Revenge of the Nerds, Hairspray, And Using Black People To Legitimize Causes
by guest contributor Ampersand, originally published at Alas
If Revenge of the Nerds is on TV, I often watch it. Not the whole thing, but a little section, here and there. It was a movie that I loved as a kid. But it was crap back then (despite some decent performances, including John Goodman as the mean coach), and it’s aged badly.
Revenge of the Nerds is vilely sexist; forget that none of the female nerds get much screen time or personality. The hero nerds are peeping toms who distribute nude photos of the cheerleaders to the general public without consent. One of the protagonists rapes a cheerleader by disguising himself as her boyfriend (the movie makes it clear that she never would have consented to kiss him, let alone fuck him, had she known his real identity).1
The one black nerd isn’t depicted in a racist fashion; instead, they made him gay so he could be depicted in a homophobic fashion.2 The one Asian nerd is nothing but a pile of racist anti-Asian cliches.
So, anyway. Vile movie. It got to me anyway, when I was a kid, because its message — that degrading treatment of nerds is wrong, does matter, and that bullies should be punished — was a message I wanted to hear.
On to Hairspray. The new version, not the John Waters version. Fun movie, good music, good performances. Much better than Revenge of the Nerds.
I saw it with my sister and niece and nephew. I liked it. It’s message, which is that degrading treatment of fat people is wrong and does matter, and that racist anti-fat snobs should be punished — is one I approve of. Picky person that I am, I still had complaints. There were plenty of cruel anti-fat jokes for the audience to enjoy; virtually all of these jokes were aimed at a fat character played by John Travolta wearing a fat suit.3
And then there was the peculiar strategy employed in both movies. Both movies focused on a discriminated-against group — nerds in one case, fat people in another — whose complaints about discrimination are not usually seen as legitimate or important. So how did the screenwriters decide to make these causes seem legitimate? By having nerd rights and fat rights (respectively) piggyback onto black civil rights.
In Revenge of the Nerds, the nerds join a (previously) all-black national fraternity; the head of the fraternity organization becomes sympathetic to the nerds when he witnesses anti-nerd discrimination (the jocks drive pigs through the nerd’s house). The subtext is that Black people are our experts on discrimination, so if a Black character recognizes something as discrimination — even if the incident has nothing to do with race — the presumably mostly White audience should accept that it’s discrimination, too. (In the end, the nerds defeat John Goodman and the jocks because the nerds’ Scary Black Frat Friends come and physically protect the nerds, intimidating the white jocks.)
In Hairspray, which is set in the 60s, the main character learns to fight for fat rights by joining the fight for civil rights for Blacks4. The idea is that the fight for racial equality is, inherently, a fight for the dignity of all people, including fat people. This is much more agreeable than how Revenge of the Nerds uses Black people, but I still find it interesting that both movies try to validate the idea that the rights of nerds/fat people matter by using the “see! Black characters agree!” strategy. It’s a symptom, I think, of how The Struggle For Black Civil Rights is the iconic struggle for rights in US culture, and so everything must be analogized to racial discrimination in order to be understood as discrimination at all, at least in pop culture.
It’s unfortunate, I think, both because it puts an unfair burden on Black history to have it be treated as the Iconic Form Of Civil Rights Struggles, and because it tends to make it hard to conceptualize the struggles of other oppressed groups where they don’t resemble the struggles of American Blacks.
- The movie tries to make this okay by having the cheerleader fall in love with her rapist once he unmasks himself, because he was that great at sex. No, really, that’s what’s in the movie. I’m not making this up.
- It’s possible to do a flaming gay male character and still do the character intelligently and with respect in a comedy. But that ain’t what happened in Revenge of the Nerds.
- I call this strategy “The Absent Fatso“; having a fake fatso, who the audiences know isn’t really fat, lets the audience and producers enjoy cruel jokes without having to confront the cruelty.
- Which reminds me a bit of how many of the second-wave feminists learned to be activists in the 1960s civil rights movement before becoming feminists.
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
dawn wrote:
We’re showtunes fans around here and my son has been bopping around to the Broadway soundtrack of Hairspray since it was released and I took him to see the show when it toured. We were both excited about it coming to the big screen and he was especially anxious to see it when he heard Zac Efron had been cast as Link. We finally saw it last week and he was happy but I was disappointed. The fat jokes certainly fall differently when they’re directed to a wincing straight man in a fat suit then when they’re directed to a loud, proud drag queen posing as a woman — no fat suit needed. I also felt that in the stage show the black characters were more knowing and less indebted to the plucky heroine. In the stage show (as I remember it) the black people lead the way and the white kids are just along for the ride. There’s less, “Hey, I never would have thought of marching if this little girl hadn’t told us racism is wrong!” The differences are subtle but the stage show had more John Waters around it. Like [spoiler alert] Inez’s triumph at the end? Not present in either the original movie or the stage show. John Waters may be sentimental but he’s a sentimental cynic and his overarching smirk is missing from the movie. (Some of the best lines are stepped on like the producers are hoping people don’t actually HEAR them.) And considering my son was — what — four? maybe? when it came out, it was a good introduction to a concrete discussion about civil rights. (Another reason I miss a fabulous drag queen in the Edna Turnblad role — since the message is that everyone should be celebrated for who they are, it was also my son’s introduction to a discussion about civil rights for gay people.)
Can’t speak to Revenge of the Nerds though ‘cuz I can’t remember it.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 7:54 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
I do remember RTN. Lamar is made into a non threatening black male via the stereotyped homosexuality.
The Iconic version of the Civil Rights Struggle cheapens the CRM by allowing every issue to piggyback on it. Not only is it appropriated, but it’s recast in a way to make racism look like the exception, rather than the rule.
I’ve only seen the John Waters movie with Divine (yay) and pre-”don’t go there” Rikki Lake. I used to watch it all the time! My mom was the one who clued me into Divine. As we watched it, she told me about Black Thursdays - the day when the Black kids could go dance to Black entertainers, and the other days when White kids could go dance to Black entertainers. Herein, lies the danger of the Iconic, yet inaccurate portrayal of the CRM. What they portrayed in Hairspray was real life for Black folks. We heard this growing up.
My question is whether the White parents who danced on the White days share their experiences when they watch this with their kids…..
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 8:48 am ¶
beth wrote:
While the overall message of Hairspray is great, I take issue with the remake for essentially whitewashing the queer camp out of it.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 9:17 am ¶
Allen wrote:
I’ve loved and hated Revenge of the Nerds for the same reason. As a kid the nudity was great when I snuck and watched it, but now, as an adult, it’s kind of creepy. Plus, I am really bothered from the dearth of well developed black characters. And the whole “we struggle just like Black folks” movement has been a problem for movies for decades. The funny thing is, people rarely say “We struggle just like the Jews did.” I think people recognize the Holocaust as a very specific and horrific injustice and that same feeling isn’t passed along to the Black struggle for equal rights.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 11:37 am ¶
Morgan wrote:
“revenge of the nerds” is one of the last vestiges of comedy as the prerogative of straight while males. “hairspray” bends over backwards to prove that it’s not like that, the ridiculous ending offends just as much. not that inez is not worthy of her glory, but i walked out feeling insulted. it’s a slap in the face to those who did have to struggle to desegregate to show the civil rights movement as a side-product of tracy discovering her right to big hair and a bigger body.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 12:00 pm ¶
B wrote:
Re: Hairspray, I’m a fan of the original Waters movie, and just haven’t been able to motivate myself to see the stage version (well, $$ is also a factor there, admittedly), or the recent movie. I think the essay and the comments here have solidified the idea that I’m not missing anything. One thing that is sort of a bummer for Walters in this is that there are people who haven’t the foggiest idea that his film was the source for the subsequent musicals, or, worse, liken him to them. D*mn shame.
Also, I was fairly young when I originally saw RTN, and therefore didn’t notice any of the issues brought up above, despite many, many viewings. Ugh, I totally feel gross for watching it so many time, now.
Finally, to end my rambling, there are so many obviously f-ed up racist movies from the ’80s. This interests me for two reasons: 1) many of us readers were kids, or at least teenagers at the time and might have missed it; and 2) by the ’80s, it is pretty clear that everyone should have known better. To that end, maybe there could be a series of essays about these movies. Two that come to mind as all kinds of problematic (which, once again, I watched several times) are “Big Trouble in Little China,” and “The Last Dragon.”
Thoughts?
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 12:10 pm ¶
Mr Mully wrote:
I remember “Revenge of the Nerds.” The Asian guy seems to come right from those old Jerry lewis movies. It’s funny how by now it is borderline criminal to make racist jokes regarding African American males (rightly so) in the mainstream media but yet Hollywood still thinks it’s a riot to make fun of Asians and Hispanics.
Here’s just a couple I can remember off the top of my head:
Asian male gigalo in “Deuce Bigalow” part 2 has small penis-hysterical.
Asian girls in “Mean Girls” can’t speak English and has an affair with the Gym coach-lol.
Asian girls in “I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry” Slutty Fobs- Pure comedy gold.
Don’t even get me started on Chris Tucker’s “Rush Hour” jokes.
Because smaller minorities are less vocal and demonstrative against media stereotypes and racism, they are considered fair game under the forgiveable umbrella of comedy. It’s a shame and a travesty that it is still deemed acceptable and that the perpetrators do not suffer the same scrutiny and public crucification as a Michael Richards.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 12:49 pm ¶
gatamala wrote:
borderline criminal…public crucification as a Michael Richards
Mr. Mully
That means you have to make more noise. In order to do that, some folks are going to have to let go of any perceived model minority privileges and speak truth to “white” power. And try to do it without whining about “you don’t do that to blacks”. If you paid any attention to this blog and hell, tv, you’d know that’s not true.
borderline criminal…public crucification as a Michael Richards
Rush Hour is a tragedy in and of itself. Wisecracking, fast-talking, shufflin cop is not a positive image. Last time I checked, Chris Tucker didn’t write the movie and Jackie Chan still keeps cashing the checks.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 2:11 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
Gatamala: I was just about to mention the “model minority” thing, but I haven’t been able to figure out how to do it and still steer clear of the “we-have-it-worse-and-have-always-had-it-worse-than-you” thing (which is just insensitive, since we all have it pretty bad.)
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 2:26 pm ¶
Wendi Muse wrote:
gatamala, i totally agree with your points. think the oppression olympics have little place in discussing community organizing to oppose racism in the media.
however, i understand mr mully’s point to the degree that our society does seem more sensitive to making fun of blacks. of course we still see it, but it seems to be done in the way that’s more subtle lately (in media only, not in every day life). if you are racist towards blacks, it’s seen as racism…but sometimes racism toward asian-americans is seems as simply humor..due to many factors like:
1. limited attention paid to community organizing.
there are asian-american community groups out there who do the same thing that lots of black organizations do, but they get very little coverage in the media, which seems to still think in black and white.
2. asian-americans, while seen as foreign, are considered superior academically and behaviorly to blacks (as far as stereotyping goes) by way of the model minority myth, which exacerbates problems within cross-cultural organizing to combat racism in the media. it’s like hey, we make fun of them, but their not as far down on the social ladder, so it’s more like poking fun at ourselves than it is kicking someone while they’re down…and because they don’t have a problem with their position as model minorities, they probably won’t object…
that’s me speaking as a racist media exec of course, not as wendi muse. i don’t buy that excuse, but i bet you money it goes through people’s heads to make racist ads
3. the “positive” stereotypes of apa people outweigh negative ones, at least when compared to blacks…
as we all know here, positive stereotypes are still bad stereotypes, but i think some people don’t consider a few obviously negative stereotypes about asians as being as harmful as they would be to blacks b/c there are enough “positive” ones out there to balance it out…which is also crap, but again, i think people think this way and can ignore the truth
4. americans receive little education with regard to the asian-american experience in this country, whereas they get a tiny bit (yay black history month?) about blacks, esp when it comes to the slave bit…at least, they know about it (not to say they know a ton, but they know it existed). i’m sure lots of people still think asian-americans are ALL immigrants and know nothing about the coolie system, or the garment industry, or the gold rush, or the construction of railroads in the west…at least not enough to realize that asian-americans had a big role in all of those and a lot of apa people have been here for a very long time. i think that lack of knowledge about our complete history as a nation assists the ignorance process…and, in turn, our ability to ignore (or not register as racist) offensive portrayals of asian-americans in the media.
sorry that was forever long…but i think it’s more than just one group being favored over the other when it comes to addressing racism-related grievances. if anything, the constant media focus on racism toward blacks has come as a disservice because it makes it look like blacks are always on the defensive, like we think everything is racist…it has a boy crying wolf effect on the general public, i think…and to be honest, i find that to be really detrimental to the struggle against racism. there needs to be a balance in representation when it comes to news on anti-racist activism that has yet to occur.
in a poll recently, they found that most americans thought there were far more blacks population wise due to our television exposure on the news…i think rachel at rachel’s tavern covered it, so it would be worth looking up if you have a chance.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 2:40 pm ¶
Wendi Muse wrote:
ugh ok, sorry for all the comments, y’all…
and not to totally derail the comments on this post…BUT i think gatamala’s point about renouncing/giving up privileges that may come with so-called “positive stereotypes” (asian-americans are all good at math, black men are all good at sports, black women are all strong, latinas are all sexy/hot) is an interesting one because it made me wonder…how exactly does one do that, as a community, at least?
some have tried, but seem to fail miserably because they attempt to assert the opposite (i.e. films about asian-american slackers…). is it necessary to renounce a “positive” stereotype by relying on something generally seen as more “negative”?
if not, how do we get there, especially when most of the images of ourselves that we see in the media we, as people of color, are not responsible for?
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 3:08 pm ¶
Jack D. wrote:
re “It’s unfortunate, I think, both because it puts an unfair burden on Black history to have it be treated as the Iconic Form Of Civil Rights Struggles, and because it tends to make it hard to conceptualize the struggles of other oppressed groups where they don’t resemble the struggles of American Blacks.”:
I agree that it’s unfortunate that the human brain seems incapable of embracing complex social structures and justice without constant re-education from generation to generation to generation.
But I don’t agree that it’s a bad thing that “Black history” be shouldered with the “burden” of the Civil Rights Movement becoming iconic. The use of a symbol or metaphor is one of the strongest tools in any form of education, ala *this* is like *that.* It’s a simple fact of life that reminding people of a historic struggle is necessary to make a point about other issues … because we’re just not smart enough to figure it out otherwise.
Yes, the Civil Rights Movement is often wielded like a hammer instead of a scalpel — Hairspray probably falls closer to the former. But that’s not necessarily such a bad application, given that we’re talking about mass-consumption, pop-culture entertainment.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 3:16 pm ¶
La-msviswan wrote:
gatamala wrote:
“That means you have to make more noise. In order to do that, some folks are going to have to let go of any perceived model minority privileges and speak truth to “white” power. And try to do it without whining about “you don’t do that to blacks”. “
Thank you. Thank you. There is nothing left for me to say.
“Wisecracking, fast-talking, shufflin cop is not a positive image.”
Don’t forget, loud mouth, sexist, half stupid, and sex crazed.
Considering all the noise and fighting black people have made over these many decades, there is still not much compliance in comparison. That in itself shows less respect to the black population - in comparison.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 7:39 pm ¶
Ike wrote:
“how exactly does one do that, as a community, at least?”
Wendi, I’m wondering the same thing. Asian-Americans make up a pretty small percentage of the population, around 5%. We do try to make noise. But mostly, we just get ignored and laughed at. I get the feeling that we’re going about this entirely the wrong way, so does anyone have suggestions?
“In order to do that, some folks are going to have to let go of any perceived model minority privileges and speak truth to “white” power.”
The model minority stereotype is not a privilege, and honestly I don’t see many Asian-Americans trying to hold on to it.
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 9:25 pm ¶
Raafi wrote:
What is this black nerds month or something?
Posted 18 Oct 2007 at 9:35 pm ¶
Kai wrote:
gatamala, I know you don’t mean your comment in the way that I’m about to address; but I’m chiming in here because it seems like a perfect opportunity to make a point that I think needs to be made more often. I’m a strong believer and practictioner in inter-community organizing and coalition-building; and one thing I’ve learned over the years is that members of each racial and/or ethnic group should try to avoid instructing another group about how to understand and combat their own oppression, because in all likelihood members of each racial and/or ethnic group know their own history of oppression better than anyone else and have spent more time and energy figuring out how to combat it than anyone else. It shows basic respect to assume as much about one another.
Over the years I’ve been instructed by lots of non-Asians about anti-Asian racism, but I honestly doubt that many of the people doing this instructing have had as deep a background in the history of Asian American anti-racist struggle as I do, which always makes it a bit awkward. Indeed, the irony is that much of this advice that I receive actually includes hints of racist stereotyping: the idea that Asians are quietly, passively going along with white supremacy, playing with our abacus in the corner while America burns. Sure, there are plenty of people of all colors who have been drawn into white supremacy, but let’s not get hung up on them when there’s so much other action to pay attention to. Frankly, if you don’t hear the noise Asian American anti-racists are making, it’s because you’re listening to the wrong stations. For example, anyone round here heard of a little blog called Racialicious? Recently mentioned in The Nation magazine? Um, yeah. A good example.
In fact, Asians, Blacks, Latinos, Indians, have all found ways to work together as allies for centuries. There’s a lot of hidden anti-racist history outside the gaze of the white mainstream, which offers us inspiration and intellectual footprints. Obviously white society uses devices like the model minority myth (a.k.a. house slave) to divide people of color, so that we fight over the master’s crumbs; people of all races need to learn to recognize and dismiss that bullshit. But it doesn’t make any sense to ask Asians to “defy” the model minority myth by, say, flunking out of school and going to jail; the response to “positive” racist stereotypes isn’t to mold one’s behavior around “disproving” some racist notion, but rather to attack the racist notion itself, at the root; so that all people gradually come to see one another as three-dimensional human beings, not cardboard cut-outs.
Ike, you’re right, I don’t see Asians trying to hold onto the racist stereotypes of us either. As for what we could be doing, here’s my suggestion.
Peace.
Posted 19 Oct 2007 at 10:26 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
Kai~ point taken. I definitely get what you are saying and almost didn’t post my previous message. Trust me, I hear the noise. The targeted folks don’t. Energy is misdirected when someone trots out “you don’t do that to blacks.”
It is very fair to admit that ALL of us have folks that will not speak truth to power and actively collaborate (*koff* DebraLee*koff*) with these folks and sacrifice “their own” for profit. I don’t see how we can address the situation by pretending they don’t exist or minimizing their impact.
On a philosophical (?) level, I don’t necessarily believe “our” interests converge as neatly or as often as some folks would like. That is not to say that I don’t care, but I’m pragmatic.
At no time, did I ever imply that one should exchange a positive stereotype for negative one.
Posted 22 Oct 2007 at 1:27 pm ¶
lorraine wrote:
{{{sigh . . . }}}
I loved Hairspray–the first movie, the Broadway show, the second movie–but it was only in watching the new version of the movie, with the weight (no pun intended) of all that I’ve learned in the past few years on my shoulders, that I had this sense that there was something that should bother me about the movie. I actually said to a black friend of mine who is a co-laborer in this work, “DON’T SAY ANYTHING TO ME ABOUT _HAIRSPRAY_! I DON’T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT! I *LIKED* THAT MOVIE!”
but I knew that there was something “not quite right” about it, and I want to reluctantly thank you for verbalizing it for me.
am I a bad fat-white-chick-trying-to-be-anti-racist if I still enjoy the movie? if I buy the soundtrack?!
Posted 28 Oct 2007 at 8:51 pm ¶