The movie was such a representative of what divides us (whites and blacks). . The entire time I watched the movie, I sat there wringing in disgust.
The ship just by chance settles over Johannesburg South Africa.
The international community decides that it’s perfectly OK to house aliens from another planet smack dab in the middle of a highly populated African Community.
Ask yourself this…if the damn ship decided to hover over New York City, would the decision to house the aliens inside NEW YORK CITY be made? Hell no. Those aliens would have been housed outside of the US let alone New York City.
The native Africans were made to look like savages. There was no distinquishing between their behavior and the aliens who lived in the tent city.
The director played the “Africans will eat you or aliens stereotype” card throughout the movie.
He inferred that African prostitutes (women) had sex with the aliens!
The lead rogue African leader within the tent city area was obsessed with eating the aliens and the hand of the white guy who was turning into an alien as an act of witch doctor type of medical care and to settle his hunger for power (pun intended)!
I’m serious.
The reason I like the GEICO Caveman commercials is because I have had their exact astonishment/look of being offended reaction to various racist actions exhibited by whites either towards me or my children in the school system. This movie caused the same reaction in me!
The crowd (overwhelmingly white) CHEERED the damn movie when it ended! I was pissed!
I will not watch another Peter Jackson produced movie!
It sounds to me there’s a message he’s trying to get across. It’s rare such a human issue is related in sci-fi this way. You may been offended because that was the point; to offend with a truth as ugly as it may be. Of course it was preaching to the choir for you, but it’s meant for those cheering next to you.
Someone else made this point. I get it. I can tell you, the others in the audience it was meant for didn’t seem to get the message.
We’re talking about Hollywood here. I still don’t see the lessons to be taught about how they depicted African citizens there near the tent city. I mean, black women having sex with the aliens… the wheel chair bound African (and his followers that are obsessed with eating the aliens and then the white guys arm?) Those are all plays on the “Africans are cannibals” card that Hollywood itself conjured up decades ago and used throughout a myriad of “classic movies” that made Hollywood what it is today.
It doesn’t help that the damn director is a white South Afrikan. If he IS sensitive to the subject of racial stereotypes used against Blacks, he should know better then to use these knowing how they support the mindsets of other whites that Blacks in general and Africans in particular are savages.
Screw them.
Well seeing how the NAACP, Sharpton, or Jesse have yet to scream foul, it must be going over people’s heads. (But other than you and me, which other black folks are going to see the movie anyway) I’ll definitely check it out though. Hopefully they show it on my college campus for free cuz you know the prices @ the show are too high.
Another one of my friends from G.I. saw the movie, called me (without knowing that I had seen the film) and started blasting the movie as being racist.
Birds of a feather…
Oh, and I could care less about the NAACP/Jesse Jackson/Al Sharpton set. The reason I blog is to share MY view. I’m tired of them thinking that they represent me. I remember the time I actually joined the NAACP in Nashville Tn when I owned a business there.
There was really no voice there for me. The elders controlled everything and allowed very little to no input on matters from younger members. I was in my mid 20’s at the time. That experience shed light on the Jesse’s and Al Sharptons mindsets of black leadership.
I don’t let what the mass media says about Jesse and Al affect my thoughts of them, though. While I don’t look at them as “leaders” so to speak, I respect the fact they have been there over the years when others really have not been interested in speaking out.
I just think their approach is dated. Like the approach to things the Nashville Branch of the NAACP’s took… dated (marches, picketts etc…)
THEY REALLY DON’T WANT TO HAVE A SUCCESSOR as far as black leaders are concerned. They want that spot light on them until they expire. Being a leader is not about the spot light. It’s about doing what’s right for your constituents.
It’s time for them to step aside. On the other side of things, however, WHO is ready to step IN TO THE SPOTLIGHT and be the voice(s) of the black constituency as a whole for the new millennium? I put voices as plural because I believe it should definitely be more then one person.
There are so many deep brothers and sisters out there, raising families, navigating their careers…I just think it takes a conglomerate of black voices to truly represent our issues here in the 21st century.
I agree with you on Jackson & Sharpton, they seem to be the media’s “black men,” and they are both past due. I”m just waiting for some red alert, but I’ll have to judge for myself once I see the film. It may never rise as an issue until we make enough noise, but we’ll see.
Interesting perspective on the movie. I haven’t seen it yet and was hoping to soon.
Re: Al & Jesse
These two oppression pimps only show up when the cameras are rolling and the majority of black folks figure a certain “case” — like the Jena 6 — is unjustified.
Why aren’t they denouncing the atrocities of the Dumbar Village attack? When black people attack blacks, which happens more often than when blacks attack non-blacks, people why aren’t they standing up and denouncing this behavior?
Why do they get pissed off when someone tries to give black men a talking-to, as evidenced by Jesse’s off color remarks involving the president’s penis. “Trying to tell black people how to act …” he said. Heck, someone should because he sure isn’t!
I’ll tell ya why; Al & Jessie would be out of “jobs” if they did. As long as black folks are cuttin’ up, we’ll keep oppressing ourselves. And as long as we are oppressed Al & Jessie have something to do.
These clowns don’t represent me and they shouldn’t be the voice for blacks at all. Period.
I got into a real tit for tat with Black Sentinel and Brotha Peachmaker about the problems we as black people face with each other. I can speak first hand on how my parents were made to feel like prisoners in their own home the last 5 years they lived in Gary prior to their retirement/relocation. I was taken aback during one visit to the very house I was brought home from my birth and raised in. I saw where my father had placed two brackets on both sides of our back door and used a cut two by four as a brace between the brackets as “extra security” to prevent break in’s!
Soon after that visit, the very group of guys that I GREW UP WITH LITERALLY successfully broke into the house (pass the barrier), stole a lot of stuff, got caught by the cops, threatened my parents (my father didn’t even press charges), supposedly made “MARKS” out of me and my brother ( because we came up there right after the break-in and was not asking any questions…none of them punks showed their faces in the hood while they KNEW we were in town!) The grown man in me allowed me to deal with it, but the little boy in me, the one that still had that unwavering love of Gary Indiana took a serious hit. I was really crushed that guys that I had fought with(ontheir sides), balled with, played hide and go seek with, would break in my parents house! One was my next door neighbor on one side, the one on the other side helped plan it. The others lived on the same block.
They were on that stuff. All I could think of was what if my mother was there when they broke in? Would they have harmed her? These days, you can’t put nithing past people that’s on that stuff.
Anyway, the point is, the issue of black on black crime is something a person who either was raised in G.I., lived there at any time or has relatives/friends that live there knows about! It’s been an issue for more then 40 years in that city. Today, it’s at an EPIC level. It would be HUGE if we were to organize in our community when one of our own suffers at the hands of another. I can tell you, the problem is, RETALIATION IS REAL IN A CITY LIKE GARY. The perfect time for someone from the outside like a Jesse or a Al to show up and do what needs to be done…speak out against black on black crime! That way, the locals don’t have to worry about retaliation. This is the best response I can think of. Things like the Dunbar Village Attack happen far too often in communities like West Palm Beach and Gary Indiana.
I was accosted by Sentinel and Brotha Peace Maker when I mentioned my critique of the long white tees our youth wear and described an exchange I had with a group of them in the post “What’s wrong with Blacks”. It has become far too easy to point out the racist actions of whites and blog about them. From time to time, we GOT to critique our own.
I’ll leave with this. On my way home today from work, I had to dodge some debris in the road. Not a jerk the wheel like dodge but a rather smooth (so I thought) adjustment. This was done right before a stop light. Apparently, the maneuver startled the driver to my right. Pissed her off is probably the right description. I didn’t really notice it until, after sitting still at the light for about 30 seconds, I looked to my right and the back seat passenger of the minivan driven by the pissed off black female driver was making gestures to me through the tinted back drivers side window. I also noticed the driver make some type of gesture to me as she creeped the van forward. I pulled up a little and when I did, she really began doing a lot of gestures towards me with her window rolled up.
Now keep in mind that at this time, I really wasn’t aware that I had pissed someone off. So I roll down the passenger side window (bad idea). When I do so, she rolls hers down. She yells in a “hood” like southern tone, “You need to learn how to drive that damn thing motherfucker! I’ll teach yo ass how to drive it…
My response?
I said, “You probably can’t even count to twenty. How you gonna teach me ANYTHING”, in a calm cool voice and then started laughing at her. She got so flustered. The girl in the passenger front seat of the mini-van bust out laughing too. The light turned green, the driver made a quick steering wheel gesture as though she was going to ram me with a mean ass look on her face… I continued laughing at her and drove off.
Sometimes it seems like we can’t stand one another. I’m so intrigued by this vantage point. I believe in speaks right to the point of how we deal with one another. Especially since it seems like I’m always getting into confrontations with sista’s either at the check out line at Wal-Mart or with some restaurant waitress. I had one tell them, I bet yo sorry ass is married to a white woman (she noticed the ring on my finger).
My wife is black.
The GEICO caveman ads are racist. Most white people don’t notice this. I do notice however that the cavemen are depicted as white suburban yuppies/preppies in ALL of the ads…right down to the way they talk.
The word “Caveman”, along with “Pink Toe” are racist words used my black people towards white people.
but being a white male I have the luxury of not knowing what racism feels like because I take on the attitude of Morgan Freeman.
Quote: Stop talking about race and racism will end.
Those ads are funny as hell though.