An Actual Fantastic Discussion on Race and The Vampire Diaries...

[ladygawain]

If you know me at all, you'll know that this is a subject that rests very close to my heart and weighs upon it every single time there is an episode of this show. This article is really great and I have so many complicated feelings on the matter and I thought I'd share it here if anyone's interested. There are some points I find problematic and

Comments

[audrey229]

The discussion with Gone With the Wind is a perfect example of the idea that we have to look at a text and be AWARE and conscious of both the racist and sexist practices that were taking place on our culture during that time.

You cannot watch Gone with the Wind and ignore the fact that it was made in the 1930's during a time when the lynching of Black people was still extremely prevalent in the South. You can't. You can't watch that movie and ignore the fact that Hattie McDaniel was FORBIDDEN from attending the premiere of the movie in Atlanta in 1939. If you ignore that stuff then you are rewriting history and you are ignoring that which you HAVE to be aware of to truly understand the era of the film.

Gone With the Wind is a flawed narrative. Period. Mammy is a loving, smart, wise character but we don't ever truly see her POV unless it is specifically linked to Scarlett and Rhett. That is a huge problem. It doesn't mean that Hattie McDaniel wasn't amazing in the film---she was. She brought depth to a role that was written not from her POV.

Clark Gable IS amazing in that film. Let's face it...Clark Gable was a rare star. I mean...my God...he was the man who inspired Clark Kent. Like, he was the literal inspiration for the charm and passion that we see in Superman. It's because of him. Vivien Leigh was a gorgeous, beautiful talent. But you can acknowledge those things while still recognizing that the film was made during a time of extreme discrimination and it has PROBLEMS!!!

I think there is this mistaken idea out there among some white people that it's "racist" for them to bring up slavery. And its like...NO. It's racist for you to PRETEND THAT IT DOESN'T EXIST AND TO REWRITE HISTORY. The best thing this show could do would be to TALK ABOUT IT and acknowledge it and really make the narrative clear that they KNOW that racism was a stain on the town and that now the vampires are STILL PAYING FOR WHAT THEY DID through the pain of the witches that were slaves and were wronged. There is a way that they could do it but the just keep ignoring the blaring elephant in the room which is that these women were SLAVES. Just talk about it! Just say it!! We know!! You don't make it go away and not be the reality by not talking about it. And it's worse to literally erase the pain and suffering of an entire race of people by not talking about it and making it MATTER to your narrative.

Also, just a random unrelated aside....someone just told me that the Salvatores supposed to be Italian??? Because umm there were no fucking Italians in the South in the 1860's in America. Like, historically, there were not. And if there were...they wouldn't have been living on Plantations.

[ladygawain]

I think that's what is so troubling with the show's CONSTANT, and I mean constant references to GWTW. I mean, I have a complicated relationship with that film. My brothers (one of whom passed recently as you know) and I used to watch it together every single Christmas when I was a child and even though we were not really educated on racism in the US, we knew it to be problematic but we still really loved it? However, with adulthood, and knowledge, it's become kind of intolerable to me on too many levels.

This is all to say that I get it. I get the nostalgic appeal for some, I understand the romance of it but the fact that they continually hark back to that film and that time period with no critical eye towards the very problematic racism and slavery, ESPECIALLY when they're re-creating their own own analogue to that period through the vampire-witch dynamic is reprehensible and irresponsible.

The best thing this show could do would be to TALK ABOUT IT and acknowledge it and really make the narrative clear that they KNOW that racism was a stain on the town and that now the vampires are STILL PAYING FOR WHAT THEY DID through the pain of the witches that were slaves and were wronged. There is a way that they could do it but the just keep ignoring the blaring elephant in the room which is that these women were SLAVES. Just talk about it! Just say it!! We know!! You don't make it go away and not be the reality by not talking about it. And it's worse to literally erase the pain and suffering of an entire race of people by not talking about it and making it MATTER to your narrative.

Yes to all of this. I mean, and the show will build this history in which all of the witches were slaughtered - literally slaughtered, and utterly disenfranchised by the families who now call themselves "founders" and yet they don't let the one person who is a descendent of those disenfranchised, enslaved, massacred people speak? They don't explore her history? It's erasure and negligence in the worst way and I have to say that this show has made me feel a lot of things but it's in this matter to do with race and women of color where I have been most deeply .... hurt by it, if that makes sense? And it's just gross.

And to the Italian Salvatores - yes, their dad is named Giuseppe. We don't learn whether he was fresh off the boat or what but their whole situation is anachronistically stupid. They should have given them different names to be honest but oh well.