blackhorrorwhiteterror

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Blog Post #6

Men are always the problem! This was the immediate moral that I drew from Kassi Lemon’s film Eve’s Bayou. At the root of all of the character’s ails was a man. For Eve, her mother, and Cisely, the man in question was their nasty father. For Aunt Mozelle, it was all these men who ran out on her in the most dramatic way possible (dying). And for Lenny, it was that trifling, disgusting, Louise Bastite once again. Of course, I’m kidding. But again, maybe I’m not?  Maybe Kassie was trying to tell us something on the low. I’m just saying. 

 I find the film’s purposefully ambiguous nature to be a sort of Litmus Test. I believe that the version of the truth that people adhere to is determined by their overall outlook on the world. By this, I mean that one’s position within their family, experience with intergenerational relationships, and feelings towards women inform what people take away from this film. That’s where the ambiguity stems from in my opinion because the truth seems very clear (and this stems from my experience as the eldest daughter who doesn’t think that our elders are always right).  

For example, in the case of Cisely and Eve vs their father in their separate disputes with him (in Cisely’s case his SA of her, and for Eve his cheating) it’s important to note their dynamic (in terms of each player’s identity).  Cisely and Eve are both children who are girls. It isn’t uncommon for elders to not take children seriously, or for people overall to not believe girls/victims, especially in cases of SA that involve a prominent male individual. Overall women and children are not respected members of society.  

As I stated earlier, for me, the truth doesn’t feel uncertain at all. And I believe this to be partially informed by my position as a girl-child. I believe Cisely because I’m more inclined to believe a child over a man who spent the whole movie cheating and lying. Also in situations of SA like this, I think it is of the utmost importance to take a victim’s testimony seriously. Especially children, too often they get ignored in extremely serious situations like these because a lot of people would rather save face for their families than deal with the autonomy of their children. But, that’s something to get into in a different blog post.

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Blog Post #5

Beloved is a story that makes me feel physically ill. I've never been able to finish the film in one sitting because of how heavy it is and how deeply uncomfortable it makes me feel. So few works have been able to draw such a visceral reaction from me and it's because real life is the scariest thing possible. There's simply nothing more terrifying than the conditions that people have had to face under institutions like slavery. History, especially to me, an African woman, is horrifying. I'd never travel back in time unless I had the option to stop Europeans from venturing into Africa in the 16th century. 

Sethe's story of feeling she had to murder her children in order to keep them from becoming slaves is so heartwrenching that it could only come from real life. Who could be so twisted to come up with such a premise on their own, without any historical context? 

I was really surprised to hear that the film did so poorly at the box office that Oprah fell into a deep depression. Black trauma sells to American audiences. So why didn't this film about a deeply traumatized Black family not do well? I believe it's because people only like Black trauma when it's glamourized and sensationalized by a non-Black person. They prefer when the agency in storytelling is stripped from the Black characters and their pain depicted as mere spectacle. Also, the movie does go on for almost three hours which probably played a role in the poor response (but I'm wary of this conclusion since a movie like Oppenheimer which is also very long was critically acclaimed). 

Another reason I fear the film may have flopped is because of how honest it is about slavery and the conditions of people (especially Black women) in the 1800s. I was reading some reviews about the film and people just don't like how uncomfortable the topics broached in the film made them and I can guess that for some it's because this was the first time they were ever confronted with the gruesome, graphic details of the conditions Black people in this country have had to endure. This truth is hard to watch, hard to swallow, and hard to reconcile. And this is one of the reasons I value this movie so much. There's so much to learn from the discomfort it breeds. Maybe I'm biased because I'm both Black and a huge Toni Morrison fan, but I think this film deserves way more praise.  

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Blog Post #4

"Wet Pain" by Terrence Taylor offered me a fresh perspective on bigotry that I have not seen explored anywhere else. The idea of racism as an infection that can poison the minds of even the most seemingly tolerant person is surprisingly novel.

Though set in 2005, this story could have easily been about today. Deans' character and his deterioration represents the foot soldiers of the alt-right that prop up the authoritarian conservative government that is gaining more and more power in this country. The people who make up the MAGA-supporting voters who come out in droves to vote against their own interests, fueled by the rhetoric of extremist politicians and pop-culture figures.

Dean, like many working-class white men today, finds himself in a much worse position (financially) than his racist ancestors. Though a bad economy, and lack of opportunity is why Dean is down on his luck, he blames minorities. There are many Deans in America who are facing a tough time due to a government that doesn't care about them, but because they've drunk too much of the conservative-rhetoric Kool Aid they are blind to that and instead turn on people they should be allied with. Though the cause of Dean's infection is being back in the South, there are other Deans all over the world right now who are being poisoned by Fox News, and other conservative medias telling them that the problem is the minorities and not the politicians in office that are backed by powerful lobbyists who's interest don't care for the wellbeing of Dean ot his family.

The description of Dean's death was really poignant. The fact that he was found dead, by himself, outside during a storm in which many were left for dead by the government was really powerful. He was tossed aside and all the officials had to tell his wife is that she was lucky she could even get her husband's corpse. At the end of the day Dean, like the minorities he berated, was abandoned by the legion (the police, government, first responders etc). This is a powerful reminder that at the end of the day we are all the same to the oppressive forces.

The scariest part of the story was Lynn's experience. My heart wept for her as I thought of what it must feel like to be in love with a bigot. To hear the man you love call you awful, ugly racist names. How scary it must've been for her when he snapped. Her experience is literally the scariest thing that could happen in an interracial relationship.

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Blog Post #3

Bernard Rose’s 1992 Candyman is a film that has always existed within my knowledge of pop culture but it is not something that I had ever watched until this class. I think it’s because I spent some of my younger years in Madison, Wisconsin which is not at all far from Cabrini Green. I remember my friends and I daring each other to do the unthinkable and utter the boogeyman’s name in the mirror without chickening out. Of course, we never made it the fifth “Candyman”, therefore I can't verify for sure if the legend is true or not. I wish I had watched the film as a child as I’d like to know if I would’ve felt the same way about it as I do as an adult. Watching “Candyman” was a bit of a weird experience. This film is something that I have always recognized as significant in African American culture (cue the gaps in cultural knowledge that come from the African immigrant diasporic experience ) but the movie did not really feel Black. And I mean this in a sense that it felt like it was tailored to a white audience although it is something that I have always thought was made by a Black production team. What set me off was the way the inside of Cabrini Green looked and the depiction of the Black characters. Firstly, Cabrini Green did not look real at all. I couldn’t tell if it was because of the 90’s production/camera quality or a cheesy art direction decision but the hallways of the building were almost cartoonish. The idea that someone spray-painted a lady’s front door (mind you it’s not like it’s outside, they’re fully indoors) was so bonkers to me. It’s such a 90’s after-school-special-on-the-hood-coded choice. It was weird and I was surprised that a Black director would go that way in depicting a Black housing project. Other than the comical building all of the Black characters were non-people. My boyfriend and I made a game of spotting the magical negro. It felt like every interaction Helen had with a Black character was either violent or they gave her a nugget of info to aid her journey, the way non-playable characters help the heroes of video games along their way. We were also confused about why Candyman was in Cabrini Green. If he was maimed by white people why would he be terrorizing a Black community? Wouldn’t he be terrorizing the descendants of those who harmed him? His motives really confused us. It’s not that I find the film to be an enjoyable watch, I just thought that a lot of the choices made were interesting and now that we’ve talked about them in class I can see why they’re made and enjoy the film as a relic of the past.

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Blog Post #2

As a kid I despised rewatching movies. I felt like there was no point since I already knew the plot and the ending. As an adult, I appreciate opportunities to revisit a work in new contexts and with new companions. That is why I am glad that we watched Jordan Peele's US in class. The first time I'd seen it was in a non-academic context with a friend. We were both not fans of horror, and we watched most of the film through the cracks of our fingers. Although we enjoyed the film, we left our viewing experience with more questions than answers. In hindsight I realize that this is the Monkeypaw effect.

Fortunately, I was able to shake my spooks and rewatch this film for class. Watching it for a second time felt quite different. I found myself watching through Red's eyes. No, I did not feel homicidal rage towards Adelaide, but I couldn't help but think of Red as I watched the first act of the film. Adelaide stole the life Red could've (should've) had. 

This is point is especially poignant as a citizen of the American Empire during Israel's war on Gaza. Although Peele intended to address the houseless population, I couldn't help but think of the Palestinians who have been reduced to the same statistics and headlines as that group. My interpretation of the tethered has been expanded through the lens of globalization. During this second watch I began to consider how we are tethered to people all over the globe via our habits as consumers and citizens of the United States of America. 

Though the superpower we belong to has always had an oppressive stronghold on the geopolitical state of the world and has caused carnage time and time again in the name of its god capitalism, being an American feels especially yucky in today's climate. Our participation in the genocidal ambitions of our allied nation-state through acts such as paying taxes that fund the aggressions makes us Adelaides in a sense. Though the actions of governments are not the fault of their citizens, we must admit that we are able to dance as a result of someone else not being able to. And this thought is bone-chillingly unsettling. How do you grapple with knowing that a lot of the privileges you enjoy come at the expense of others? I don't know how to walk away from this feeling smiling the way Adelaide did at the end of the film. 

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Blog Post #1- Get Out Discussion

Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” is a poignant representation of how some white supremacists use liberalism to shield themselves from confronting their inner biases. I’m not sure where Peele is from, but the depiction of the Armitage family felt like they were inspired directly by the wealthy, progressive, white class that I grew up around in the Bay Area. You know, the people with “Black Lives Matter” signs in their windows despite the fact that their home once belonged to a Black family who was displaced so that they could move in. The scene in which Chris meets Rose’s family for the first time and her dad speaks to him in an attempted blackcent and makes thinly veiled racist remarks made me cringe, as it reminds me well-meaning older white people I’ve met in my life who try to relate to me through microaggressions. When Rose’s dad addresses the whole “white family, black servants” thing to Chris, it reads as him wink, wink, nudge, nudging Chris. What he is really saying is “ I know this is problematic and looks really racist (because it is), but you know I’m not racist brother”. I’ve found myself in similar situations where a white person has said something explicitly racist and then turned to me as the only Black person around for approval/ reassurance that they are in fact not racist. And like Chris, these are usually situations in which I am in the less advantaged position (ie I’m at work and they customer, or they’re a gatekeeper for an opportunity I want), but unlike Chris I don’t offer the reassurance they are looking for (they usually are met with a crazy look from me at the very least). 

I appreciate that Peele did not only villainize the white men in the film, but also the women. I feel like white women are usually let off the hook for their role in white supremacy because of their womanhood and the patriarchal belief that women are too powerless to be evil. Rose’s character was the personification of how white women weaponize their assumed innocence/virtue. In the beginning of the film she feigns ignorance at why Chris may be apprehensive about meeting her parents due to his race; although she’s a grown woman (I’m not sure the ages of the characters but she’s at least in her late 20’s) she acts surprised that racism may be top of mind for a Black person. Chris just rolls with it, and it’s a subtle example of how white women are excused from accountability because expectations of them to interact with race on a meaningful level is low. Of course, later in the film we find that her ignorance is all a ruse and I think this is so powerful because it illustrates the fault in prescribing innocence to white women automatically.