*The views expressed in the following editorial are those of the author, and do not reflect those of RubyHornet.com and its staff.
Following up on his article debating the racist-ness of Paul Mooney, Kamaara Lens is back with his thoughts on the blockbuster of the year, James Cameron’s “Avatar”. See it below.
Note: [Any time you find yourself between these punctuation brackets in this piece, imagine yourself to be in your own private theatre. It’s dark. Only the screen is in front of you. Images come to you as you read.]
Is “Avatar” Racist? Here we go again. The RH staff asked for my response to the question for Oscar week, and you can’t blame them. Like any good editorial staff, they go where there are stories, and an anti-Avatar vibe has been buzzing around despite the film’s box office success. But for real, this is Kamarra, and for real? This is a question people are asking?
[See a slightly Native-American looking, locked out Jamaican hair styling, sort of Amazon woman resembling, kind of Nuba tribeswoman like figure gliding towards you. Oh, by the way, you’re in the jungle (of course), where she is so in touch with the natural, spiritual, and emotional world that you can’t help but love her. And everything, every green leaf, brown branch, and striped, no nipple boob on her body is in 3-D. By the way, she’s a ten-foot tall blue jungle person and doesn’t know you are one of the “sky people.” You look down at your body, and damn, you are now ten foot tall and blue, and damn, you can run and jump and you’re back in touch with a raw physicality that you lost in the western world (that’s what blue people are good for). You check under your loincloth and have a two-foot long dong. A horse cock, like all the Blue people do. Life is great. Now, you just have to use your intelligence to help the blue jungle people think their way through taking on the Sky People. You are from a western culture with rationality and intelligence, and it is now time to match your intelligence with this jungle woman’s primitive, emotional, ecological powers.]
Stories of cross-cultural contact have the ability to speak so much new truth into the world and to illuminate the ways different cultures intersect and diverge. They help answer the question, “What’s a difference that really makes a difference?” Stories of cross-cultural contact also, however, have the ability to be so thoughtless, cultural stereotype driven, and just plain stupid that they can’t help but perpetuate racist, simplistic thinking. Hence, they are the worst kind of racist.
Oh and by the way, a sexy black actress plays the ten-foot tall blue jungle woman that was galloping towards you, and a Native American actor, West Studi, plays one of her elders. It’s just coincidence that the Blue people are played by Blacks and Native Americans. Nothing to look at there.
But let’s really get to the problem here. Let me quote one of the producers of “Avatar”. In response to the charge that the plot of “Avatar” was simplistic and recycled, he said, “People don’t walk away from the theatre with plots. They walk away with themes.” Ok, whatever, I’ll give you your little point there, but stop fiddling with your little gadgets in some strange kind of circle jerk and write a plot that is deserving of its themes.
[See Kamaara bust open the door to a small white walled room with movie posters plastered all over the four walls. The four old men playing with their gadgets in the center of the room fumble to hide what they’ve been doing. There is a picture of Zoe Saldana on the floor between them.
Kamaara rips off his glasses and spits on the carpet.
“You get out of here,” one of the men says.
“No,” says Kamaara, “You listen to me you rat bastard sky person. The questions you raise and the themes you explore are not as important as the way in which you explore them: with curiosity, freely flowing, unburdened by past certainties, more interested in questions unanswered and perhaps unanswerable. This is creativity.”
Kamarra performs his speech like a young Marlon Brando, like the Al Pacino from “Heat”, like Denzel playing “Malcolm” before he left the N.O.S.
“Who the hell are you?” asks one of the old men.
Kamaara extends his arm towards the man and raises his pointer finger directly in the geezer’s face.
“I’m the dude that will seriously spear you if you don’t shut up. Now, focusing just on technology, “Avatar” may be a bold and beautiful creative act, but in terms of story, I can’t think of a less life affirming experience. Technology above all else? Isn’t this exactly what “Avatar” argues against? Blue people–heart-filled, soulful, and spiritually enlightened—use their arrows against a gun toting, unthinking, and technologically advanced race. Those big ass noble savages win out in the film, but their ‘spirit’ certainly didn’t in the production or writing.”
“2 billion dollars worth of failing?”
Kamaara slowly shakes his head and begins to draw a spear out from underneath his Matrix trench coat.
“Means not matching their ends, artists will always fail.” The old men begin to scatter.]
Is “Avatar” Racist? This is the question I have to answer? I refuse. I’m going to let a commenter from my last piece speak here. They say it better than I could.
[On the screen in front of you, see an array of the multicolored flashing lights similar to the “Can’t tell me nothing” video. They’re lighting up a smoke cloud that begins to take the form of writing. The smoke reads, “You got something to say? Say it.”]
From now on, for each column, I will include whoever writes the most insightful, well written comment in my next column. This week’s “piece” comes from Slickhomie commenting on “Is Paul Mooney Racist?”
“Let me separate u from ur family. Let me rape ur boys & girls.
Let me create ways to have u at odds w/ ur people ie: light vs dark, old vs young, man vs women etc.
Let me have this type of bullshit go on undisturbed
For centuries… then ask a descendent
Whose family been systematically through that HELL
To “tell it like it is” through comedy.
In the words of Ms One : come on yall lets keep it real.“
by Slickhomie
Well said, Slickhomie. I mean for real, Racism has dominated the last 400 years. And instead of letting me ask, “Is the American Education system racist?”, “Is Corporate America racist?”, or “With its collusion and seedy bedfellow relationship with Corporate America, is the United States government racist?”, I’ve got to ask the question, “Is Avatar Racist?”
Avatar, meet my friend Ochocinco. We’ve got two words for you: “Child,” and “Please.”