To whom it may concern...

[anonymouse08]

Download link for "White America" - VVC Fuck You Challenge 2008: Click for the Sendspace link (updated 8/16/10).Sorry about the subject heading, couldn't resist. ;) I've seen a few people here and there wondering if this vid would be uploaded anywhere since the vidder chose to stay anonymous. Sure, why not

Comments

[liviapenn]

These are our deeply flawed shows, and we love them to distraction.

Which...ouch. If that's actually the meaning we are supposed to draw from the vid, then your vid is scathing criticism indeed.

Is it? I haven't seen the vid yet (still downloading) so maybe I won't actually think it's saying this, but if it *is* saying this-- well, it's *true*, isn't it? I mean, just in the sense that we're *still watching.*

I don't know. I stopped watching SPN S3 about three episodes in because it just felt wrong. Too grim, too much emphasis on the horror-porn-- it just didn't feel the same as the previous two seasons. But I still love S1 and S2 and would recommend them to just about anyone-- warts and all.

Same with VM season 2-- watched a few episodes, gave up on it (the main reason, IIRC, was the lack of Wallace and Weevil, and the new focus on the Casablancas, blargh.) But I can't count the number of people I've *made* sit down and watch S1 in two or three marathon chunks. It's so good!

And it still took a friend of mine watching S1 to point out to me "you've noticed that nearly every line of dialogue that Wallace gets, that isn't pure exposition about the case, you could tag on 'BECAUSE I'M YOUR BLACK FRIEND YO' and it would make sense?" ... And I had never noticed that. But it's true. Even *offscreen* lines of dialogue that Veronica only responds to, like when she calls Wallace to help her out of the trunk of a car. "Hey Wallace, what's up.... Yes, LL Cool J rocks, Wallace... now listen..."

But on the other hand, I mean, I was deeply disappointed in DW S3, but I still watched S4. I paid *money* for Dr. Horrible.

Does it matter if we still love these shows if we recommend them like I recommend novels written in 1930? "Well, it's great--! But look out for the couple of scenes where the hero and heroine talk about how all Jews are greedy and sticky-fingered. But other than that, it's fantastic and you'll love them!" Does that make it okay, if we at least acknowledge the issues? Are there shows (like SPN) or characters (like Spike) where the problematic issues go so deep that you can't separate the icky parts out and say "Well, aside from that, the story is great and the characters are great!"

Is it okay to say "Well, it was 1930 and you couldn't expect Dorothy Sayers to know any better than to have her hero be an anti-semite?" At what year is the cut-off point, where you have to stop saying "Well, you can't really expect Rob Thomas to portray feminist activists as anything but criminally psychotic misandrists, or for Russell T. Davies to depict black women as anything but sidekicks hopelessly pining after the white hero (who ignores them in favor of his TRUE love, who is white?)" Or do you refuse to make excuses for anyone?

I doubt this comment is short enough to be posted in one chunk which means I should probably stop talking...

[mresundance]

"you've noticed that nearly every line of dialogue that Wallace gets, that isn't pure exposition about the case, you could tag on 'BECAUSE I'M YOUR BLACK FRIEND YO' and it would make sense?" . . . Even *offscreen* lines of dialogue that Veronica only responds to, like when she calls Wallace to help her out of the trunk of a car.

Ouch. So even if he's offscreen, "we have to make sure the audience knows he's the black dude". That's not tolkenizing nor problematic because of the assumption that "everyone is white unless otherwise noted", which is longhand for white = default.

And sidekicks who are people of color and tolkenized . . . not a really old trope . . . (where is Tonto when you need him?)

Again, though, I haven't seen that much of the show, so all this could be totally blown out of the water by the fact that I don't really know the character, and what I'm getting is what I've been told, in a sense. I mean, there could be ways the character toys with certain notions of race, or brings about more awareness. Just sayin'. It could be, like tv_elf pointed out, more about Veronica being able to trust Latino and black guys in her life and while constantly having to deal with crazy murdering white dudes.

I so agree on SPN. Especially season 3. I watched it all the way through, and it did get a little better towards the end, but still. I kept watching thinking, nah, it can't get it any worse. And week by week . . . it did. It kills me that so many people in SPN fandom fall over themselves over Kripke and Sera Gamble. Hey, I like Kripke's ideas - the characters, the universe he's created - etc. But I will NEVER fall over myself for the writing either Gamble nor Kripke have done as of late. Sorry. They need to do better on the huge problem of sexism and misogyny in the show before I'll tip my hat to them. I really don't care if the focus is the boys. That doesn't preclude writing the few female characters that actually show up to be more than sex objects or victims - or any female characters - as actual human beings with some kind of agency and authenticity behind them.

There's been the revamped BSG and Joss Whedon out there, amongst others, and I'm supposed to be all excited by some screenwrite who puts "skanky bitch" in the mouths of their characters on a nearly weekly basis? Yeah. Fuck that.

But yaknow. I did still watch. So I'm guilty, guilty, guilty as anyone else.

[veredus]

I'm going to have to expand on this more in my LJ but another way to interpret it is to see the three fandoms as three different case studies of three different types of bigotry: racism (Spike killings of non-white slayers), marginalism (VM's treatment of Wallace) and misogyny (Dean's treatment of women even if they are suppose to be demons).

If you look at the vid with that in mind, the vid makes a lot more sense. Then instead of a condemnation of fandom for loving these characters despite their ickiness, the first coda (the one with Spike burning up, VM running down a dark hallway, and Dean dead) comes off more like a cautionary tale about the consequences of committing such prejudiced actions.

What's even more interesting is the second coda when you see Sam laughing, VM and her dead friend laughing in a limo and Spike smiling in a bathtub seems to be a negation of the consequences (i.e. "We're still okay!"), but coupled with Emimen's lyrics seems more like a "Haha, I'm kidding! No, seriously, I hope you die." type of a fuck you.

There's other interesting things in the vid, like the vidder's views on Dean's descent into a demon/evil, Sam's polarizing position to Dean, Emimen's lyrics of "look at all the hugs I get" being paired with clips that are not hug-like at all that seems deliberate on the vidder's part (but might not be). But I'll save that for a more expanded post later.

Credit goes to cmshaw, anoel and who spent most of Sunday night talking about this vid with me and watching it over and over again. It might not be the explanation that works for everyone, but it works for me. And I figured it wouldn't hurt to throw in another pov.

[veredus]

elz was the third one, stupid fingers.