two related pop-culture links for you...

[liminalia]

When Will White People Stop Making Movies Like Avatar?

and

And We Shall Call This Moff's LawThe law in question being summed up roughly as, "Whenever someone critiques the racial tropes in a work of entertainment online, the probability that a white commenter will say something like 'Why can’t you just watch the movie for what it is??? Why can’t

Comments

[dichroic]

I think that should be "probability rapidly approaches one".

So as not to derail with my kneejerk math, I will say that I agree with the sentiment, and further, I think the answer to "why can't you just watch it for what it is?" might be "Ummm, because 'what it is' is both racist and hackneyed."

[liminalia]

Fixing. You can tell I never took Stats.

[dichroic]

You can tell I taught it ;-) (Well, Six Sigma. Close enough.)

[onelittlesleep]

"It's just fantasy/a movie/scifi!"

or

"Do you have to see race in everything?!"

and strangely enough, I see this one alot on race commentary lately:

"You might not realize it, but at one time, the IRISH were some of the most oppressed people in the world!"

[liminalia]

Oh yeah, I've seen that too many times to count. 99.9% of the time from people who were born long after Kennedy was elected, let alone when NINA signs were prevalent. What does that even mean? "We were discriminated against 3 generations ago, so we totes can't be racist"?

[onelittlesleep]

It means they have NO REAL AWARENESS of the effects of racism today. They assume racism is about SLAVERY and reparations and has been LONG TAKEN CARE OF.

So they bring up Irish history like "WE GOT OVER IT. WHY CAN'T YOU?"

[liminalia]

Yep, I think you got it in one.

[liminalia]

I think I may have worded the law unclearly: it is the person who says, "It's just a movie" who should just sit on their hands, sorry.

[teaberryblue]

Yeah, on the subject of your asterisk, even people trying to be progressive are sometimes unaware of the issues. I mean, I would guess Cameron was trying to be progressive.

Part of my job involves vetting TV and film scripts. For every one thing I point out that writers change, there are ten that they keep in with some silly explanation for why it HAS to be that way. And I'm constantly uncertain that I'm qualified, as a white woman, to be doing this job. I'm sure for every one thing I catch, there are ten things I miss, and that means that the writers are only changing one in a hundred.

[teaberryblue]

As a former film student, I firmly believe that it is possible to critique something for its technical achievements separately from critiquing it for its story achievements (or failures). It's even possible to point out the good things a story does while remaining cognizant of the bad things.

That being said, am I the only person on this list who has to bite her tongue every time someone she knows said they enjoyed this movie? Everything I have heard about it makes me want to hurl.

[facetofcathy]

For a quick and pithy answer to it's just a mooooooovie:

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1948662,00.html

(Complex scientific study of behaviour reported in a popular newsmagazine--assume there are some issues with the story.)