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

[antikythera]

This movie has suddenly made me understand what this white guilt trope is about -- it's the white guy (or metaphorical white guy) being redeemed in his own eyes and/or in the eyes of those whose oppression he's participated in. (It's all about his feelings and how people feel about him and how he feels about himself, which is too funny because I keep getting told that's how white women act.) It's a big white wish to be able to prove that you're a better white guy than the rest of the white guys

[dichroic]

There are actually not a ton of cases in history where people threw off their oppressors without outside help, though said help hasn't necessarily come from among the oppressors' ranks. More often I think it's been from 'the enemy of my enemy', like the French helping in the American Revolution. Sometimes the opporessors were already crumbling from within (e.g. the overthrow of the Roman Empire). In other cases I know of, there may not have been tangible help, but world opinion played a role, as with India winning its independence (in that case I think they were also able to convince a lot of people within England that colonialism was wrong). Since I've just lit the menorah I'm also reminded of the story of Chanukah, where there was no outside help - but those guys also didn't win in the long run.

Of course, that doesn't mean they couldn't still make a fictional movie where the oppressed did it by themselves. It would be inspiring, certanly.

[supermouse]

The only film I can think of where the oppressed throw off their oppressors without a white man joining them and becoming their leader is _Happy Feet_.

[antikythera]

There are actually not a ton of cases in history where people threw off their oppressors without outside help,

Yeah, but how many times did outside help from one guy make the difference between survival and genocide? We're talking about movies here. ;) Avatar has proved that these stories don't need to be told in realistic Earth history settings.

[dharma_slut]

heh.

I am imagining a movie where the colonists leave (this would be from the white POV) with the fires of celebration dwindling away-- a party to which the white people were un-invited.

And there is no special snowflake genius gone-native-guy for the audience to identify with.

No redemption for whites. Yeah, that would go over big....

Come to think of it, has there ever been a movie in which Earth was dominated by an alien race and was liberated by a special-snowflake alien dude who became the messiah for (white mostly) humans? Who was the Big Cheese in that Battlefeild Earth film? An earth guy, right?

[antikythera]

I refuse to acknowledge L. Ron Hubbard. :P

Would that be a good movie, if the special-snowflake-oppressor-gone-good story was told from the perspective of the oppressed race? Would it make a difference if the oppressors were not human and all humans were in the same boat?

I would like to see the movie that you describe there told without any humans in it at all -- maybe the purple dog people celebrating while the boats of the green bird people disappear over the horizon. But I don't know if that would be any less pointy of a story from the white audiences' perspective, or enough less pointy that Hollywood would not be afraid to tell it.

I've said it before, Hollywood sucks. It isn't made for those of us who aren't straight white Christian males.