White Supremacists Are Back (On Television)!
Sons of Anarchy, FX’s other critically acclaimed and well-rated drama, follows the local politics and personal dramas of a gang of motorcyclists in northern California, who traffic in weapons and porn (no wonder the show is popular), but also stand for principles: justice, fairness, community, etc.
Season two focused on the powerful League Of American Nationalists, headed by a shadowy businessman named Ethan Zobelle. Unlike Justified’s country bumpkins, Sons of Anarchy envisioned a scarier white nationalism, one connected at all levels of government, rich and devious. Zobelle is looking to play an interesting game of racial warfare in California. He pits the various ethnic gangs against each other and looks to break down the mostly white, but nonetheless integrated, Sons of Anarchy through various schemes.
Unambiguously Zobelle is a bad guy, and his goons are portrayed as angry and misguided. But not completely. Wanting narrative complexity, Sons creator Kurt Sutter gives both Zobelle and his top man AJ Weston (played by uber-gay-friendly Henry Rollins) children to care for. Most interestingly, Zobelle is always a highly intelligent man. He speaks volubly about the need for America to stay true to itself and not let outside interests take hold. This is where the show enters murky waters, which are dramatically interesting and well-written, but nonetheless disconcerting.
I wonder how many of Sons of Anarchy’s viewers – I presume a large audience of white, older straight men, given the show’s focus – are subtly seduced by Zobelle’s commitment to “American” purity, his cunning and business saavy, his churchgoing lifestyle, fancy cigar shop, and, yes, even his gorgeous daughter. He has a life many American men would want. That he’s peddling drugs and guns is irrelevant – we all know from The Sopranos, Mad Men, Breaking Bad and numerous other shows that criminals often make the most relatable and interesting characters. Zobelle is so charming he’s even hard for me to hate.
Sons of Anarchy gave white supremacy a sheen of respectability and upward mobility. It’s a fascinating dramatic choice and made for solid, unsettling storytelling, but I wonder if every fan has the critical distance to see beneath the surface.
Representation: I’m Not the Police!
Will the search for ratings and headline-grabbing series motifs eventually lead to a show about a neo-Nazi group? It’s not as far-fetched as it sounds. As mentioned, cable is already having success with shows about immoral people and groups. Television is a tough market, and novelty is hard to come by.
As I said earlier, I have little interest in policing what should or should not be shown on television. I believe we create the media as much as, or more than, the media creates us. No program is going to change a significant number of people into white supremacists. Haters will hate with or without representation — research from online gaming to YouTube has shown this.
I think what I’m so fascinated by is a very public and sustained engagement with America’s dirty secret, something we ignore, hoping it will go away, something we’d rather not acknowledge for fear it be seen as “legitimate” and catch on again (or more). It doesn’t need to be said that during a time when the first black president’s lowest approval ratings are among white voters (which, for complex reasons to be sure, have been as low as 39%), and when he’s the most polarized first-year president in polling history, it does make minority TV viewers slightly more sensitive to these kinds of representations. (I’m not even going into the Tea Partiers; it’s been over-discussed).
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