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Star Wars is Racist


Good God a Bear
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On the other hand, the explicit racists in Star Wars are the villains. Quite conspicuosly so. The Empire harkens back to British Imperialism while the First Order is outrightly fascist. As such, I doubt it's a question of SW being either completely absent of racism (or at least stereotype) or completely guilty of it. Only sith deal in absolutes, after all.

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Well the ugly trade federation guys in the PT with the bad Chinese accents were pretty racist depictions. Plus the slave owning Jew-fly was pretty racist too.

 

But... Whatever

This is what I mean. Lucas is a known liberal and he wouldn't never be an active racist. But his use of stereotypes betray his growing up in a position of privilege.

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So is the guy from the Bloodhound Gang with the Scottish accent a stereotype? Is the Asian guy from Culture Club a stereotype? Or is it okay because they actually used those guys?

 

Frankly, I find that calling Jar Jar a Jamaican stereotype racist. I know enough Jamaicans to not have had that cross my mind when I first saw TPM.

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Well the ugly trade federation guys in the PT with the bad Chinese accents were pretty racist depictions. Plus the slave owning Jew-fly was pretty racist too.

 

But... Whatever

This is what I mean. Lucas is a known liberal and he wouldn't never be an active racist. But his use of stereotypes betray his growing up in a position of privilege.
I get your point about Lucas not being an active racist, but I disagree that it is about privilege. Somebody can have lots of money, power, connections, whatever and still be sensitive to other races and cultures. I think his problem is one of being insulated and perhaps disinterested in the outside world and how our culture has changed in the last 30 or so years. It's just ignorance... Not malevolence, it's more like grandpa talking about how he likes the beat of that "negro music" you're listening to, perhaps sneaking in a stereotype or two because it is all he knows, without realizing how badly that dates him or that many people today do not appreciate that terminology/descriptions. A rich, privileged person can make that mistake, and so can somebody who is dirt poor.
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I don't think Star Wars is racist. It's just that all the mythological and cinematic materiel it's drawing upon for its points of reference is racist. No real life Japanese people tallk like the Trade Federation talks but the Japanese bad guys in World War II movies sure did. I don't think the hooknosed slave-owner with the Mediterranean inflections is there to make a statement about how George Lucas feels about Jews, or Arabs, or Italians, or Greeks; he's just mindlessly and insensitively drawing on some archetype from some old sword'n'sandals movies he's seen from when he was a kid. The new version of the Empire in the new movie isn't there to make any real points about Nazism or fascism or imperialism or colonialism; these guys aren't Eichmann and Mengele, they're the Boys from Brazil. Darth Vader isn't black when he's bad but revealed to be white on the inside once he's proven himself to be good because of something Lucas alone feels or thinks, that whole black/white dichotomy is so deeply entrenched in thought and language going back to antiquity and overlaps so well with racism (see, for example, umm that Key and Peele sketch with the news team) that it's going to come out in any story told in those terms (you know what WAS racist or at least dumb? having that good version of Vader in an alternate Elseworlds non-canon Star Wars comic where he survives once he turns to the lightside wearing painted white armour, that's super dumb and racist, that's what the lady on the news should be really mad about, there should be a Congressional investigation into why that was).

 

Whether there's a real distinction in effect (is a difference that makes no difference any difference?) is probably arguable but I do think that this stuff is operating on a level removed from reality which means that, I, for one give it a pass. Plus, also, let's be honest, nerd blinders.

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Well the ugly trade federation guys in the PT with the bad Chinese accents were pretty racist depictions. Plus the slave owning Jew-fly was pretty racist too.

 

But... Whatever

This is what I mean. Lucas is a known liberal and he wouldn't never be an active racist. But his use of stereotypes betray his growing up in a position of privilege.
I get your point about Lucas not being an active racist, but I disagree that it is about privilege. Somebody can have lots of money, power, connections, whatever and still be sensitive to other races and cultures. I think his problem is one of being insulated and perhaps disinterested in the outside world and how our culture has changed in the last 30 or so years. It's just ignorance... Not malevolence, it's more like grandpa talking about how he likes the beat of that "negro music" you're listening to, perhaps sneaking in a stereotype or two because it is all he knows, without realizing how badly that dates him or that many people today do not appreciate that terminology/descriptions. A rich, privileged person can make that mistake, and so can somebody who is dirt poor.

 

I meant his upbringing. The George Lucas that was raised upper middle class in Marin County and raced cars and got to go to USC. Granted there's less excuse for it once he became a man of the world-- my point is that I know a lot of people who grow up around white people, and are surrounded by white people most of their lives and they'd deny they were racist, and they'd never actively go off and burn a cross on somebody's yard-- but you'd by surprised by how many stereotypes they believed without even realizing it.

 

If you can find it online (let me know if you can't) a GREAT read is the transcripts of the story sessions with Lucas, Kasdan, and Speilberg for Raiders. It's fascinating by how creative it all is-- but it's also full of casual racism from people who have no idea they are being racist.

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I meant his upbringing. The George Lucas that was raised upper middle class in Marin County and raced cars and got to go to USC. Granted there's less excuse for it once he became a man of the world-- my point is that I know a lot of people who grow up around white people, and are surrounded by white people most of their lives and they'd deny they were racist, and they'd never actively go off and burn a cross on somebody's yard-- but you'd by surprised by how many stereotypes they believed without even realizing it.

Oh yeah, I know his background. I just think there is a distinction between somebody's "privilege" and their "ignorance;" GL is both privileged and passively ignorant, but I don't think the ignorance stems from privilege. I think it stems from his personality type, and is something no amount of diversity or cultural exposure could affect. There is something so obtuse about that man, like he could have grown up in Detroit, graduated from A&T, and still never got the memo that it's not cool to go to parties wearing blackface (GL has never worn blackface to a party as far as I know, ofc).

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If you can find it online (let me know if you can't) a GREAT read is the transcripts of the story sessions with Lucas, Kasdan, and Speilberg for Raiders. It's fascinating by how creative it all is-- but it's also full of casual racism from people who have no idea they are being racist.

 

The dinner scene in Temple of Doom is a good example. I remember reading Spielberg saying that whole scene was misinterpreted, they were making a commentary on Indian stereotypes. Instead they just offended a lot of people.

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Unconscious bias too (my preferred term for this sort of thing); very few people (if any) are free from that, and it usually manifests itself as positive discrimination in favor of what you are familiar / comfortable with instead of overt racism or sexism

 

Once I became aware of it, re-watching some of my favorite science fiction movies and noticing a lack of female characters (completely absent in some cases) that I didn't notice before was rather unsettling

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If you can find it online (let me know if you can't) a GREAT read is the transcripts of the story sessions with Lucas, Kasdan, and Speilberg for Raiders. It's fascinating by how creative it all is-- but it's also full of casual racism from people who have no idea they are being racist.

 

The dinner scene in Temple of Doom is a good example. I remember reading Spielberg saying that whole scene was misinterpreted, they were making a commentary on Indian stereotypes. Instead they just offended a lot of people.

I remember that scene as a kid and thinking it was so crazy weird and exotic. When my kid saw it the first time he was really confused cause unlike me, he's grown up with Indian friends and many meals at Indian restaurants.

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For the most part he played nice up until the release.

 

But I think the general adulation of the new film, sprinkled liberally with smug, almost celebratory "Thank G_d we can forget about the PT now!" exclamations has driven him off the deep end. GL has never been wrong about anything in his life, ever; it's the audience, stupid.

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Today, "white slavery" primarily refers to sex trafficking -- specifically, kidnapping a woman and forcing her into prostitution in another country.

 

Though, I may be giving GL too much credit. He might still think it has to do with the Ottoman slave trade.

If I were someone who already has a reputation for being racially insensitive, I think I would try to pick better words.

 

And it's a pretty stupid and offensive comment regardless.

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For the most part he played nice up until the release.

 

But I think the general adulation of the new film, sprinkled liberally with smug, almost celebratory "Thank G_d we can forget about the PT now!" exclamations has driven him off the deep end. GL has never been wrong about anything in his life, ever; it's the audience, stupid.

I bet you're right. It's being received way better than he expected and he can't take that.

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