Wiscon 31: What These People Need Is a Honky

[oyceter]

Description: Tom Cruise is the Last Samurai. Kevin Costner wins the heart of American Indians with his wolf dancing. Orlando Bloom, in Kingdom of Heaven, goes from medieval England to Jerusalem to teach the Arabs how to sink wells and transport water. Is there anything that can be done about this plague of Orientalist white-guy Mary Sue-ism?

Panelists: Doselle Young, coniraya, me, Janine Ellen Young (mod)

Props to vito_excalibur for the Best Panel Title Ever!

Doselle Young ran in, saw me and coniraya sitting there, gulping down our caffeinated beverages of choice in an attempt to be coherent for the panel, and said, "I'm the moderator?!"

"Yup," we said, still half asleep.

"But I don't want to be the moderator! Being moderator is boring! I think we should rule by anarchy!"

And we probably would have until Janine Ellen Young (Doselle's wife) came in and got stuck as the moderator. There was much joking around about what the panel needed was a honky, as Janine was the only white person on the panel. I think coniraya (black) joked that he was probably going to get killed off in the first half.

I don't have very good notes on what was said at the panel, since I was mostly trying to concentrate on sounding somewhat intelligent.

I gave a list of movies that may or may not fit the panel description, as largely culled from LJ (LJ knows all!). My caveat is that I got these off the flist and haven't seen most of them. I'm also adding in the titles that came up during the panel itself.

List of movies/books: The Last Samurai, Shogun, The Painted Veil, The Magnificent Seven (? eventually voted off by the audience), Kim, South Pacific, Lost in Translation, Seven Years in Tibet, The King and I, Anna and the king, The Man Who Would Be King (identified as a take on the trope), Dances with Wolves, Geronimo, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Windtalkers, Glory, Cry Freedom, Blood Diamond, The Constant Gardener, The Last King of Scotland (as a sort-of take on the trope), Amistad, Kingdom of Heaven, Emerald Forest, Clan of the Cave Bear, Lawrence of Arabia, Return of the Jedi (Ewoks), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III, Tears of the Sun, Pathfinder, Tamora Pierce's Trickster and Kel books, and the multitude of movies that fit the "white teacher saving inner city kids" trope. ladyjax threw out Posse as an example of a good take on the trope.

I summarized the trope as being (please picture scarequotes around all occurences of "natives"): White guy flees from his own culture for personal reasons (to set him up as different from those with white privilege). White guy meets natives. Natives educate white guy. White guy learns the way of natives, possibly also converting a native person who was originally doubtful of him, thereby proving white guy's worthiness. White guy fights for naties. White guy makes dramatic escape while the native guy dies, possibly trying to help the white guy. The movie then ends with a dramatic coda and captions that inform the audience that despite white guy's triumph, the Situation Remains Dire.

The key to all this is that the entire movie is about the white guy's personal growth and realization and that people of color serve only to further the white guy's epiphanies.

"And don't forget, the white guy always gets the sexy native girl! Or a white girl who has been raised native," said one of the panelists.

Janine asked all of us which movie of this type offended us the most, and we all fell silent for a while. "But there are so many!" someone said.

Doselle Young then (or before? I have horrible memories of this panel) talked about a recent movie he saw in which the black character not only sacrificed himself for the white character, a la Terminator 2, but did so singing and dancing. I think I mentioned Cry Freedom because it was the most recent one I had seen and because the first half actually focused on the black character, only to have the entire second half be about the white journalist's escape. There were maybe two black characters in the second half, and the movie was set in South Africa! Coniraya mentioned Phantom Menace (I think); he remembered being so excited about it, only to go in and be slapped in the face with Jar-Jar Binks, the Japanese-sounding evil traders, and the Jewish-sounding merchant/slaveowner.

Janine asked if Lucas was deliberately being racist; all of us thought no, probably not. Coniraya said that lots of cartoons that Lucas watched probably had the same accents and that Lucas might have just picked it up, but that that was why it was important to examine these things.

I brought up the Ewoks speaking Tagalog, knowledge courtesy of littlebutfierce ("Yes, let's make the little brown bears speak the language of the litle brown people!" she remarked there); Coniraya told people about the Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee casting news. The audience all groaned out loud, and Doselle Young put his head in his hands and said, "Excuse me. I need a moment to process." I can't remember if news of Brian Dennehy cast as GenghisKublai Khan came up here or not, though I suspect it did.

seaya mentioned the giant genre of "white teacher saves inner city kids," leading Coniraya to describe a Mad TV sketch featured "Nice Teacher Lady."

Janine asked us why we thought these "white man savior" movies were made by Hollywood. I think I took that opportunity to spout off my theory that the movies displayed the difference between institutional racism and personal prejudice; the heroes in the movies are ok in the end because they have conquered their personal prejudice, even if they have done absolutely nothing to combat racism as an institution. But the coda at the end about the Dire Situation served to make the (white) audience feel better for educating themselves on these issues.

Coniraya made the point that these movies clearly weren't being made for POC, which was racism in a whole 'nother sense. The filmmakers and writers were simply assuming that their audience was white.

I think I made a point about how even though the story of the white pilot in Shogun and the mixed-race protagonist of the Bury My Heart movie were both based on historical fact, someone (or many someones) made the decision to use that historical figure instead of focusing on non-white historical figures.

Someone in the audience mentioned mixed-race characters in media and how they're nearly always forced to act as a bridge between cultures or a translator or an interpreter. And then, of course, there was mention of the Tragic Mulatto trope. starkeymonster said something like, "Wouldn't it be nice if, for once, there were a mixed-race character who was just, you know, there? Having her own life? And not being tragic or conflicted?"

Coniraya also said that he lost respect for any actor or performer who was mixed race but claimed to be white, and only later admitted to being mixed race when it was politically savvy to do so.

We went back to the topic of interracial romances and how they always seemed to be between a white man and a woman of color; I can't remember if people mentioned that it was like colonialism in the miniature, but I suspect they did. Coniraya also mentioned that the black man never gets to have a romance with the white woman, citing Pelican Brief (the romance is in the book) and something that I forgot. I can't remember if the trope of the desexualized Asian man and the super-sexualized Asian woman came up, though I think it did, because I remember saying something about not being a geisha.

Someone asked if Denzel Washington specifically asked to be paired with other women of color; Coniraya said yes, but that Denzel was one of the few black actors who had the clout to do so.

There was also talk of the politics and financials of Hollywood, of how there are nearly no actors like Denzel who can draw in a white audience, and of how the system perpetuated itself. All the starring roles are given to white actors, so they become the ones people are familiar with, while actors of color get stuck with stereotyped roles. And, of course, the system went even further, so that most producers and writers and directors are white as well. Coniraya mentioned Pam Noles' post on white males still dominating Hollywood, surprise surprise.

I think I said something about how most of the movies have the person of color admiring the white protagonist for his character or his skill or something, and in general the panelists seemed to agree that the movies were a salve for white guilt -- get acknowledged for your efforts without having to give up any privilege.

Someone else brought up the fact that we were mostly talking about movies and TV (there was mention of the Buffyverse California and the Stargates); Doselle mentioned that for books, he wasn't as struck by it because it wasn't visual. I mentioned the Empire books by Feist and Wurts for mine (People! Asian culture is not all about ritual suicide!). I think this is when Coniraya talked about the Tamora Pierce books.

We never got around to talking about the Magical Negro as a possible complement to the Honky Savior trope, and I think the panel concluded with panelists saying that it would be so easy not to create a Honky Savior movie just by having POC as the main characters.

All in all, this was the panel I had the most fun at, and I think it went pretty well with the audience too. I do wish we were able to talk about more things in detail, but I think we hit a good number of topics. Also, the audience was great.

ETA: I forgot! Here's the link I told people about at the panel: "How to write about Africa."

ETA2: Attributed note of white teacher subgenre to seaya

ETA3: Fixed info on Brian Dennehy and added link.

Comments

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

It's true, although I'd argue that the society of The Hero and the Crown reads as white. Which is not to say that it doesn't have a cool two true love thing and a take on the patriarchy.

Re: Please clarify

[estara.livejournal.com]

well geographically both are Damar, just several hundreds/thousands ? of years apart and the heroine of the Blue Sword even sees Aerin in some campfire and meets Lute, as far as I remember. .. ought to reread sometime soon

Re: Please clarify

[rilina.livejournal.com]

The Hero and the Crown is also problematic because Aerin is coded as being different racially from the people she saves; she's described as being red-haired and green-eyed and thus different. It's still a honky story, if perhaps marginally less problematic than The Blue Sword.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

Thank you!

Re: Please clarify

[mkcs.livejournal.com]

I saw it as much more problematic, in that sense, than 'The Blue Sword'.

In 'The Blue Sword', the situation is a thinly camoflagued version of the British Raj. The racism of the British in the situation is acknowledged to at least some degree, and the 'Afghans' in the hills are allowed to be educated and intelligent, as well as being exotic to the British-born heroine.

And the mystical powers that the heroine develops turn out to be because she's part-Afghan, not because she's a foreigner. Furthermore, it's 'white woman and mixed group of native tribes and white men save white and native kingdoms from evil demons'. It's not as though the Afghans have no agency.

In 'The Hero and the Crown', the mystical powers seem to correlate worryingly closely with how white one's skin is. Aerin's family originally came from the North, and they have some power. Aerin's mother came from the North more recently, so she's a white-skinned red-head and she and her family members have much more power. The wizard, Luthe, has much more power than her family again, and he's even whiter than her, and blond.

Aerin and Luthe save Damar without Damar even being aware of the fact.

I was surprised, reading this thread, to find people who'd read Aerin's family as 'coded white', when there is explicit discussion of the skin colours in the book, although I suppose if one read it before 'The Blue Sword' and one skipped over a few passages, one might very well miss it.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

Good points about the problematics of "Hero and the Crown" being even more hidden. Though the general response to "Blue Sword" as colonialist is usually a rejection of "Blue Sword" as racist, probably because it's a childhood favorite of so many.

I was surprised, reading this thread, to find people who'd read Aerin's family as 'coded white', when there is explicit discussion of the skin colours in the book, although I suppose if one read it before 'The Blue Sword' and one skipped over a few passages, one might very well miss it.

I think I ended up reading Aerin as coded white because of her hair and her eyes, and because I think I read "Hero and Crown" before "Blue Sword." The other part may also be because the culture feels very Eurofantasy-esque.

On the other hand, I think I need to reread to make more notes about skin color and dynamics and whatnot in the books; it's been so long that I'm really doubting my memory.

Re: Please clarify

[mkcs.livejournal.com]

Having thought a bit further, I think one can actually make at least a reasonable argument for Aerin's not being coded white. It depends on the viewpoint of the reader, partly.

After all, in her country, she's one of a minority ethnic group that the majority see as 'savage' (uncivilised Northerners) and possibly mystical. Her dragon-killing is definitely interpreted as an expression of this by the courtiers. She's certainly discriminated against for not being of the majority ethnicity (and I did read her final acceptance of not being monarch in her own right as being a race issue, not a sex-role issue, mainly).

One could argue that this is intended to work like 'A Wizard of Earthsea', which uses brown=normal and white=savage to make a point about the overwhelming 'whiteness' of fantasy while also providing a good fantasy novel with a hero of colour.

The difference is in the viewpoint character, of course. Aerin is definitely white-skinned.

I didn't read the culture as Eurofantasy-esque, but I don't know how much of that is because I read 'The Blue Sword' first, so I saw it as very much set somewhere like Afghanistan. I'll have to read it again to see what's there.

(Are you seeing Aerin and her family as the same ethnicity? That definitely confuses me. So much of her situation hinges on her obvious physical differences from her family -- most of which are to do with colour, although height is also an issue. So if the culture is Eurofantasy, her mother can't be, but if the culture isn't, her mother, by implication, must be.)

I do think 'The Blue Sword' has a lot of very clear rejection of colonialism in it. It's easy to find bits of colonialism in it, because it is set against a colonial background, but it's got a lot of explicit statements that the colonial attitude towards other countries is demeaning for all parties, as well as the implicit anti-colonial messages that attach to having the indigenous culture succeed in preserving its independence. It is also unusual for a racist work to end in a set of mixed marriages and the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between countries.

Some of McKinley's other work suggests that one can also view the colonialism of the England-equivalent (the one that Harry thinks of only as 'Home') as normal behaviour for any country at a certain stage. Certainly, Damar used to be a great land that filled most of the continent south of the hill country -- but other stories set in different bits of this fantasy world's history ('Deerskin', 'The Healer', and 'The Stagman'), as well as bits of 'The Blue Sword', make it clear that the continent in question has been divided into many kingdoms on many occasions, and so Damar's claim to have owned all of it seems likely to have been through conquest and colonisation too.

Thanks for this discussion, incidentally. It's been really good for making me think about aspects of these books that I'd noticed, but never really focused on.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

One could argue that this is intended to work like 'A Wizard of Earthsea', which uses brown=normal and white=savage to make a point about the overwhelming 'whiteness' of fantasy while also providing a good fantasy novel with a hero of colour.

The difference is in the viewpoint character, of course. Aerin is definitely white-skinned.

Well, the last sentence is basically my problem with the book and why I think it falls into the category of "white savior." It's great that the background people are POC, but it means that once again, we don't have a POC protagonist and a white main character that saves the day.

That's also my problem with Blue Sword. I think McKinley (and most people) are anti-imperialist, but the problem still remains that many narratives about anti-imperialism or whatnot still have white protagonists.

I think you could make the argument that many fantasy books are about colonialism and imperialism and countries conquering others. But the problem with those is that they take race out of the picture, while in our world, race was a very huge part in colonialism. So it really bugs me when most stories either don't address race at all by having the entire world be white or when they do address race, but only through the means of having a white main character.

Re: Please clarify

[(Anonymous)]

There can be a huge difference between what the author intends and what they actually end up writing.

And I think this is it, here.

Harry's mixed blood does mix things up there, a bit, but really not much.

Re: Please clarify

[daedala.livejournal.com]

I think it might matter which book you read first, maybe. I read The Hero and the Crown first, and I agree that the society codes as white. White white white. The red hair was just the usual red-haired Mary Sue thing (not that I thought so at the time) really well-done.

When I read The Blue Sword, I thought it was weird how turning the land into the desert lead the people to take up a Middle-Eastern nomadic type lifestyle, but didn't actually perceive them as nonwhite, because Damar had already been coded in my head as Generic European Fantasy. Nomadism is practical in a desert, so they got tanned. I didn't imprint on TBS the way I did on THATC; the latter is one of my favorite comfort reads of all time. I've read THATC a million zillion times. I liked TBS okay.....

Since The Blue Sword was actually written first, I absolutely agree that they're both racially problematic. It's just that reading them in the direction I did, I thought they were problematic only in the absence of colored characters, and I tend to give that a pass (is that fair?) in fantasies without mass transit.

I don't know if this says more about me or the books. It seems a weird enough perspective to be worth mentioning.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

Oh, that's interesting! I think I read THATC first, which also totally read as white, but with TBS, I thought they were desert nomads and didn't get the connection with THATC for some time. So that probably skews things too.

Re: Please clarify

[daedala.livejournal.com]

I don't think I would have realized it was so directly related if I hadn't already known it was a sequel. I probably would have figured "same fictional world, around the same area, my don't stories change over time."

Throwing in the pseudo-Raj just seemed sooooooo weird. That's part of the reason I never bonded with the story. Despite Harry usually being my kinda Mary Sue.

Also, I am usually weirded out by the "white woman kidnapped by savage" type stories, and not usually into the "white woman is matched with exotic savage" type stories. It's a romance subgenre that leaves me cold. Exoticization is not romantic. I like some stories of that type that get around the exoticization somehow.

One aspect of cultural appropriation is the one where you represent a culture you don't understand, and your heroes are those whose values are closest to yours (no matter how far they are from the values of the culture in question). Like how romance heroines are always feminists.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

One aspect of cultural appropriation is the one where you represent a culture you don't understand, and your heroes are those whose values are closest to yours (no matter how far they are from the values of the culture in question).

Yes! OMG I hate those romances in which the heroine is a feminist and a Marxist and always fights for the poor oppressed people, even if she's a born noble and whatnot. It makes no sense.

Re: Please clarify

[daedala.livejournal.com]

Or the protagonist in a story depicting gay culture happens to be the only monogamous gay character. Or the good characters in a novel about India are all anti-suttee, and the bad characters are all pro-suttee. Hell, even the stories where bad characters are allergic to the good characters' cats annoy me.

It's not so much that I object to all romance heroines being feminists; it's that I object to them being 20th century feminists rather than 19th century feminists (or 16th century, or whatever). I can see that it might be hard to identify with someone who was antifeminist, enough to write the character, even. But I really like the thought process for being feminist, or abolitionist, or whatever in the context of the time and culture; I don't like time-travel stories without a time-traveler.

I would be interested in any romance recs that you felt dealt with race well. I've been racking my brain and not thinking of any, but that's probably because I'm trying to think of them. Elizabeth Grayson's So Wide the Sky was good; the hero is half-Indian, and the heroine is a white captive (in a comparatively unromanticized treatment) who is returned to the whites and is unable to fit in. I have a guilty fondness for Chase's The Sandalwood Princess, but it's terrible on race -- Magical Negro Indian, sexualized Indian Princess, etc. I liked it for the other tropes.

Re: Please clarify

[oyceter]

Huh. Y'know, I can't think of any romances that deal with race well, at least not off the top of my head.

Oh wait! Pearl Cleage. Her books are marketed more as "women's fiction," but she is a black writer who writes about race and gender issues. Sometimes I don't agree with her, but at least she is thinking. Most other romances that have attempted to look at race or even just included POC I have ended up chucking against a wall because I was so pissed off (see: Mary Jo Putney's The China Bride, Pat Gaffney's Crooked Hearts).