“Jihadis”*, Skinheads and Film Representation
By Guest Contributor Fiqah, originally published at Possum Stew
A couple of weeks back, AJ Plaid and I collaborated on a humor piece for Racialicious about White guys who had received the Black Folk Stamp of Approval for Screen Time with Sistahs™. It was a mostly tongue-in-cheek piece that was surprisingly popular (if the number of comments are any indication of how well-received it was, anyway). As the comments came in with suggestions of who to add to the list, I noticed that quite a few actors were being noted as “hot” in their film roles as skinheads. Not the cool, Trojan skinheads. The regular, scary, violent, racist kind. Now, as a general rule, as I mentioned on the thread “hot skinhead” is an oxymoron to me, so this turn in conversation was one I found intriguing:
Hm. As a related aside, I find it interesting that the mainstream American film narrative allows for the (fictional) existence of the Hot Young WHITE Supremacist/Ideological Extremist…but NOT for the (fictional) existence of the Hot Young BROWN Religious/Ideological Extremist. Meh. Another post for some other day.
Over the last few weeks, I have watched people come running to defend the indefensible. I have heard and read defense of the officers who shot Marwa Sherbini’s husband as he was attempting to save his pregnant wife’s life, counterarguments to the blatant racism and sexism exhibited by certain senators during the Sotomayor hearings, dismissals of salient allegations of racist character coding in recent summer blockbusters , and protests justifying the removal of little Black children – babies, really – from a swimming pool on a hot-assed summer day. ( “Change the complexion of the pool”? Really? Newsflash: eumelanin doesn’t wash off. Good grief.)
I have to say that of all these, the story that has unsettled me most is the murder of Egyptian Muslim Mrs. Sherbini at the hands of White German Axel W. Typically, mainstream media frames the “lone (White) gunman” as an anomaly. However, in the aftermath of this tragedy, I have read comments on blogs defending – to the point of applauding - Axel W.’s actions. (I am not providing links for these threads, but suffice it to say that is indeed an interesting experience to feel chilled to the bone in the middle of July.)
The overwhelming sentiment on some of these threads is that the monster who killed Mrs. Sherbini was just like any other nice young man who was so disturbed by the changing “face” of his country that he just snapped. And the husband being shot, well, don’t all those men beat the women anyway? Really, Sherbini, by thumbing her nose at outward assimilation as dictated by her choice of garb, kinda brought all of this on herself.
The callous dismissal of Mrs. Sherbini’s fundamental human value, and the simultaneous public defense of her murderer, stunned me. What, I wondered, exactly IS “understandable rage”? When is acting out of frustration – to violent, fatal excess – forgivable? Is it ever? If so, then for whom? More urgently, how had the compassion of Axel W.’s supporters failed to be stirred by what to me is one of the tenderest representations of humanity: a pregnant mother?
The Black Folk Stamp of Approval for Screen Time with Sistahs™ got me thinking about film representations of skinheads, but what would it look like if we viewed representations of “Jihadis”* side-by-side with so-called dreamy Skinheads?
The Jihadi: Fanatical, Crazed, Ruthless, Butterfingered
”The Arab serves as the ultimate outsider, the other, who doesn’t pray to the same God, and who can be made to be less human,” says [Dr. Jack] Shaheen, who argues that movies and TV shows do matter — that they shape public opinion at home and abroad. “[...]These movies are on television constantly. The images last forever. They never go away.” -From Washington Post article “Cast of Villians: ‘Reel Bad Arabs’ Takes on Hollywood Stereotyping”(Photo from The Delta Force courtesy of Middle East Americas)
The ways in which we perceive various groups are directly influenced by popular representations of those groups. In Reel Bad Arabs, author Jack Shaheen asserts that in terms of group representation by Hollywood, Arabs are and have been the most maligned group. After reading that, I racked my brain trying to remember films that portrayed Arabs in a three-dimensional, humane way. Gillo Pontecorvo’s 1966 classic The Battle of Algiers was one that came to mind immediately (it was not a Hollywood production). The film, a fictionalized account of the bitter, bloody eight-year Algerian war for independence, struck a particular chord with me the first time I watched it as an undergrad. I had just spent several months in a former French colony in West Africa that still struggled beneath its colonial legacy as well as modern imperialism, I had seen first-hand just how racist a lot of Europeans can be, particularly to the inhabitants of former colonies. I also knew, from speaking with my professors and the parents of friends there, just how significant Algeria’s hard-won independence had been for all the French colonies. Last but not least, I have always really liked attractive ”Fist-Up” people. The character of Ali La Pointe (played with devastating intensity by Brahim Hadjadj) definitely fit the bill.
One of the most notable facets of the character of Ali La Pointe, the film’s partially reformed-hood protagonist, is that throughout The Battle of Algiers he is portrayed as a sympathetic character. Far from perfect, La Pointe is often brusque and prone to the occasional outburst of temper.He’s not a nice guy, but he is ostensibly a good one. In fact, all of the Algerian resistance, forced to extreme tactics because they are backed into a corner, are the Good Guys. On the other hand, the French occupiers (and the director does not spare French civilians, who are complicit by their very presence) are the Bad Guys.
Through the magic of the director’s story-telling, however, the audience is never allowed to imagine away the humanity of either side. It is understood that these are people who have been pushed to behavioral extremes and ideological extremism by rapidly escalating sociopolitical disruption. Each of the film’s primary characters has a sympathetic back-story. Their more violent actions – the shooting of a gendarme, a cafe bombing – carried out with no small amount of ambivalence and hesitation, are governed by the politics of desperation. These tactics, while undesirable, are necessary. It is significant that these nuanced, complex portrayals of Arab men and women as three-dimensional human beings was not produced in Hollywood, where the Arab sheik, warrior and bellydancer figures were already ingrained Orientalist images by 1966.
As Dr. Shaheen notes, much has happened in the world since 1979, but one-dimensional, flattened, monolithic Orientalist depictions of Arabs remain largely unchanged. In the course of my research, I found no Hollywood film that featured a sympathetic Arab ideological extremist as a protagonist. No surprise there, but what was a bit of a shock was that I was also unable to find a single recent (last 30 years or so) Hollywood movie that portrayed the Jihadi as anything outside of crazed, brutal, fanatical, ruthless, cunning, bumbling, deceptive, (usually) ugly and evil. Evidencing the classic Catch-22 of troping, these often contradictory qualities (e.g., cunning AND bumbling – how?) are allowed to exist within the same character.
Textbook example: Jihadi Arab Bad Guy Salim Abu Aziz (played by stock Arab Bad Guy, er-uhm…Punjabi Art Malik, pictured above receiving his comically ironic come-uppance) in True Lies. Aziz is the leader of the Crimson Jihad (sigh…), a terrorist organization so terror-y that all the other terror-y terrorist groups give it wide berth. From his videotaped manifesto: “ You have murdered our women, and our children, and bombed our cities from afar, like cowards, and you dare to call us terrorists?” It is worth noting here that the indisputable truth of this statement is undermined by the fact that the speaker is, bien sûr, a foaming-at-the-mouth fanatic. This often happens in Hollywood films featuring the Jihadi: any legitimate beef about this country’s appalling and deplorably inefficient military strikes and the countless civilian casualties that have resulted from them is instantly undermined. That dude with the unibrow and a bomb strapped to his chest said it. So, you know, hey, no critical analysis of that statement required.
The panic that Aziz’s character’s ruthlessness should inspire in the audience is also negated at key points throughout the film by his bungling: the man renowned for his effectiveness, the man whose code name is “The Sand Spider”, is somehow also an unmitigated klutz. As Shaheen notes, the Arab Bad Guy is typically endowed with one of two Achilles’ heels: lecherousness (if the Arab Bad Guy is the Oily Businessman or the Sneaky Sheik) or ineptitude (as Jihadis are usually portrayed as being too singularly-focused on blowing shit up to be distracted with sex). This doesn’t leave a lot of room for textured character development – and that is, of course, the point.
In one of the film’s more memorable scenes, protagonist Harry Trasker’s (Arnold Schwarzenegger) wife Helen (Jaime Lee Curtis), from whom he has kept his life as a spy secret throughout their marriage, asks him if he’s ever killed anybody. He replies: “Yeah, but they were ALL bad.” So later, when Harry guns down scores of keffiyeh-wearing (?!) Jihadis, the viewing audience is unmoved. After all, they were all bad.
Shaheen maintains that the most egregiously racist illustration of the above sentiment occurred in 2000’s Rules of Engagement. In the film, Hayes Hodges (Tommy Lee Jones) a lawyer, is called upon to defend Colonel Terry Childers (Samuel L. Jackson), a fellow Vietnam vet and old friend, who issued a retaliatory fire order on a group of Arab civilians – including women and children – in the course of a “rescue” mission (removing Americans from the American embassy in Yemen). The rest of the film is devoted to Hayes proving that Childers’ order was justified. As Rules of Engagement plods along the people the Marines gunned down are shown in a humane light in one scene, as they lay dying in a hospital. Empathetic tension is introduced as the audience is given the opportunity to wonder if, perhaps, shooting them was excessive. Of course, at the film’s conclusion, we learn that even the children in the angry mob were armed,and that Childer’s acted well within the bounds of military protocol. Little ones, it seems, are not immune to Hollywood’s Jihadi troping.
Even when portrayals of Arabs veer (slightly) away from single-dimension villainy, they are often brought back around to malevolent center by the end of a film. As Janet Maslin notes in her New York Times.com review of The Siege:
Though the screenplay [...] is strenuously even-handed and even incorporates a nice-guy, Beirut-born sidekick for Hub (played ably by Tony Shalhoub), the film’s stark images of scheming Arab villains often speak louder than its diplomatic words. Bending over especially far backward, the film gives Ms. Bening’s tough cookie a complex relationship to the Arabs in her past, with lines like: ”My first boyfriend was Palestinian. You know, my father used to say they seduce you with their suffering.” When, late in the film, Arab-Americans are put in internment camps, there is the obligatory cry: ”What if it was black people? Huh? What if it was Italians? Puerto Ricans?” Well-intentioned words don’t change either the film’s visual demonizing of Arab characters or its way of titillating the audience with terrorist stunts.
In the film, CIA operative/possible ethnicity fetishist Elise Kraft (Annette Bening) has a love affair with a handsome, perpetually-nervous Arab informant, Samir Nazhde (played by Sami Bouajila, below).
Nazdhe’s jumpy because he’s been feeding intelligence regarding planned bombings and the locations and identities of various ”terror cells” to Kraft. Protagonist Agent Anthony “Hub” Hubbard (played by Denzel Washington) doesn’t trust Nazdhe and warns the normally shrewd Kraft to keep her head on straight. Kraft ensures Hub that Nazhde can be somewhat trusted because, while he is an Arab, he is not an observant Muslim. Here, the film’s anti-Arab subthemes are shifted slightly to imply that it is Islam (a religion, and therefore a choice) and not Arabness per se that is always suspect. This theme, which is underscored by the presence of non-obtrusively faithful Agent Frank Haddad (played by Tony Shalhoub) is driven home when Nazdhe calmly informs the astonished Kraft while performing pre-prayer ablutions that not only is he about to pray, he is also (dun dun DUNNNNN!) the terror cell the government’s been looking for. The cunning Jihadi in sheep’s clothing then proceeds to kill his duped lover, and is only stopped from carrying out a massive suicide bombing by Hub. Rather than challenging stereotypes about Arabs, Muslims, and Islam, The Seige subtly and not-so-subtly underscores perceptions of Arabs under the auspices of presenting a “balanced” portrayal of its Arab characters. In this film there simply is no such thing as an Arab Good Guy – only active/potential Jihadis.
The Skinhead: Angst-Ridden, Tortured, Misunderstood, Smokin’ Hawt
[Romper Stomper's] portrayal of a bunch of racist sociopaths wreaking havoc has a delirious energy that stirs the emotions. While enticing you to hate the gang [...] the film also gives you the vicarious thrill of being one of the gang. And in Russell Crowe, who plays the skinheads’ sinister leader, Hando, it has a leading man whose mixture of menace and animal magnetism suggests a post-punk answer to Marlon Brando in “The Wild One.” -From New York Times.com article “Review/Film; Of Skinheads High on Hate And Violence”
In the post-Civil Rights present, open malicious anti-Semitism and racism are viewed by global mainstream society as socially unacceptable. Neo-Nazism advocates and employs violence against Jewish people, people of color, LGBTQ people, and “race traitors.” So it’s not surprising that the even the fictional neo-Nazi Skinhead is a troubling and highly controversial figure. This could partially explain why there are so few American films with a Skinhead protagonist. It’s exceptionally difficult to construct a sympathetic character out of something so fundamentally repugnant by today’s social standards as a Skinhead.
At least, that’s what I thought. During my research I discovered that some celluloid Skinheads were admired, even revered, by ordinary mainstream audiences. While searching for graphics for this piece, I found hundreds of sites with variations of this film still of Derek Vinyard (Ed Norton), the protagonist of 1998’s American History X.
They usually featured gushing commentary of how “hot” Derek (not Norton) was. One blog showed a photo of a shirtless Derek brandishing a gun in broad daylight on a suburban street. The caption: “Derek is One Bad Ass Motha Focka.” Huhn. The irony of employing the Black vernacular to describe admiration for a White Supremacist left me momentarily stupefied, but when I recovered my senses, I was able to analyze the statement. Derek, a vicious (but young), racist (but buff), violent (but manly) sociopath may be viewed as a kind of twisted embodiment of White hypermasculinity. This review noted that “[a]dvertisements for the controversy magnet that is American History X seem to be selling Edward Norton’s buff physique, savage scowl and swastika tattoo in equal measure.”
Before the audience learns what landed Derek in prison, the film shows Derek’s gang harassing a Korean storeowner and beating a group of Black men at basketball. Because White masculinity perceives Black (hyper)masculinity as a threat, particularly as it pertains to hip-hop and youth culture, Derek’s over-the-top masculine posturing can aslo be viewed as reinforcing the White status quo, a common theme in movies with Skinhead protagonists. In the film, Derek’s racist leanings, implanted by his father, are cemented when his dad is killed by a Black drug dealer. Derek, seduced by White Power rhetoric, joins DOC, a neo-Nazi gang, and quickly takes on a leadership role. It is significant that throughout the film, Derek is presented as a sympathetic character: from angst-filled rage to reformed contrition, the viewer is never allowed to forget that Derek’s circumstances informed his life decisions. He commits two vicious murders, goes to prison for two (?!) years, and is sent reeling down the path to redemption by a shockingly graphic prison rape. There to help him along: his younger brother Danny’s (Edward Furlong) Black principal Dr. Sweeney (played by Avery Brooks) and Lamont (Guy Torry), a Black fellow inmate…who got six years…for dropping a TV set on a cop’s foot.
Though the film itself is gripping, and the performances all around are top notch, the positing of troubled Black/White relations as the cause of all this misery is unsettling: in one scene where Dr. Sweeney is enlisting Derek’s help to save Danny from following the same route, he confesses that he used to hate White people. (I’m sure this was intended to be a startling revelation and an affinity-building method, but assuming that Sweeney’s hatred of White people never led him to actually murder any, it’s not the neatest parallel to draw.) Invoking the old ”I used to be just like you/racism is a two-way street” meme, in light of the severity of Derek’s crimes, is insulting. However, it is also an important component of the film’s relentless message of Derek’s humanity and ultimate redeem-ability.
The salvation of the sexy Skinhead protagonist with the hard-luck back story seems to factor in heavily with regard to a character’s relatability. In the Russian film Luna Park, (1992) protagonist Andrei (played by Andrei Goutine) is unbridled White Supremacist rage on big old muscley legs. This is, Janet Maslin notes in her review, no accident:
Mr. Lounguine is a tough, idiosyncratic film maker who makes very deliberate choices. In the role of Andrei, he has cast a muscular, blandly handsome bodybuilder with no acting experience (”a socialist realist fresco become flesh and blood,” the director has said of his character) and a bellicose air. The film cares less about Andrei’s private thoughts, which often seem anguished and impenetrable, than about the forces that have produced him.
While one could argue that any inner process that isn’t told from the first person in film is difficult to articulate without resorting to soliloquy, Maslin’s observation is spot-on. When it comes to Andrei, Lounguine would rather show us than tell us. So torn up with some barely identified (Poverty? Unemployment? Excessive testosterone?) angst that he cannot bear to be sober or alone for very long, Andrei spends most of the first half of the film with his boys, drunk, shirtless and shouting, spewing insults that would give a seasoned sailor pause, and generally being scary. This comedy-drama’s central conflict emerges when a fellow skinhead drunkenly reveals to Andrei that his father, who he had been told was a dead “Aryan war hero,” is actually a man named Naoum (Oleg Borisov), an alive-and-well Jewish musician in Moscow. Andrei then tracks Naoum down to kill him, which he almost does via a minor heart attack when Andrei reveals who he is to Naoum. Of course, as Andrei gets to know his father, he experiences the Skinhead moment of clarity and remorse that leads him directly into a confrontation with his gang (that seems to happen a lot in these movies…); he ultimately chooses Naoum. Who he, you know, initially came to Moscow to stab kill murder visit. Sigh.
Being a handsome, well-muscled and tattooed Skinhead appears to cover a multitude of sins. In the Australian film Romper Stomper (1992),when Skinhead gang leader Hando (played by Russell Crowe) isn’t bashing someone’s head in, he’s radiating tightly-coiled shirtless menace. (I will note here that Ed Norton seems may have taken a lot of his inspiration for his rendering of Derek from Crowe’s Hando; the similarities are too numerous to be accidental.) The film takes an inordinate amount of pleasure in showcasing the violent rage perpertrated by Hando and his gang, periodically intersplicing it with sex, and allowing the viewing audience to interpret the film from the standpoint of its brutal main characters. While there is no proper redemption at the film’s end for any of its main characters, the figure of Hando stands out unsettlingly not as a sympathetic figure, but as an aspirational one.
As ludicrous as Hando may be, in Mr. Crowe’s portrayal he exudes an antiheroic charisma that could persuade more forgiving audience members to take him as a role model, a sexy rebel with the wrong cause.
Apparently, the Skinhead is sooooooo hawt that the viewer has to remind themselves that, underneath all that sweaty sexy super-masculine RAWRness, he’s a vile, repellent and murderous fucking human being. Huhn. When’s the last time you read a similar caution in a movie with Jihadis? Right. And you’re never gonna, either. Unlike the Jihadi, the Skinhead’s ideological extremism allows the racist social hegemonic structure to remain intact. Could explain why our military actively recruits ‘em. Whereas a Jihadi is always a loose cannon, a Skinhead is allowed to be a loaded pistol with the safety on.
Final Thoughts
After 9/11, there was a noticeable drop-off in Hollywood of films depicting Arab/Muslim terrorists. There was also a coinciding sharp increase in the number of reported hate crimes and incidents of racial-profiling and general harassment of both Muslims and individuals of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and Iranian descent. While researching for this post, I encountered a number of blogs that complained – complained! – about the disappearance of the Jihadi from popular cinema. Mind you, the Jihadi was only gone from 2002-2007, and returned with a vengeance in that Islamophobic Orientalist schlockfest The Kingdom (2007).(If you can stand to stomach it, read the gushing NYTimes.com review here. ) It’s worth noting that during the Jihadi-free cinematic lull, films that offered realistic, three-dimensional portrayals of Arab and Muslim characters were also absent. The U.S. military occupation of countries throughout the Middle East, the immediate cause of so much death and despair, is rarely portrayed in film as anything but fundamentally benign by Hollywood. In the absence of Arab Bad Guys in movies, television shows like 24 helped American viewing audiences fill their Jihadi voids weekly. With regard to depictions of Arabs and Muslims, it’s obvious that Hollywood couldn’t say something nice, so it chose not to say anything at all. In light of the very real damage that these false, negative and conflated stereotypes of Arabs, Muslims and Middle Easterners do to these groups in real life, Hollywood’s silence is disturbingly eloquent.
(Photos courtesy of NYTIMES.com, unrealitymag.com, IMDB.com, e-Cahiers du Cinema.com, Empire Online.com Middle East Americas.com and Allez Savoir.com)
*The term “jihadi” or “jihadist”, like ”Mohammedean” and “Shi’ite”, appears to be an erroneous term created by mainstream (non-Arabic speaking) media to refer to a mujahid, the proper word for an individual who engages in jihad (plural: mujahideen). The word “jihadi/jihadist” is often used within the media to describe mujahideen, a word that is more clearly associated in Western media specifically with Afghanistan. It must also be noted that the notion of jihad has been deliberately twisted to equate it with extremism and violence by Western media.
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Abu Sinan wrote:
Great post.
I dont want to derail the post, but as a bit of background I think it is important to note that not all skinheads are racist or neo-nazis.
It is important to note that there are many skinheads who are VERY anti racist, SHARP Skins (Skin Heads Against Racial Prejudice) are a good example and many are members of ARA (Anti Racist Action) and similar groups.
The skinhead movement has it’s roots in the “rude boy” ska culture of Jamaica. Songs such as “Skinhead Moonstomp” and “Skinhead Girl” by all black bands such as Symarip show the true roots of the skinhead movement.
It was in the 1970s and 1980s that the far right latched onto the skinhead movement to promote it’s agenda and led to decades of fighting between racist and anti-racist skinheads. As a matter of fact several anti racist skinheads in the USA have given their lives fighting racist skinheads.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 9:15 am ¶
ACW wrote:
I would like to suggest for inclusion “Higher Learning”.
Norton’s character in “American History X” doesn’t excessively redeem himself as we often see characters do in Hollywood films, but I appreciated the message that people can change (?)… Nevertheless… swastika tattoos are never sexy.
My other response to this post is that Hollywood hasn’t progressed much since “spaghetti westerns”… it seems that all actors with brown skin are interchangeable to the producers.
What I take away from this post is complicated…
Let me preface this thought with qualifiers (and I’m still working on coffee, so this may not be complete):
(1) Similar physical characteristics may exist within an ethnicity, allowing others to identify or *assume* someone’s culture on sight (he’s Korean, she’s Irish, etc.); and,
(2) No culture or ethnicity is evil in its entirety or deserving of abject fear; and,
(3) We tend to fear the unknown; and,
(4) Media is a huge influence, whether positive or negative, and ‘educates’ us (even when that information is wrong);
All that said… does anyone else see a problem with Hollywood using actors of culture A, B, or C to portray the ‘evil’ culture Z? Yes, Hollywood needs to stop demonizing culture Z in the first place, but in the meantime, it plants fear of Z as well as A, B, and C in viewers. The result? Americans come across as crass and insensitive for misidentifying or confusing middle eastern cultures *and* learn to fear anyone with brown skin.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 9:44 am ¶
N wrote:
Interesting! Someone should also do a comparison, if it hasn’t been done, of James Bond to every nonwhite male character who behaves the same way.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 9:45 am ¶
AJ Plaid wrote:
@Abu Sinan–
Fiqah already noted that at in her lede paragraph–
Not the cool, Trojan skinheads.
–complete with a link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trojan_skinhead
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:06 am ¶
Slush wrote:
Fascinating post.
Not that surprising really, but definitely something I hadn’t thought about before.
What I wonder is if a Hollywood movie that created a hot Arab jihadi would be successful in making the character have sex appeal to a broad swath of American audience. Or would it be too contrary to all the other media messages around that it just wouldn’t work?
I’m really wondering, not asking a rhetorical question. I’m inclined to think that they could if they tried. But it occurs to me that there is also an element to it of ‘hot is in the culture of the beholder.’
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:09 am ¶
ACW wrote:
@ Slush: It would definitely be an independent film, wouldn’t come to my city, and would take forever to free up so I could get it as a dvd rental.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:28 am ¶
LM wrote:
Fantastic post.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:36 am ¶
Deaf Indian Muslim Anarchist wrote:
what an ignorant article. You have basically slumped all Skinheads into one category: THE NEO NAZI/FASCIST POSER!
You have FAILED to mention how the Skinhead scene was born out of Jamaican/Dancehall music in England during the 1960s. Did you know that there are BLACK, JEWISH, and BROWN skinheads? (including me)
You didn’t bother to mention the existence of SHARPS (SkinHeads Against Racial Prejudice), either.
You didn’t bother to look up the fact that many skinheads, were in fact, ordinary, working class English youths who socialized with Black teens in the 60s. It was ONLY in the late 70s and early 80s that the BNP and National Front decided to steal the Skinhead/Oi scene and insert racist politics into it.
Neo Nazi “skins” are nothing but POSERS who are looked down at and spat upon by REAL SKINHEADS who have nothing to do with racism, neo Nazism, or fascism.
Wow. I am a Skin Punk and I’m sick of people making ignorant assumptions about the Skinhead scene.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:37 am ¶
Deaf Indian Muslim Anarchist wrote:
Thanks, Abu Sinan already pointed out the obvious. Much appreciated.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 10:38 am ¶
redbecca wrote:
There have been some commentaries about the way white supremacists actually LOVE the portrayal of skinheads in “American History X” but I can’t remember where.
You might also want to check Shane Meadows movie “This is England” – which is the first movie I’ve seen that doesn’t wind up subtly glorifying a racist skinhead as hyper-masculine (and, for the SHARP fans out there, also shows the origins of skinhead culture in the ska scene).
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 11:22 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@Redbecca,
Having known a lot of skinheads on both sides of the political/racist divide I can tell that it isnt that racist skinheads liked “American History X” it is just that they found it a bit more realistic and there were more attention to factual details about “skinhead life”.
The fact that the lead character drops the racist movement, nevermind the fact that racist skinheads and their followers are not shown in a flattering light in the movie, means that most racist skinheads I have known didnt like the movie at all.
They appreciated the small details, ie types of tattoos, lingo used by the skinheads, down to little things that only skinheads of both political divides would be aware of, things like thin “braces” worn by real skinheads which have normally been messed up by the media.
In many respects the movie was more factually correct about these types of skinheads, not that the movie as a whole, was flattering to racist skinheads.
As person who grew up around the skinhead/punk scene in the US and Europe in the 1980s, I can say it was one of the first films where they seemed to have hired a advisor for the film who was either part of the skinhead scene, or closely associated to it.
Getting back to the wider theme of the post, it would be nice if the makers of these various movies about “jihadis” hired some experts who actually knew something about the jihadi/extremist Muslim world so they could get similar details correct.
If they can take the money and time to hire someone to advise them on skinhead culture, why not the sameon jihadi culture to make the pictures more realistic?
Even if they dont paint the jihadis in a nice light it would still be nice to see them be a bit more realistic…….ie they can talk REAL Arabic, not pidgeon Arabic or the 4 year old Arabic we hear from some Western Arabs playing these roles………Sunnah beards instead of three day old growth, Sunnah pants and other religious and cultural items that would actually be accurate.
There is one role that comes to mind where a Muslim is actually treated half way okay, it is Morgan Freeman’s role in the Costner Robinhood movie, but even in that movie where they show Freeman’s Muslim character praying they cannot get it right and have him doing something that looks nothing like Muslim prayer.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 12:21 pm ¶
Irene M. wrote:
This is why I don’t watch 24 anymore. At the behest of a friend, I watched a couple of episodes and they had Alexander Siddig, the hottest man on the planet and my first celebrity crush, playing the evil terrorist complete with fake accent, baggy clothes, and an ungroomed beard. The directors/writers had rightful heir of freaking James Bond on their cast and decided to wrap him in offensive stereotypes and hit him upside the head with the ugly stick. Ugh.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 3:13 pm ¶
gatamala wrote:
Damn DIMA. Check the first paragraph.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 3:19 pm ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@Irene,
Siddig is a good example. His Arabic is pretty iffy, but he was raised in the West by a Western mother, so that is normal. In “Kingdom of Heaven” they actually had him playing a Persian.
At least in that movie they had the sense to cast Ghassan Massoud as Salah ad-din. Imagine if they had cast someone from outside of the Middle East? In this case they cast a Syrian to play the historic figure who was actually Kurdish, not Arab.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 3:26 pm ¶
Manto wrote:
“It must also be noted that the notion of jihad has been deliberately twisted to equate it with extremism and violence by Western media.”
+++++++
And by significantly loud and active religious extremists who describe and contextualise their violent actions with this terminology and rhetoric.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 5:07 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
Wow, thanks to everyone for your feedback. I definitely appreciate it. I’ll address some of your questions now.
@AJ, gatamala: Thanks for the kudos and the assistance. Hey, a girl can’t respond to comments from the beach!
Special lurve/hugs to you both.
@LM, Slush: Thank you both for your kind words. Slush, while I’d loooooove to see that movie, I’m firmly of the opinion that it just ain’t gonna happen, at least not in Hollywood. A number of foreign films feature attractive Arab protagonists, so I think that’s our best bet here.
@N: While I don’t have any links, I know that there are articles about Bond versus the Villain of Color (I remember covering this in a film class years ago). It would probably take some Googling but I’m sure you could find something. Happy hunting!
@ACW: I didn’t include “Higher Learning” because I wanted to limit my focus to films with a skinhead protagonist. Remy (Michael Rappaport) was never really clearly defined in that film. I’m not sure where Singleton was going with it. Hell, I don’t think Singleton was sure where he was going with it. As far as the “foreign and unknowable” goes, I included a link for the documentary “Reel Bad Arabs” in this post, where Dr. Jack Shaheen discusses how Arabs and Muslims are and have been perpetually “Othered” in Hollywood for about a century now. It is willful ignorance and Orientalism, and not lack of knowledge, that is to blame for the continued positing of the Arab as the Other. In other words, a lot of folks just find that whole “mysterious, exotic, dangerous East/Easterners” thing sexy. Hence, its endurance.
@redbecca: I didn’t review “This Is England” because I believe it is a documentary, and I was dealing with fictional protagonists only. Still, it sounds like it is worth a look. Thanks for suggesting it.
@Irene M.: Ah, Doctor Bashir. I always really wanted him and Dax to hook up.
I don’t watch “24″ at all, it just seems like a hot mess, but I suppose if Kiefer Sutherland’s the “hero” then uglying Siddig up is an absolute necessity. SIGH. Too bad.
@Abu Sinan: Thanks for the additional background about anti-racist skinheads. The link I provided in the fourth sentence of the post actually lists a number of groups that you mentioned, as well as a brief summation of their history. Also, with regard to Alexander Siddig’s and others Arabic-speaking skills: I’m going to ask that you please be a little less derisive in your assessment. Siddig’s (born Siddig El Tahir El Fadil El Siddig Abderrahman Mohammed Ahmed Abdel Karim El Mahdi) non-Arab parent, rudimentary Arabic, and Western upbringing absolutely contributed to his personal development…but this does make him less “authentically” Arab. You know that people “lose” language for all sorts of reasons, one of the big ones being assimilation. You are also aware that degrees of assimilation are often determined by parents. In light of all these factors, this kind of assertion – from a non-Arab adult student of Arabic language and culture – strikes me as insensitive.
@DIMA: I welcome thoughtful, intelligent feedback. Your comments were neither. You obviously neglected to read through this post in its entirety. It’s interesting to me that, in light of the extensive research I did for this post, you would presume that I needed a 101 from you. I am well aware of the history of skinhead movements and their relation to coinciding musical developments. I am also well aware of the continuing tension between anti-racist and racist skinheads. But this post wasn’t about that. This post was about depictions of extremism and popular responses to those depicitions. If you’d like to read something about how racist skinheads have essentially appropriated the skinhead image from anti-racist skinhead groups on this site, then I suggest you write something up and submit it.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 8:26 pm ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@Fiqah,
Sorry if you think that way about my comments concerning the Arabic skills, or lack there of, for some Western Arab actors.
I can only vouch for the languages I speak and understand, but I think Western media is lax when it comes to Arabic and Farsi in a way they wouldnt dare be in more commonly known Western languages.
I just wonder if it isnt a bit of racism on the part of media producers and directors? Or is it that they think no one will know any better or that no one will catch it where as with a language like Spanish, German or Italian they have to work much harder to get it right because a lot more people will know?
Personally I find it a bit offensive when media use language in fictional settings and dont do EVERYTHING they can do to get it right.
Languages are a major part of people’s identities and cultures. When you fail to take the required time and effort to get it right I think you disrespect both the people’s identity and disrespect the culture.
I never claimed that this particular Arab’s lack of Arabic skills had anything to do with his authenticity as an Arab, although anyone who has spent any time in the Middle East and Western Arab communities will know that knowledge of Arabic is a VERY big deal in how people from an Arabic background are perceived.
I found it to be a bit disrespectful of the Arabic language and culture to have not had the actors work on their language skills better. Again, one wonders if such a lapse would have been allowed for a more commonly understand language in the West, like Spanish?
I am aware of how people loose language and I am very aware of how people work to either gain back their language, or to gain a language they never had because of historic oppression. This was very common in the areas in Ireland where I lived where people made an effort to learn Irish after systematic oppression of the language and hundreds of years of attempts to destroy it.
Anyway, it is an issue I have, as you said as an adult student of Arabic, for those who make no effort to learn their own language. I know this happens for many reasons.
It is my attempting to try and be a bit more sensitive that has caused me to not speak in Arabic to Arab Americans until I know whether or not they speak Arabic. Many times I have spoken in Arabic to Arab Americans only to find out they dont speak any Arabic and it becomes a bit embarrassing for both parties involved.
Posted 14 Aug 2009 at 11:25 pm ¶
harlemjd wrote:
Naveen Andrews’ Lost character is about the closest I can think of to a modern Arab Hollywood character who’s supposed to be a sex symbol. (Oded Fehr in Sleeper Cell may be another good example – I think he’s sexy as hell – but I never watched the show, so I don’t know.)
And I agree with Alexander Siddig being awesome. Glad I never watched 24. His appearance on MI5 was OK, if still a bit scruffy.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 12:10 am ¶
TwennyTwo wrote:
Just a note for Harlemjd- Oded Fehr isn’t actually ‘Arab. From what I know, Naveen Andrews’ isn’t, either. Whether they play sexified Arabs isn’t under dispute, however.
This debate definitely has my attention; I feel that I don’t know enough to say more than that. I feel like the new kid in a class that has ideas and wants to respond to the discussion, but has no idea how.
peace.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 2:18 am ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@Abu Sinan: I understand your larger point regarding proper research regions, cultures and languages as they pertain to accurate media representation. I agree that Islamophobia and racism heavily inform these ad nauseum false depictions. And you’re right, they couldn’t get away with it with Spanish or Italian – although I have been told that it still sometimes happens with dialects of Chinese. Regarding the Irish/Arabic language comparison – not the cleanest parallel to draw. Conquest and assimilation, while they often overlap, are not the same things. These two identities and languages are perceived VERY differently, at least stateside. I also strongly maintain that putting “Arabness” along some kind of essentialist continuum wherein outsiders are permitted to arbitrate degrees of an individual’s “Arabness” is problematic, but I think this is something we’ll have to agree to disagree about.
@harlemjd: (British actor of Indian descent) Naveen Andrews played an insurgent? Hmm. I never watched the show. I’ll have to look him up. Also (Israeli) Oded Fehr’s character in “Sleeper Cell” is worth looking at. I have to confess that I don’t watch a lot of television, and shows like “24″ and “Sleeper Cell” just really don’t appeal to me a-tall. I focused on films in this piece, but I think these shows are worth a look.
@Manto: I’m not sure I understand what you mean. Would you mind elaborating?
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 8:29 am ¶
ACW wrote:
@ Fiqah: RE: Higher Learning: I certainly see your point!
I’m saving your “Reel Bad Arabs” link for Monday when the kids are out of the house so I can give it my undivided attention.
@ Abu Sinan: (said) “When you fail to take the required time and effort to get it right I think you disrespect both the people’s identity and disrespect the culture.” <– This has been one of the most accurate summaries of the problem I’ve stumbled across in quite some time. Well said!
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 8:30 am ¶
Fiqah wrote:
Oh! All: Please read Ms. Thea Lim’s wonderful analysis of the film “Traitor.” It explores many of the themes discussed here.
http://www.racialicious.com/2008/09/04/muslims-theyre-just-like-us-representations-of-islam-in-traitor/
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 10:41 am ¶
Adrianna wrote:
Hot Jihadis really ! lol you only see those in foreign movies . I’m thinking of the guys in Paradise Now. As for the hot white supramcist only Ed Norton did it for me , but then again I love everything the man does . he is mesmerizing on screen. I’d pay to watch him read a catalog .lol
Holly wood only like pretty white people . their whole business is about reinforcing white beauty. Of course The despicable neo Nazi is going to be hot. he is white.
@ Irene M
I heart Alexander Siddig too ….. so yum.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 12:09 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Fiqah
Great, great essay. (I could easily see this becoming a book or longer article, fyi) As I’ve already posted on Possumstew and given Link Love on Vs the Pomegranate I won’t repeat my comments here, except to say again that comparing white racist skinhead representations in the movies with scary, othered Arab and Muslim “terrorist” ones is a terrific idea. I love what you’ve done here and I’m still thinking a lot about it.
I do have a thought about the skinhead tangent that has sprung up I’d like to share: While I am often frustrated by the unproductive digressions that plague posts with Arab and Muslim themes online, I don’t think that is the case here. Your post has inspired additional commentary… but I think that’s a sign of how successful it is, rather than a critique of what has been “left out” so I hope you will take that way… even if the way some issues have been raised leaves something to be desired. You have done a fantastic job of opening up a wide-ranging conversation about a rich and under-reported phenomenon. And, for me, that fact that some of your respondents are pulling at different threads and further fleshing out stuff that–out of necessity– wasn’t your central focus, is a good thing. It means that there’s a lot there.
So this is my thought: Since your post is about representations I think it is totally fine to concentrate on racist skinheads, even though I appreciated Abu Sinan’s on-thread clarification. But, while I don’t cosign @DIMA’s approach, I think her underlying point is an interesting one to consider: that skinheads, whose image has become synonymous with racist violence, splintered off from a larger movement that was multi-racial. I wonder if we could get past the way that came up and look at the dynamic there a minute in light of what you’ve written?
“Arabs” and “Muslims” have been stock characters since the beginning of cinema while Skinheads didn’t appear until the late 20th century. But in a short space of time that subculture–or at least its image–was overtaken by angry, racist white guys who co-opted the style and changed it from within. Like Abu Sinan I was on the scene back in the day and I remember how upset early Skins were about the emergence of what we called then “Nazi Skins.” They became so pervasive that Dead Kennedy’s felt compelled to write their famous song “Nazi Punks Fuck Off!” (which they sang directly to the Nazi Skins in their audience to encourage them to, well, fuck off).
For our purposes I think this points to two different racist strategies to control PoC. 1) To represent us in media as quintessential “others”, like with Arab and Muslim characters or the inverse, to assume our style so completely that we disappear, like with Skinheads. I can see parallels with the rise of mid-90’s “Wiggas” whose often casual racism came wrapped in a style derived completely from PoC.
Does that make sense?
@DIMA
Holy lead-with-your-fists Batman! It’s not that I don’t understand your objection… As you can see above, your comment made me think. But I’m afraid the way you phrased it made it too easy to dismiss. I hope you come back to this thread with your ‘A’ game because I think you have a lot to add to this conversation. Just my two cents.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 2:22 pm ¶
jvansteppes wrote:
This is a smidge off topic but I want to take a moment to go back to your description of Marwa Sherbini’s murderer (why is his last name abbreviated?) and the notion of ’snapping’ in the face of a multiethnic country ’sneaking up on him’. I hadn’t read that detail before and it immediately struck me as some sort of Islamophobic version of the ‘gay panic defense’.
According to the gay panic defense, murder of a gay or trans person is a totally justifiable reaction to the discovery that someone is gay or trans or the horror of them hitting on you; Sherbini’s killer’s ’snapping’ is up the same alley, especially in the way that the victim is blamed for looking or acting too gay/trans, or in this case, ‘too Muslim’. Ultimately being different is perceived as the real crime, not the violence against he or she (or ze) who ‘chooses’ to be different.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 4:51 pm ¶
harlemjd wrote:
Twennytwo – yeah, I know that neither actor is Arab. I just listed them because the characters in question are.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 5:57 pm ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@Joseph,
I think you make good points and your comments about “Wiggas” got me thinking about how some of these “Wiggas” and their groups have actually coincided with racist skinheads.
A good example would be the “Nazi Lowriders” originally from California and how they co-opted a hip hop image and fused it with a radical racist agenda.
They have been one of the fastest growing hate groups in the Southwest and have become a force to be reckoned with in the California state prisons, second only to the Aryan Brotherhood in their influence in the white prison population.
Unlike mainstream racist skinheads who are easily identifiable by the standard skinhead “uniform” of Doc Martens, “braces” (suspenders), flight jackets and the like usually adorned with far right memorialbilia, “Nazi Lowriders” often look like the stereotypical hip hop fan with baggy pants and shirts, hairstyles and the like.
Back in the day, during the early and mid 1980s, it was the PEN1 (Publican Enemy Number One) Skins that co-opted PoC styles. Instead of the standard skinhead dress they often dressed like Hispanic gangsters, “Cholo” style.
When I first became involved in the punk/skin scene in the early 1980s in the US it was before politics, especially race politics, divided the scene. We had black skinheads, Mexican skinheads, Jewish skins, you name it. A few incidents in the mid 1980s caused it to split very quickly and VERY violently.
Posted 15 Aug 2009 at 11:21 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@jvansteppes: Thanks very much for your thoughtful feedback. I had heard of this, and I’m so glad you brought it up. Yes, there are striking similarities, and I think that the “red thread” here is the Othering process. Of course these arguments are patently absurd to anyone with a heart/brain, but I was taken aback by how many people seemed to be of the opinion that Axel W. (I have no idea about the last name thing either, I’m guessing the German press has a different policy regarding releasing names) was justified in his horrific actions. And I’ve read similar defense of other hate crimes, where living one’s life and being true to one’s self is perceived as – meh, this term is inelegant, but bear with me – existential flamboyance that invites verbal abuse or physical violence. I’m never sure how this argument stands up in court or in the court of public opinion (because I’m not an asshole), but it often seems to when the victim is a member of an oppressed and hated group.
Posted 16 Aug 2009 at 12:11 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@Adrianna: Two words. Kais Nashef.
That’s all I’m sayin’.
Posted 16 Aug 2009 at 1:16 pm ¶
BSK wrote:
Re: Alexander Siddig
What I found interesting about his appearance on 24 was how he was juxtaposed with the “bad Arabs”, lead by actor Adoni Maropis. The way in which the characters were physically presented were interesting, and I think said a lot about how we define good and bad, particularly through the use of attractiveness. While I’m not expert on attractive men, I would say that Siddig definitely was closer to the Western male ideal than Maropis. Siddig had lighter eyes, a gentle demeanor, and wore suits. Maropis was angry, had a shaved head, and wore all black. While I would venture to say both actors were attractive men, the impression was still “Handsome guys are good, ugly guys are bad.” This meme is played out all over the place in media, but I thought it was interesting here. If you look Western and have blue eyes, you’re the good guy! Those bad guys have heavy accents and are so gruff and mean! *Sigh*
Posted 16 Aug 2009 at 8:16 pm ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@BSK,
” If you look Western and have blue eyes, you’re the good guy! Those bad guys have heavy accents and are so gruff and mean! *Sigh*”
A lot of this depends on the times and current news. Remember “Die Hard” with Bruce Willis where the terrorists/bad guys were tall blond haired and blue eyed German terrorists?
That worked because they were leftist/Marxist type terrorists who were the “enemy” at that time.
Hollywood is nothing if not opportunist!
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 9:55 am ¶
Adisa wrote:
The paragraph where you explore white male hypermasculinity could just as easily be about the paradoxical love many Americans have for The Hells Angels (and others like them). These big bad white guys are the living, breathing counterpoint to the fear that many white men hold for Black and Brown men.
These white papas don’t take no mess, especially from darkies.
By extension, the troubling ‘rooting for the bad guy’ that we see for “The Sopranos” and “Sons of Anarchy” are more examples of the same.
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 10:02 am ¶
Fiqah wrote:
Okay, y’all have twisted my arm. There were so many references to “24″ that I decided to watch a few episode clips that featured Siddig’s character.
@BSK: You are right, there is definitely a subtextual narrative happening with the light/dark juxtaposition. Siddig, who plays a reformed Jihadi (insert eye roll here) is obviously a sympathetic figure, while the darker-skinned (American born Greek descended) Maropis is violent and very much unrepentant. I hate the show because it never effectively challenges the “Go Team AMERICA!” meme. Nobody ever really seems to stop and ask WHY all these people are so angry. Rage doesn’t happen in a vacuum, so pretending it’s the natural state of an entire people should be more problematic to our image-makers. Anyway, apparently, Siddig’s character gets killed off saving the hero – typical. Even a reformed Jihadi must be punished. SIGH. I’m going to assert that Maropis, who is quite handsome, had to be “uglied” up for his role as well. (Don’t want him detracting attention from ole Kiefer, after all.) Anyone whose never seen him can follow this link and decide for themselves, though: http://www.adoni-maropis.com/index2.htm
@Abu Sinan: While Nazis in period films are often portrayed by attractive actors, I have to say that the White extremists in ‘Die Hard” really just were comparitively not. Also, there was a lot of xenophobia happening in that film, where Americans were united (sorta) across racial lines because those crazy foreigners were trying to kill everybody. (Hmmm. Nazi/neo-Nazi characters also don’t seem to ever have political demands; it seems as though they’re always after money.)
@Adisa: Absolutely. Constructions of the masculine are problematic, but we see their constant reiteration everywhere. Why, as I write this, that Hillshire Farms commercial with the Manly Men grilling in their backyards and shouting “Go, Meat!” is on. ‘(Cause, you know, Real Men eat MEAT.) A lot of (White) men who operate outside of accepted societal norms are viewed with admiration/envy by other White men. It’s the appeal of the rebel, and it doesn’t work without trumping the intimidating hyper-masculinity/sexuality of men of color, who must always be controlled.
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 3:58 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Fiqah
So many interesting permutations of this argument! I don’t watch “24″ either because that bullshit is like Birth of a Nation: the Series to me. But in following this thread I thought to myself “Adoni Maropis”? That’s a Greek name. Turns out Maropis is a Greek American actor who grew up in Pittsburgh. His father is a periodontist.
But, because of his “exotic” dark looks he mainly known for playing 1) Abu Fayed, Arab Terrorist on 24 and 2) Quan Chi, Evil Asian Sorcerer in Mortal Combat: Conquest.
So… this guy (like the Aborginal actor Cliff Curtis and, to a lesser extent, the Israeli Oded Fehr) is an All-Purpose Eastern Bad Guy analogue.
No matter which way you come at it, the representational machinery of this dynamic is effed-up.
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 4:20 pm ¶
Winn wrote:
@fiqah,
“I didn’t review “This Is England” because I believe it is a documentary, and I was dealing with fictional protagonists only. Still, it sounds like it is worth a look. Thanks for suggesting it.”
“This Is England” is not a documentary. It is, IMHO, the best look at the early days of the British skinhead scene since “Made In England”, the film that launched Gary Oldman’s career. It also deals explicitly with the infiltration of the skinhead scene by white nationalist elements. It is particularly germane to your discussion however, in its depiction of Combo, the character who returns from prison to his old skinhead gang with very different views about race and patriotism. In contrast to the portrayals of Hando and Derek Vinyard, Combo is obnoxious, intimidating, yet quite lonely and pathetic, and obviously attempting to find a way to assert himself and feel less impotent and invalidated. The film is unambiguous in its view of the path Combo chooses, but never one-dimensional in its depiction of the character or his relationships. The film humanizes him without glamorizing him*. Combo is no aspirational glamour figure, but he is not a cardboard villain either.
“This Is England” is about rage and hate, disenfranchisement and scapegoating, grief and loss, masculinity and fatherhood (or lack thereof), and regret and remorse. It is a terrific film, and one that serves as an elegant counterpoint to the others you discussed.
* I will say in both the case of “American History X” and especially “Romper Stomper”, the glamorization has as much to do with the incredibly charismatic performances of Crowe and Norton as with the script or technical aspects of the film. The actor who plays Combo gives a terrific performance, but he does not have the high-wattage charisma of Crowe or Norton (and RS was Crowe’s fifth film, and a relatively low-budget Australian indie. It was no Hollywood film with a machine designed to glamorize Crowe’s character; word of mouth about his performance took care of that).
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 6:03 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Joseph –
@Fiqah
So many interesting permutations of this argument! I don’t watch “24″ either because that bullshit is like Birth of a Nation: the Series to me.
Okay, five minute off topic, but not really tangent:
Once I was in a restaurant talking to one of the interns about 24. We chatted a bit about 24 (I think in response to Jehanzeb’s piece about it) and then stopped thinking about it.
On the way out, we were stopped by our waitress, who had heard snippets of our conversation about 24 without knowing the context. When I told her I wasn’t a fan of the show, her face got *really* intense and she really wanted us to know that Jack Bauer “got things done” and Jack Bauer “saw things through to the end” and we really needed to “appreciate American heroes like Jack Bauer.”
Me and my companion were shocked into silence.
From the way she was talking to us, it was as if we had insulted her long dead parent or something. So, I can see where your linking it to Birth of a Nation may be on to something. I haven’t seen that kind of fanatical zeal about something outside of fandom, ever….
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 6:34 pm ¶
atlasien wrote:
I just wanted to make a brief note on “Romper Stomper”. I totally agree that the portrayal of the racist skinheads is problematically sympathetic, and part of a disturbing trend… one that I’m glad Fiqah is pointing out.
But Romper Stomper has an awesome extended sequence halfway through the movie where a bunch of angry Asians rapidly congregate and beat the crap out of the racist skinhead gang. They relentlessly chase them from house to house and keep beating them and beating them, and just when you think they’ll stop, they beat them some more.
I suppose if you were a racist, your reaction to that scene would be “ugh, a faceless horde of Asians unfairly overwhelms the white heroes.” But I viewed it as “underestimated Asians refuse to be victims, turn the tables and administer awesome, epic beat-down. YEAH!”
Even if you disagree with the (rather hazy) message of the movie, I think it’s worth a watch for that sequence alone.
Posted 17 Aug 2009 at 6:52 pm ¶
RCHOUDH wrote:
Excellent post Fiqah! I love how you eloquently compared and contrasted these two ideologically extremist character types with each other. And you’re absolutely right the jihadi will never catch a break in Hollywood! Forget making him look hot and get a complex emotional backstory; he’s always gonna be stuck playing the bad guy and a monster. The racist skinhead however is prone to making mistakes and later redeeming himself because he’s human after all/sarcasm. Also, what you mentioned about hot white supremacists embodying a twisted version of white hypermasculinity really caught my interest. And finally I can’t believe there are people out there actually trying to justify a pregnant woman’s murder! That’s simply sickening to me (thanks for not linking to those repulsive comments)!
Posted 18 Aug 2009 at 2:15 am ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@Joseph: Yeah, no. Understood. In my comments I’ve been sure to note the actual ethnic background of actors who play the Arab Bad Guy for the reasons you mentioned. Sideways oppression – you know I love it (not). “24″ is terrible. I spent most of the time rubbing my forehead. I don’t recommend that anybody watch that show. Some stuff is just bad. Like, for your soul.
@Winn: Yes, thanks for the clarification. I actually looked up the IMDB page after posting the comment. It looks like a great film, and I’ll definitely give it a look, but not right away. All these skinhead movies in succession are a bit much; you’d be surprised at how much psychic damage hearing slurs – even in a film – can do. Also, I’d like to just point out I was also really troubled by all the fan posts for Derek Vinyard. NOT Ed Norton, but Derek Vinyard. And while I agree that Crowe’s performance in “Romper Stomper” was great, his sex appeal was sold in equal measure here…as evidenced by the fact that he spent most of the film partially nude. Now, contrast this image with portrayals of (usually) unattractive AND bafflingly over-clothed film Jihadis. Yeah…no.
@atlasien: Thanks for your thought-provoking feedback. Yes, I remember that scene, and considering the awful, bloody violence on the part of Hando and Crew that instigated it, I think a li’l “getback” glee is understandable. Since I never identified with the protags that scene made me happy, too. I am not ashamed.
@RCHOUDH: Aw, shucks. I’m glad you liked it, thank you. Yes, the Sherbini discussion boards were most upsetting. As link-happy as this post was (seriously, assembling all my links took a WHOLE DAY) I couldn’t bring myself to lead anyone into that sort of ugliness. A lot of the stuff I encountered would make you ill; at one point I was tempted to just not finish this piece because of it. BUT – I had an objective, and I would not be stopped. Ah, the things I do for love of the R.
Posted 18 Aug 2009 at 1:56 pm ¶
Fiqah wrote:
@LDP: Jack Bauer is a “real American hero” who “gets things done”? Hmm. I would NOT have been able to resist the urge to shriek “Cohhhhh-BRA!” in response to this kinda “G.I. Joe” nonsense. You can’t take me anywhere…
Posted 18 Aug 2009 at 3:01 pm ¶