WHITE Rameses II and the case for racial representation and why it matters.

[Buster's Uncle]

So just look at that ridiculous Nordic-Egyptian Rameses II from the new 6 DLC.

That HAS to be some deliberate/conscious whitening on the original, BTW.  Someone went to the trouble to make that face look like modern Egypt founder Gamal Nasser -or Dr. Zahi Hawass the Egyptian Egyptologist in all the documentaries -google them if you're familiar w/ neither--- and then he gets *blue* eyes and is paler than above-average-pale ME? Pshaw.

Do they think that will please their audience of exacting history nerds who know better?

We certainly know less about the ancient Egyptians than we think we do, but that light pink Rameses is a bad guess, even leaving out paintings and sculptures surviving with the pigment relatively intact.  -They aren't much help anyway, 'cause the ancients didn't much worry about accuracy in art portrayal.  They were more or less doing propaganda cartoons in whatever medium, not least the sculpture.

I'm told there's much said other places, by those who take an interest in discussing 6 stuff, about the cartoonishness, especially his big hands - of which I think they're barking mad, the original set of leaders tending worse.


-So there's so much more, but I think I'll take my time and break it into several digestible posts.  More, more interesting, follows from this setup post tomorrow.

[Buster's Uncle]

So, there's a Haitian on CFC who -desperately- wants Black representation.  This is a halfway to pleasing him.

Now it's already bedtime -busy day getting nothing much done- so I'm gonna have to put off googling the evidence I want to reference and stretch this presentation out further than I'd intended, but let me say this - it neither breaks my leg nor picks my pocket for Henri to get his representation.  I don't like weaker-than-weak arguments that ancient Egyptians were black any better than the next pedant nerd - but I've listened to Whoopie Goldberg talk about Lt. Uhura, and extended some compassion.


-More on that tomorrow asap, and a Blacker Pharoh...

[Buster's Uncle]

Very first thing Google coughed up:


Whoopi Goldberg Perfectly Described The Importance Of Uhura In Star Trek: TOS
BY DANA HANSON
Screen Rant
PUBLISHED JUL 31, 2021


Whoopi Goldberg's story of how she became a Star Trek fan perfectly describes the importance of Nyota Uhura's inclusion in The Original Series.

Nyota Uhura And Guinan From Star Trek

Lieutenant Nyota Uhura from Star Trek: The Original Series was an important character for many reasons, but Whoopi Goldberg's story of how she became a fan perfectly sums up why the character meant so much to so many. TOS was the first series in what became the Star Trek franchise, airing between 1966 and 1969 before being canceled after three seasons. Despite this, the show gained a cult following in syndication and paved the way for the franchise to be reborn with Star Trek: The Next Generation in the 1980s.

TOS was created by Gene Roddenberry, who sought to use it as a way to explore a variety of socio-political issues that were relevant to the time. One of the ways Roddenberry accomplished this was by casting a diverse group of people as series regulars, including Nichelle Nichols as Lieutenant Uhura, the USS Enterprise's communications officer. As a black woman depicted in a position of power and respect on a television show in the 1960s, Uhura was unprecedented, and the character's positive legacy cannot be overstated. Uhura served as an inspiration to many, including Doctor Martin Luther King Jr., who famously encouraged Nichols to continue with the role when she considering quitting after the first season. However, the story of how Nichols' portrayal inspired a young Whoopi Goldberg is perhaps the best summation of Uhura's legacy.

Goldberg, who went on to have her own Star Trek career as Guinan on TNG, was nine years old the first time she saw an episode of TOS. In one of her first meetings with Gene Roddenberry, Goldberg recounted to the creator how the first time she saw Uhura onscreen she went running through her house calling "Come quick, come quick, there's a black lady on television and she ain't no maid!" Roddenberry later told this story to Nichelle Nichols herself, who then recounted it during an interview for the 1997 documentary Trekkies. Since then, Goldberg's statement has been disseminated widely online and is quoted often by fans as a way to celebrate the incredible legacy of the franchise.


Nyota Uhura From Star Trek TOS

Whoopi Goldberg has corroborated the story of her first TOS viewing in other interviews and expanded upon it, saying that seeing Nichols on TV made her realize she could be anything she wanted to be. In an interview with Neil deGrasse Tyson for National Geographic, Goldberg explained TOS was the first time she had ever seen a black person depicted in a version of the future, showcasing just how little black people were included in the science fiction genre up until Star Trek. Uhura inspired Goldberg to want to continue Star Trek's tradition of positive representation, and this desire was mainly what incentivized her to campaign for a role on TNG.

Because of this, both Nichols and Goldberg have now become important parts of Star Trek history, contributing to a legacy that has paved the way for more and more diversity in the franchise. Black characters and other characters of color have played extremely important roles in subsequent series, and Trek continues to get better at depicting other minority groups, such as members of the LGBTQ+ community. Without Star Trek: The Original Series and Nichelle Nichols' groundbreaking performance as Lieutenant Uhura, however, people like Whoopi Goldberg might never have been inspired to push things further, and the show's diversity legacy would never have been the same.


https://screenrant.com/star-trek-whoopi-goldberg-uhura-tos/


She's also remarked "It's the first time I ever saw the we existed in the future."  -MATTERS.

[Buster's Uncle]

Also very first Google video hit:

I could probably find 20 different vids of her telling that story - Dr. King told her she was important, and of course she told the story the rest of her life more often than she said her middle name.

[Buster's Uncle]

A White Jesus painting hung on my Gramma's wood-panel wall forever. People want to identify with, and I doubt there's much consciousness of racial issues, usually, when people do that, for all that it's wrong.  Gramma was assuredly racist, but I'm still certain the living White Jesus w/ pretty auburn hair & beard reaching to knock on a plank door set in a stone wall (Jesus is knocking) entirely reflected nothing but that she loved Jesus and that was the traditional image of him going back to the pre-byzantine Roman Empire - so that's what she thought he looked like.  Southeastern US protestants strongly tend to philo-Semitism, actually.

-So give the ignorant white folks that much slack: they usually don't mean anything and don't know any better...



...If this is not the actual same image, it's very close...

[Buster's Uncle]

--All pharaohs embiggen a bit, BTW.--


So meet Piye, which Henri informs me was the name of a Kushite Pharoh.  Assume there was a dynastic marriage w/ the old nobility, thus mixed - and that Egyptians then looked much like Egyptians now, 'cause I wasn't about to completely redraw the face.  This was enough work as it is, to do a neat job.

History is done no damage by using him as a reskin of Rameses II.

What they should do is, a Multicultural DLC -recolor/renames, low-ish effort for a less broad audience, very ignorable for any history purists that bothers. As long as Firaxis at least breaks even on the deal, everybody's happy. Whoopie seeing Uhura on TV mattered to Whoopie in an important way, and I'm fine with throwing li'l Whoopie a bone.

-More than fine.  People want to identify.  Have a heart.

[Buster's Uncle]

PS:

George Takei discusses how the Asian community reacted to Sulu on Star Trek

-See also George's autobiography, To the Stars, a fine read.

[Unorthodox]

https://www.livescience.com/ramesses-ii-facial-reconstruction

[DrazharLn]

> Hair and skin coloring based on what's thought to have been common in ancient Egypt were then added to the facial reconstruction.

The facial reconstruction is only really of the bone structure (and it's kind of a dodgy forensic science, IIRC).

[Unorthodox]

https://www.thecollector.com/were-ancient-egyptians-black/

edit: BU, I forget the code to fix the width, and this is buggering the forum...
[edit II, figured it out]

[Unorthodox]

> Hair and skin coloring based on what's thought to have been common in ancient Egypt were then added to the facial reconstruction.

The facial reconstruction is only really of the bone structure (and it's kind of a dodgy forensic science, IIRC).

The biggest drawback for facial reconstruction has historically been a lack of data to get suitable averages, and that's been improving as more data comes in.  I trust the computer run ones more as they tend to lack a lot of the bias inherent in someone scultping.  (fortunately for me, who's interest is to recreate mummified flesh on top of bone, I don't need the averages and only bone info, of which there's plenty)

Yes, Egypt was a lot more ethnically diverse than a lot of people think, and that evidence is mounting, but it's inherently a bold decision to pick one extreme or the other, as firaxis and BU both do in their chosen colorations.  It's best to pick somewhere more middling. 

(edit: I think the blue eyes are especially troublesome to be honest)

[Buster's Uncle]

I wasn't picking anything - both recolors are attempts at black, and Henri preferred blacker.

Now, I think the prior recolor is within credibility, but I would have put the original lips back and gone a few shades lighter if I was guessing for actual Rameses.


That forensic thingy did something about the shade I woulda shot for, maybe a hair darker because Rams was allegedly macho and hunted a lot, and that face strikes me as modern Egyptians wouldn't look twice at him.

[Buster's Uncle]

https://www.thecollector.com/were-ancient-egyptians-black/

edit: BU, I forget the code to fix the width, and this is buggering the forum...
[edit II, figured it out]

I have to poopoo this pic - those are 100% late Roman.  Note the oversized eyes in the Byzantine style; no earlier than Ptolemaic, not a one, and there may not be a single pure Egyptian in the entire lot.

[DrazharLn]

Looks like these portraits became popular around first and second centuries AD: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fayum_mummy_portraits

Which isn't late roman, but is in a period of heavy Roman and Greek influence and not in the era of the pharoahs.

[Buster's Uncle]

Yeah; they're coffin/cheap latter day mummy decoration paintings.