The obvious tag is a bit more appropriate.

Well. THAT was annoying.

Witchydiva: So, um, if I am half white and half asian, but I enjoy movies white people make, does that mean I hate part of myself?

Yes. Either that or you're just a person who can enjoy a flick and not turn EVERY GOD DAMNED THING into social commentary.

Repeat from the other day.

Roook: That movie made me hate white people like me

I haven't even seen it, and I hate white people like you.

The Spoony One already analyzed this.

muck4doo: If white people want to keep playing these games, let them. The noble savage, the white savior...It's all played out as hell. Here's a tip for you. Mexicans(Yes I can speak for many of them) do not look at you white progressives as some kind of liberators and saviors. We look at you as the next gen of the white mans burden types. The attitude in the barrio and Mexico is that you can go fark yourselves. Put that in your pipe dream bowl and smoke it. You treat people there like a bunch of dumbasses who can't do anything without your help, and only you know how to save them. Go fark yourselves.

lol

muck4doo: If white people want to keep playing these games, let them. The noble savage, the white savior...It's all played out as hell. Here's a tip for you. Mexicans(Yes I can speak for many of them) do not look at you white progressives as some kind of liberators and saviors. We look at you as the next gen of the white mans burden types. The attitude in the barrio and Mexico is that you can go fark yourselves. Put that in your pipe dream bowl and smoke it. You treat people there like a bunch of dumbasses who can't do anything without your help, and only you know how to save them. Go fark yourselves.

It's that kind of attitude that proves you people have a lot to learn.

tdpatriots12: It's that kind of attitude that proves you people have a lot to learn.

Did he call Mexicans savages?

DamnYankees: Pete and repeat walk into a bar...

Link (new window)

Didn't you get the memo? Repeats are okay as long as we reach our 20-Avatar-story-per-day quota.

Isn't the same link available on Fark FURTHER DOWN THE GODDAMNED PAGE?

Repeat, people!

If there is a market for Rah Rah White Pride movies where white people mow down brown natives gloriously and with only good consequences, why isn't Rush/Beck/Fox bankrolling and producing a flick like that?

I mean, if there is some great white silent majority of people just seething at how the Jews in Hollywood make fun of them and demean their proud heritage, a movie that caters to their ego should be a huge blockbuster!

Big Dave: If there is a market for Rah Rah White Pride movies where white people mow down brown natives gloriously and with only good consequences, why isn't Rush/Beck/Fox bankrolling and producing a flick like that?

/slips on Devil's advocate hat

There's - well at least in this case - two different "kinds" of racism. The stuff Rush/Beck/Fox roll out is based in feelings of resentment. For one reason or another the "conservative racist" feels that the races he or she is prejudiced against do not deserve whatever treatment they have received and should be "put in their place." So a movie like Avatar that treats them sympathetically would not appeal to them. They'll just rent Zulu, an otherwise excellent movie that still appeals on some level to their instincts.

On the other hand there's the "liberal racists" who deep down don't even comprehend their beliefs as racist, and have genuine hatred for folks described in the above paragraph. They view the same races from a different perspective; one of pity, self-loathing, and a feeling of responsibility for their plight. It goes beyond that otherwise reasonable opinion by making the assumption that due to said interference, the oppressed minorities are weak and unable to help themselves without assistance from their (basically) conquerors. It still assumes a superior role, but the motivation is completely different. Guilt not resentment.

So give Rush Limbaugh a typewriter and he's going to write a completely different, but still quite racist movie. They're just attacking the same prejudice from different sides.

Though lots of movies make the completely understandable move of making a white male protagonist because that's who goes to movies, and they assume viewers can't empathize with someone different than them. In that case, the prejudice is the filmmakers making assumptions about the audience. If that's the case, can we blame them?

/really, really simplified some terms

I'd love to see a movie where a predominately white, technologically advanced society arrives on a utopian planet and are immediately killed an eaten by the dark-as-night natives and their ships broken down into scrap parts.

I can't see how anyone would have a problem with that scenario. No sir.

//Warning: sarcasm.

ModernLuddite: I'd love to see a movie where a predominately white, technologically advanced society arrives on a utopian planet and are immediately killed an eaten by the dark-as-night natives and their ships broken down into scrap parts.

Have they made a movie about Captain Cook (new window)?

Actually, after thinking about it, here is a much much better example.

Rich white man confidently strides in to exotic territory with an army and promptly gets killed in a method usually reserved for nightmares and horror novels (new window).



But if you're looking for a movie that's actually been made that even vaguely fits into your hypothetical "white man getting owned by minority" scenario, the closest is probably Kingdom of Heaven.

DarthBrooks: Trust me, you've seen this movie already.

Or Pocahontas, or Dances With Wolves, or The Last Samurai (sans the ending). The great white hero trope isn't something limited to Ferngully and it was by far not the first film to do it. Beyond the naturalistic theme, and that trope, Avatar resembles Ferngully pretty much not at all.

It's a terrible movie. I've been saying this for days here, on the twice an hour Avatar threads, and I've been attacked for it almost every time.

Leishu: Or Pocahontas, or Dances With Wolves, or The Last Samurai (sans the ending). The great white hero trope isn't something limited to Ferngully and it was by far not the first film to do it. Beyond the naturalistic theme, and that trope, Avatar resembles Ferngully pretty much not at all.

I'm starting to think race is just one of variations on a common theme.

Take Robin Hood. Robin is a noble, or at least of noble birth, and he returns to England to help the common people fight the nobles. He's still a noble and the commoners were being quite capably repressed by the Sheriff of Nottingham before he showed up to fix everything.

I'm not sure what that means, to be honest - but the similarities are there. And it's not exactly an uncommon way to tell a story.

...no I haven't seen Avatar and probly won't...

i think we're supposed to worship those that are our perceived superiors and kowtow to our perceived inferiors.

mebbe. it's a movie.
get over yourselves.

tdpatriots12: ...no I haven't seen Avatar and probly won't...

I feel weird about this movie. I didn't like it at all. I didn't want to watch it. Yet, somehow I am glad I saw it. It's a farking mind-bender.

God I hate this movie. I hate every lowest-common-denominator halfwit (or LCD sexual deviant) it was meant to appeal to. I recommend seeing it though.

galactus5000: Rubber Biscuit: It's a terrible movie. I've been saying this for days here, on the twice an hour Avatar threads, and I've been attacked for it almost every time.

Because both you and Bill Frist keep saying the same thing over and over and over, not realising that you are in the minority and that the rest of us wish you would just shut up and go somewhere else.

We get it, you didn't like the damn film. Message received. You can go away now.

I get it. You have a weird fetish for shiat movies. You can go now.

Twat.

I think that if people try really hard that they will find any excuse to not like a good movie.

tafka: I think that if people try really hard that they will find any excuse to not like a good movie.

Nothing about what I've seen or heard about this movie makes me want to see it.

The problem with people like this is that they'll just never be happy.

Make a film that shows black people as gangsters and it's racist. Make a film which suggests they might be a little more than that and go an inch too far, and it's "white guilt".

I happen to think Dances With Wolves isn't much of a "white guilt" movie. The native Americans were treated like crap, and white people were told they were savages. I read DWW as two things: a call for tolerance, and a man following his own path, being non-conformist.

I'd much rather see a lot more criticism of Spike Lee and his horrendously simplistic views about race than DWW or Avatar. But oh no, you won't get a liberal going anywhere near him.

galactus5000: Rubber Biscuit: galactus5000: Rubber Biscuit: It's a terrible movie. I've been saying this for days here, on the twice an hour Avatar threads, and I've been attacked for it almost every time.

Because both you and Bill Frist keep saying the same thing over and over and over, not realising that you are in the minority and that the rest of us wish you would just shut up and go somewhere else.

We get it, you didn't like the damn film. Message received. You can go away now.

I get it. You have a weird fetish for shiat movies. You can go now.

Twat.

I get it, you're a tool.

Wentz.

Quit trying to make "fetch" happen.

io9 is biatching about something? Imagine that. That site's always had a problem with having nothing worthwhile to say but still having to say something.

if i get what the article is really saying is..that i'm feel guitly because white folks killed and mistreated indians and blacks in america and liking avatar is my way of letting go of that guilt. But as a ethnicity we will truly be set free of such feelings when movies like avatar end like the really should have with the Space Marines laying waste to the natives with their superior fire power?

But wouldn't that last part, the space marines winning, open a whole nother can of white folk guilt? Sure it would. Parrallels would be linked to the,all this after the space marines win over foreign lands, British Empire and its vast control over the world through Imperialism and Colonialism. Or it could be seen as the marines, very american sounding and looking, are policing the galaxy and god knows the rest of the country blames america for that already.

ITS A LOSE/LOSE Situation. No matter where you turn white people will feel guilty and make movies like avatar.

Heck, the first thing I thought when I saw the trailer was "great, first we kick the brownies out of their teepees, now we're kickin' the bluies out of THEIR teepees"

/no I didn't

oldebayer: Roook: That movie made me hate white people like me

I haven't even seen it, and I hate white people like you.

Beautiful.

Avatar if a great film, however.

When Will White People Stop Greenlighting This Stupid Article?

Wait didn't we already have this thread?