Stereotypical Staten Island

So I’ve been slacking once again. Not much of a surprise there. I have been working as an intern at the Advance, so you can check out the work I’ve been doing for SILive.com here. Anyway, I did a project a few months ago on Staten Island stereotypes and posted it on a blog specifically for a class I was in, but I never got around to posting it on this one. So until I have the time to get the ball rolling with this blog again, you can read this for your local fix.

Staten Island certainly has more than its share of stereotypes.  Now with the recent success of reality television shows that feature “typical Staten Islanders”, our borough is being ridiculed more than ever.  As a practically lifelong Staten Islander, I’m quick to laugh it off.  Besides, most of the Staten Island slander is fairly true and pretty humorous.  However, lately I’ve been wondering if these negative stereotypes could potentially influence the way younger generations of Staten Islanders feel that they should act.

For this project I decided to take a closer look at Staten Island’s portrayal in the media.  I wanted to take a closer look at the stereotypes and see how people felt about them.  I’ve stumbled on quite a bit of humorous media throughout my quest.  Enjoy.

Search “Staten Island”

UrbanDictionary.com is a website that allows its visitors to compile their own dictionary. Filled with slang terms and biased entries, this website is comical and potentially even useful when taken at face value. Look up “Staten Island” on this site and you will find an excessive 70 definitions. What are the majority of these entries filled with? Staten Island stereotypes.  Here is a sampling of selections from some of the top rated entries:

“A place where the makeup is thick and the accents are thicker.”

“Where Italian people go to die”

“The forgotten borough”

“A place where everybody from Brooklyn moves to.”

“The long lost bourough of NYC. Staten Island has the biggest wiggers in the world. Kids from Todt Hill drive around in there Escalades and Mercades listening to rap and hate all the black, mexicans, Puerto Ricans that drive by them.”

“The South Shore is where Sopranos wannabees meet Clueless (the movie). All the parents go into serious debt so that their children are spoiled rotten. They may live a house that is split into 5 families but don’t worry they are all driving Infiniti’s and BMW’s. The North shore consists of more minorities which the South shore want to be but hate. Girls on the South shore walk around with Coach bags and fake Louis Vuitton’s and think it looks gooo to wear white lipstick, orange skin and pin straight hair. By the time most Staten Islanders turn 40 they look like Sharpei dogs.”

YouTube.com offers Staten Island slander that is even more entertaining thanks to audio and video.  Below is a great recent music video put together by some Staten Island girls mocking the typical stereotypes in a remix of Katy Perry’s hit song “California Girls”.

Here are links to a couple of my other favorite Staten Island spoofs on YouTube:

Guido Meets Guidette – The Islands #1

Maria-Marie’s Sweet 16 (Part 1 of 2)

Watch Staten Island

On October 17th, 2006 MTV aired “I’m a Staten Island Girl” as part of it’s True Life documentary series.  This episode followed three young women from Staten Island on their quests for love, money and fame.  The episode became infamous locally for its portrayal of Staten Island women in a negative light.  That wasn’t the first time Staten Islanders made a fool of themselves on television.  It wasn’t even the first time some locals looked ridiculous on the True Life series.  Back in 2002, “True Life: I’m Getting Married”, introduced us to the quintessential Staten Island couple planning for their big day.  Remember Charlie and Sabrina?  If you don’t feel free to refresh your memory with the video clip below.

Today, with the recent popularity of The Jersey Shore, Staten Island has found itself being pummeled by criticism even more than usual. The Jersey Shore, a reality show that follows eight housemates during their summer vacation, was widely criticized for its portrayal of Italian-American stereotypes. With three of the cast members hailing from Staten Island, the show just reaffirms the stereotypes that were already present in the media.

SNL aired a skit in December 2009 called Gossip Girl: Staten Island. Blake Lively was featured in the skit, which parodied her own hit show while poking fun at our borough. You can view this skit on Hulu by clicking here.

Bridge and Tunnel, a Staten Island based reality show, which was supposed to air on MTV, was recently cancelled. We should all be thankful. The trailer makes it quite obvious that this train wreck of a show would have just led to more ignorant jokes about the island. Staten Island Dump, a humorous local blog, posted about the program cancellation along with a clip of the show’s trailer. You can and should view that by clicking here.

Opinions

Below is an audio file some thoughts on Staten Island stereotypes from a few females that have lived here for quite some time.

Stereotypes by Julianne924

Now many of you might be wondering what the big deal is. After all, there certainly is some truth to these stereotypes, and they’re funny. So why bother worrying about it?

During an interview, Alyssa, a lifelong Staten Islander, was asked if she felt that there could be negative effects on children who watch shows like The Jersey Shore. “Absolutely, yeah. I think that I now see even younger kids that are trying to look that way. The way they dress. They are wearing makeup when they’re younger, and wearing leggings. I can already see that they’re trying to fit into these trends,” she explained. She later added that though she hopes to leave Staten Island because she doesn’t want to raise her children here, partially because of the stereotypes we discussed.

Alyssa’s boyfriend, Nick, who moved to the Island a few years ago from Brooklyn said, “While many people might just laugh these shows off, there are plenty of other people that mindlessly fall prey to these stereotypes. The popularity of shows like The Jersey Shore just make it possible for people that really behave that way to justify their lifestyle.”

I know from personal experience that people will often make snap judgements based on the fact that I’ve grown up on Staten Island. I’ve found that I have actually become accustomed to being defensive when it comes to speaking about the borough I call home. While I am usually able to joke about the way Staten Islanders are portrayed, many others are truly insulted by it. What worries me the most though, are impressionable children and those people who take these stereotypes seriously.