Punching Nazis in the *face*

[andrewducker]

[Poll #1765531]

context.

Comments

Q1

[lsanderson.livejournal.com]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/opinion/blow-my-very-own-captain-america.html

Re: Q1

[andrewducker]

That would be the link in the context, yes.

Re: Q1

[cyprinella]

What an unfortunate URL for that article.

Re: Q1

[lsanderson.livejournal.com]

I suspect that he's gotten more than a bit of... err, blowback with a last name like "Blow."

[bart-calendar.livejournal.com]

The thing is, unless there are superheroes flying around that I've somehow not noticed we have to assume that Captain America and all comic books are set in a parallel universe.

In that parallel universe it's completely possible that the U.S. Army was integrated during WW2.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

Point of order: Your "modern viewers" who are "feeling excluded" are actually modern white viewers who don't want to be bothered with the truth. As the link pretty clearly shows, option 1 managed to exclude both the grandfather who actually served and his modern day grandson who saw the movie and knew better.

[innerbrat]

Not necessarily. Many viewers of colour do not want to be reminded that history sucked, and do not want to go to see a movie that uncritically shows a world in which racism dictates the way the world is organised. Had Captain America showed a segregated army, it woud have had too choices on how to do so: 1) show it without comment, which in a movie that is already about "America good, Nazis bad", would provide implicit approval from Marvel. OR 2) spend narrative time and tone showing that American society is deeply flawed. Which may have been possible, but it would have been a different movie.

I know African Americans who refused to let their children see The Princess and the Frog, because it ncriticaly showed segregation in 1920s NOLA (I have not seen it and cannot comment on whether this decision was justified).

Many conversations I have had with people about the depiction of people of colour in historical fantasy and related genres, says that in some cases they'd rather see them in prominent characters roles than worry about the historical likihood of them being in those roles.

Not that the OP doesn't have have a valid point of view, because he does, but I don't think that racial revisionism in ever case is necessarily a bad thing.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

OK, fair enough. It bothers me, it bothers the people I know, but I do need to be reminded that we're not necessarily representative of The Way Things Are.

[asim.livejournal.com]

Hi. Actual PoC here, who's grandfather actually served in The War In Question.

If -- it's not a universal if -- we don't care to be reminded, it's because so often it's been fictionally abused, maligned, written so poorly or ham-fistedly that it offends not only our sense of what our forefathers went through, but offends anyone's sense of a damned good story to begin with. When so many well-meaning people offer to write Yet Another Special Episode for your "plight", it can get a little...old, shall we say?

More to the point: wrapping it up as "many PoCs don't want to see it" ignores that we're diverse. African-Americans and Asian-Americans will likely have different reactions to CAPTAIN AMERICA, and groups and individuals within those groups will have different reactions, as well. I know you say "many", yet your overall text, to me, reads as "almost all", and I would caution you against that; some African-Americans might have forebade their children to see PRINCESS AND THE FROG, and some even protested the movie -- but many also enjoyed it, and thought it an excellent film about a little-known bit of American culture.

For me, CAP, in this context, was a mixed bag. The film was better than I hoped...but I know I winced at the integration, fake plastic history or no. I know I thought of my Grandfather, and his life-long hatred for WWII and what we went through, when Gabe helped take that Hydra train -- and at other points, as well.

And that's the reality for me, and I think for a lot of SF PoC fans out there. We have so few choices about media that really reflects our reality AND is generally popular, that when historical fantasy includes us -- and CAPTAIN AMERICA is essentially a fantasy about WWII -- we grade on something like a curve. Sometimes that comes out with more anger than others, sometimes, it's more offensive than others, sometimes we're simply accepting of the need for that curve. CAP is a lot less offensive, for example, than the movie of LAST AIRBENDER, and I'd daresay that there's something about quality writing opening up quality integration in there, as well.

It's a balance. Until this sort of thing is fully overcome, it's always going to be a balance. My experiences and observations say that's a stronger truth than the more binary view I see you presenting -- even if I do love the icon you use, as well. :)

[innerbrat]

Oops - I'm very sorry if it read like I was speaking for PoC there.

My choice of the words 'many' and 'some' and specific examples were meant to indicate that I wasn't trying to say 'almost all' but I understand that the same words are used as a blanket for 'everyone', so I could have made that specific.

I definitely did not mean to offer it as a simplistic binary, I just wanted to say that I imagined not everyone included in the "modern viewers" label would have been white, as interactiveleaf objected to.

Thank you very much for taking the time to reply, and for offering your perpective on the movie. It's appreciated, and I get what you mean about grading on a curve.

[innerbrat]

PS I'm totally reading all your journal now. When you get a friending notice, don't be surprised.

[ajr.livejournal.com]

A tricky question. In a straight war movie, I'd prefer the latter option, that of it being more historically accurate. Largely because when you have a war film that claims to depict what actually happened (to some degree or other), it bugs me when they get things wrong. U571 being the canonical example of that sort of thing. Why does it bug me? Because people take many such films at face value, to the extent that they distort the historical record.

But, Captain America? A superhero movie - or to put it another way, a fantasy? Where the big bad is a Nazi soldier with an actual Red Skull? Come on! If anyone thinks that's representing actual history... yeah, they got problems. So if Captain America wants to cast the best actors for the job instead of the most accurate for the period, I've got no problem with that. Because, you know, in this case it's very definitely Not Real.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

There are also intermediate options like "technically accurate, but in fact someone of the relevant characteristics just _happens_ to be best friends with the protagonist". Which I'm not sure is better, but is an understandable alternative.

But I'm honestly not sure which is best -- I'm reluctantly thinking a variety of the options may actually be best, but I'm really not sure.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

FWIW, having seen the film I notice that essentially all the soldiers shown are either from recruiting posters, or from the squad captain america put together from the survivors of Schmidt's first fortress who (I think) mostly came from his friend's battallion, but some seemed to come from all over. It seemed to suggest the black soldiers who followed Captain were from his friend's battallion (one was from Brooklyn?), but it would be equally consistent with them having come from somewhere else in the American or other army, or even civilians who were squeezed into the squad.

The only other scene with soldiers was with the survivors of his friend's battallion, I can't remember if they had any black soldiers in the scene or not.

[nickys.livejournal.com]

> displaying levels of sexism and racism which the average person imagines were universal during the "dark ages".

Just a totally off the wall idea here:
... game designers could do a small amount of research, such as say, reading a couple of history books instead of watching Holywood movies, and display actual levels of sexism (there was plenty, but it wasn't economically viable to pretend that 50% of the population were weak of body and mind, so women could actually do most stuff) and racism (almost non-existant).

[khbrown.livejournal.com]

Was racism almost non-existent because these societies were more 'racially' homogeneous? Was there still ethnic prejudice, but just amongst different groups of people who looked alike?

[nickys.livejournal.com]

Fundamentally it was a lack of competition for resources for most of the medieval era.
People of different ethnic origins were mostly either selling you cool stuff from abroad, or giving you money for your stuff.
... or they were crew on ships, and on an equal footing with the rest of the ship's company.

... oh and rich Europeans were much more prejudiced against poor Europeans than they were against rich Africans.


Even after the slave trade got going slaves in the UK were on a more or less equal footing with white servants.

[steer.livejournal.com]

racism (almost non-existant)

You are kidding right? Where in Europe wasn't there a massacre of Jews somewhere between 8th and 14th century? That's just a starting example.

[nickys.livejournal.com]

That's religious bigotry, not racism.

I'm not claiming that horrible things didn't happen back then, just that they happened with different excuses to those made today.

[steer.livejournal.com]

That's a pretty fine line to draw surely? I guess you could argue there was no racism, just religious persecution which happened to divide along racial lines (I'm also thinking of wars with the Moors and the crusades) by coincidence... but the upshot is that the most regularly encountered "out group" for much of Europe was Jewish and even when converted to Christianity they were treated quite badly quite regularly.

(I am guessing you are an historian though so likely know better than me).

Perhaps what you are getting at is that the concept of racism did not exist as such? It seems though that when large groups of individuals of distinct ethnic make up encountered each other, the result was hostility more often than it was cooperation. Perhaps I am unduly pessimistic or lack detailed knowledge.

[nickys.livejournal.com]

> when large groups of individuals of distinct ethnic make up encountered each other, the result was hostility

Quite often, yes.
But in the context of medieval Europe most foreigners would be encountered as small groups of traders, or exotic visitors with interesting stories, and there's no inherent reason for conflict to develop in that situation.

It's a very different context from the modern world in a lot of ways, one of which is that skin tone in itself wasn't a big issue.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Thanks. It makes sense.

[hano.livejournal.com]

Slightly off topic, but just to note that punching fascists hard and repeatedly in the face is to be encouraged whenever possible.

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

I was looking for the "like" button for this, but couldn't find it... ;)

[octopoid-horror.livejournal.com]

I don't understand the second poll.

Are you making the point that people believe certain things about historical sexism and racism, but they're wrong... or that people like games set in the past to treat it like the modern world but in funny clothes and without all the troubling social structures?

Since various historically (as in, games set in a specific time period of our past, but with added fantasy stuff) set games make the point that their setting is both racist and sexist, and you should be aware of that while playing.

I thought it was awfully interesting that in Captain America, the bad guys were [i]not[/i] Nazis. The prominent integration was pretty noticeable though, much like Cap's personal cosmopolitan international strike team.

[crm.livejournal.com]

lol at imparting 'historical accuracy' in a superhero movie.