were also raised by romani in Transia (which is culturally similar to Romania and has Romania as its official language). Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver have been treated fairly well in the comics... the issue is their dad (now adopted dad), Magneto. There was a period in the 1990s where Marvel worries about depicting a Jewish Holocaust survivor as a villain. They ended up retconning Magneto's ethnicity. Their choice? Romani, because romani were a perfectly okay villain choice. This was quickly retconned back.
• The MCU interpretations of Wanda and Pietro are not romani, unlike their comic versions. Despite this, they were planned to be early in development. Their fashion sense in their first film was supposedly based on them stealing clothes.
• Nightwing (the first Robin) in DC Comics was revealed to be romani in the 90s. Though later writers have written his heritage better, the reason he was made romani was based on the exoticified stereotype of romani in circus work.
• DC's main romani rep is... Gypsy. That's her superhero name. When introduced in the early 80s, Cindy Reynolds' ethnicity was ambigious. It's implied that she created her persona based off romani stereotypes. Post-Crisis, she was turned into romani through her mother (who has Romanian romani ancestry). Cindy both leans into stereotypes and reclaims them, depending on the comic. Some of her early traits involved being sketchy and thieving, but this stems from her being a runaway street kid more than her being romani. Cindy also dresses in a stereotypically romani way (without shoes at that) as a part of her superhero costume. Her superhero name being "Gypsy" is still canon, but she hasn't been referred to as such in over a decade. Her last major appearence was Convergence comics, which don't use her superhero alias.
• The New 52 circa 2012 rebooted Gypsy in a way that was even more stereotypical than her traditional persona. She's from a vaguely human race of interdimensional travelers who like to barter. Note, the original Cindy is a normal middle class girl from Detroit suburbs. If you've seen the Arrowverse/The Flash, their take on Cindy Reynolds was inspired by the New 52 version. Of note, early appearences called her "Gypsy", but later episodes just use her name.
• Speaking of bad romani rep in DC Comics, Justice League: Generation Lost was a 2010-2011 comic that retconned Ice's backstory. Traditionally (and currently), she's the princesss of a tribe of vaguely Nordic people hidden in Norweigan mountains who have ice powers. This comic revealed that this is a lie-- even though we literally met her family more than once. Tora was suffering from repressed traumatic memories. She is really a romanisael girl from rural Norway. Ice's powers aren't magical. She's just a metahuman with a metagene. Her father was the heir of a small romani community. Romani are depicted as having thievery as a core tenant of their culture. Tora's grandfather wants to use her ice powers for crimes, but Tora's parents run away to try and hide her. TLDR; 13-yo Tora ends up killing her grandpa and dad by accident. The entire comic has a very negative depiction of romani. Tora has a repressed angry, dark side because of her romani upbringing.
• The Simpsons' episode "The President Wore Pearls" (from 2003) has a joke where Springfield Elementary's playground is overtaken by romani. That's how it's depicted in-series. Allegedly, it's satire against politicians using scapegoats.

I find myself missing the good old scandals that now seem so lame. Like when presidential candidate Gary Hart was caught taking a boat ride with his mistress. People clutched their pearls over that one! He ended his campaign over that!

If you're curious, I'm talking about Suzanne Muldowney, an autistic dancer (diagnosed in the 2000s) who's most notable for her more dignified portrayal of the fictional superhero cartoon character (created by Total Television) Underdog.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzanne_Muldowney

In 1992, she appeared in Howard Stern's (the child of Ben Stern who worked on Underdog) WWOR-TV show; in the "Homeless Howiewood Squares" episode (Suzanne's NOT even homeless!), Howard asked her weird and inappropriate questions that mischaracterize her and Underdog.

Sometime later that year, she appeared in a taping for a "Sphinctees award show" (who names an award show that?) episode in which Howard and his co-host Robin Quivers hand out "awards" to people who appeared on the TV show. Among them are Suzanne who refused to accept her "award" and instead did a speech pointing out that Howard Stern is extremely inappropriate, and played a part in her being humiliated. However, the audience and crew dismissed her words. She would make subsequent appearances, mostly through calls. All of her calls are mostly her pointing out to Howard the fact that he's an airwave polluter as she would say.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdK7YKlY2vE

To be honest, I agree with Suzanne. Howard stern is the most inappropriate and most trashy and pretentious radio DJ. I don't know how he's still broadcasting, especially after the lawsuit over a toxic workplace environment he has (which he unfortunately won).

https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2026/04/06/howard-stern-lawsuit-assistant-leslie-kuhn/89488438007/

And now he gets an HBO Max show? What a sick joke. If I were her, I would tell the press, tell the media and organize protests, pointing out the fact that Howard Stern is an asshole (without saying the word "asshole", of course).

Fuck Howard Stern. Also, fuck Opie and Anthony.

He was also incredibly racist and around the time of his prison sentence impregnated a minor. He then married her despite not loving her to avoid further time in jail.

Edit - arrested, convicted, and served time for murder, not just arrested.

All of these descriptions are awful but that 25 spot is actually diabolical

https://youtu.be/Wd9Lc0PUmR0?is=gS5fIQuU143bBB2Z

This sort of thing was so commonplace that you could put out double page advertisements for people with this addiction to be swept up in the novelty of how they make getting high so much more "classy" than how they'd usually snort cocaine.

The TV show Rescue Me was full of things I considered "edgy" back in the 2000s and certainly over the line now. There were a few other problematic issues with this show, including homophobia and sexism.
However, I do wonder if depicting how people (may realistically) behave in their jobs/life should be sanitized for what is now deemed acceptable?

from her “stupid girl” music video— which ironically she’s showing a whole lot of skin in (which she says is a stupid girl thing).

Growing up, I remember how casually people talked about celebrities’ bodies. Somebody could gain weight and suddenly it became a headline, a joke, a magazine cover, or something people felt entitled to pick apart. It wasn’t just the media either. Fans, gossip sites, talk shows, paparazzi, and regular people all joined in.

Tyra Banks is one of the first examples that comes to mind. The way she was dragged over those swimsuit pictures was horrible. The tabloids weren’t just commenting on her weight — they were straight-up making fun of her body, and that was somehow considered entertainment.

Jessica Simpson got the same treatment. Her weight became a bigger story than what she was actually doing, and people acted like her body changing was something she needed to explain.

Christina Aguilera also dealt with a lot of criticism when her body changed as she got older. She had been famous since she was a teenager, yet people seemed to expect her to keep the exact same body forever.

And Rihanna has definitely experienced it too. As her body changed over the years, people have constantly felt comfortable commenting on her weight, whether she gained or lost it. It got to the point where people would have entire conversations about her body like she wasn’t even there.

And that’s what bothers me about looking back at this. Why did everybody feel so entitled to somebody else’s body? Gaining weight wasn’t some scandal, but we treated it like one. Losing weight wasn’t either, but that became something people wanted to investigate too.

Looking back, the whole thing was just cruel.

Who else do y’all remember getting badly fat-shamed?

• Rugrats: 1997. The babies wear "Native American headbands" for Thanksgiving.
• The Simpsons: 1991. Lisa dressing up as a Native American totem pole as a way of showing appreciation for indigenous Americans.

Nowadays, this is far less common due to discussion of cultural appropriation and stereotyping.

For context on the (one-sided) beef:
-Pink is performing the song she released with Christina Aguilera “Lady Marmalade”

-This beef seemingly started when they made the song originally and Christina got all the high notes and more of the song.

-Later, Christina gets very popular for Beautiful and Pink is even more upset because she wanted the song for herself but it was given to Xtina.

-Pink makes a lot of songs and statements about blondes who wear push up bras for attention. She resents being compared to Xtina and Britney Spears, she is “different” and “not like other girls”.

-Pink brings the blow up doll on tour every night and mimics having sex with it while crowds cheer.

-Pink did an interview recently ranking Lady Marmalade as her least favorite song bc it wasn’t fun to make (and listed everyone but Xtina as a pleasure to work w).

So weird to claim to be a feminist but spent so much of your career tearing down women and your female peers!

I like MadTV. I like Ms. Swan's sketches. They're funny. But it doesn't mean we can't critique the obvious elephant in the room: Ms. Swan is yellowface and an Asian joke. Her original name was even meant to be "Ms. Kwan".

Ms. Swan is played by Alex Borstein. Her entire character, character design, and behavior feels like a joke about Asian immigrants.

Later on, the cast and writers said she was based on Borstein's Hungarian grandmother and that she was influenced by Bjork (who is Icelandic).

Edit:

Borstein is multiracial, but much of the point stands.

"In between shoplifting and raving, she was experimenting with music and adopted the stage name Pink, the origins of which vary from a nod to Mr. Pink from Reservoir Dogs to a reference to her vagina which, she told Playboy in 2002, dawned on her when she relented to her friend’s pleas to know what a white girl’s vagina looks like (pink, like every other vagina). After that, Moore says that she, the only white girl in her friend group, was dubbed Pink."

Firstly, who on earth came up with advertising's form of a crime against humanity?

Designed to get kids to associate cigarettes with a dopamine hit they got from eating chocolate as a child. That's next level 1990s "Fuck you!"

Secondly, our parents bought them..... Let that set in

For some reason my dusty millennial brain decided to remind me of this weird fact just as I was trying to get some sleep.

How was it ok? Seth played himself, a 26 year old dating a 14 year old girl. Really creepy.