So I was talking some about this to Kai this morning, but what I took out of this movie, and my own experiences and thoughts, is that minstrelsy is really a problem when people don't see it as an issue. I think it is not about saying "black people are dirty scum and lazy" or anything that explicit. The issue is that, for example, the cartoons can be funny. Bugs Bunny is a funny guy, and I can totally see myself enjoying that cartoon as a kid, and not seeing anything wrong with it at all. I cringe to think about it, but I do have memories (some painfully recent) of watching extremely racist minstrel things, and thoroughly enjoying watching some exaggeratedly grotesque black man shuck and jive across my computer screen, eating giant watermelons. I can completely see how if I was more exposed to those sorts of things, and was raised with minstrel cartoons as my main form of entertainment, it would alter how I saw real black people. I wouldn't necessarily explicitly think that all black people are horrible and savage for example, but when I saw a black person I think I would instinctively compare them to the racist propaganda I had been fed, and I would not be able to look at them without seeing that Sambo or Coon image superimposed on their own face.
The problem with minstrelsy, and the reason it is a problem still, is not because it is explicitly calling all black people savage or horrible or stupid--although it does that too (but far less nowadays)--but because it discolors (pun intended, sorry) my and other peoples views of black people. It is easy picture these propagandized minstrel images when you see a black person if you grew up in a household with "Black Americana" and those images in your mind will forever keep you from seeing black people as wholly human, and disconnect the real people from their grotesque fictional counterparts. I optimistically think that few people are outright racist. Actually no that is wrong, but at least the majority of people are not explicitly racist. However, the ideas popularized through minstrel icons shade the popular view of black people for the worse, and taint how they are perceived. The minstrel propaganda is subtle, and hard to identify in this day and age, but it effects our views of black people just the same, and is even harder to separate from reality because there are fewer clearly racist images like those we saw during the movie. There is just, for example, B.A. being inevitably surprised to be knocked out and flown around the world--although I must admit, by the middle of the second season he does begin to suspect something might be up--and his rage at awakening to discover he has been transferred to a new continent. His apparent eagerness to be violent may also tend towards minstrelsy at points. I do not know if his character as a whole is a minstrel (I think not) but there are definitely aspects of the character which reflect minstrel dynamics, and subtly effect consumers views of black people, especially if they live in a relatively sheltered community (like Uni) and are do not interact with actual black people to see that they are as human as everyone else, and not exactly the popular depictions that are seen.
So do you see the shift from exaggerated racist depictions to subtleness as progress? I agree that not knowing that minstrelsy is a problem is a problem. We now recognize the blackface, wide white mouthed actors and dancers as wrong, which I definitely see as a step in the right direction. I'm honestly not sure where I'm going with this, but it seems a bit unusual to think that moving away from blatant racism isn't entirely a good thing because it just ushers in a different kind of racism. Perhaps the next step is realizing how the more subtle propaganda is also dangerous. Is there a better or worse one?
ReplyDeleteCorrect me if I'm wrong, but I think what he's trying to say is that while blunt racism has for the most part been eliminated, the increasingly subtle form it has taken almost makes us forget that it *is* damaging to the reputation of African Americans; that by adopting a seemingly more innocuous shape, subtle minstrelsy may become even more pervasive?
DeleteYeah, basically what Athena said. I would say that we are better of with the more subtle minstrelsy than with the outright racism of blackface etcetera, but minstrelsy as it is now is by no means harmless. I just think that even if minstrel images are not meant in a racist way (which I guess gets at what Mr. Mitchell was saying with the fake lynching decorations that were "not meant to be racist") does not mean they are okay. Even jokingly making black people appear stupid, meant lightheartedly, alters peoples perceptions in a negative manner. Blonde jokes, for instance, are not made because people actually think all blonde people are dumb (I don't think/hope not), but they still make people think of those jokes and the stupidity represented therein when they see blonde people. I do think that the next step is realizing that this subtle propaganda is also racist and a bad thing. And the step after that would be to realize that getting rid of subtle racism will probably just lead to even more subtle racism, and so it goes, ad infinitum.
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