on boycotting The Last Airbender
Jun. 30th, 2010 02:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
reflectedeveSo tomorrow, The Last Airbender opens in theaters across the United States and Canada. As I mentioned previously, I will be boycotting it.
Please, do not give this movie your money. The Last Airbender is an egregious example of institutional racism in action. That's really the important part, but just in case you've missed all the discussion and activism that's gone on since the casting was first announced, I'll try and provide a little background. This is not as thorough as I would have liked to be, but I'll also provide links to some fantastic resources and articles that are well-worth checking out.
As many of you probably know, The Last Airbender is a live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender, a cartoon that began airing on Nickelodeon in 2005 and had enormous all-ages appeal. A:TLA is well-written, beautifully animated, full of well-developed characters (many of whom are female), possesses excellent and thorough worldbuilding, employs a fabulously wacky sense of humor which balances out its often deeply serious themes ... and it's set in a fantasy world based on a variety of exhaustively researched and respectfully portrayed Asian and Inuit cultures.
I can't overstate this: A:TLA was groundbreaking. In a cultural landscape dominated by distinctly European-inspired fantasy stories (stretching back to, and beyond, The Lord of the Rings), Avatar showcases four richly detailed fantasy nations whose architecture, written language, hair/costume designs, food, social mores, and spirituality are very clearly drawn from real-life Asian and Inuit culture. The show's creators have discussed their influences at length, as you'll see if you pick up a copy of The Art of the Animated Series (which I plan to do as soon as I can fit it into my budget - it's gorgeous). And the characters who populate that world, named Aang and Katara and Sokka and Zuko, Toph and Iroh and Suki and Azula ... they're Asian and Inuit too. (In spite of some truly bizarre claims to the contrary.)
How rare is it to see one strong, well-developed Asian hero in a major media property of any kind, much less four or five of them, heading up an entire cast full of distinct, well-developed Asian characters with their own histories, personalities, political alignments, strengths and dreams?
Here's an article that breaks down Paramount Pictures' casting choices, for some context there. (Paramount is the studio producing The Last Airbender, though they're hardly alone in perpetuating these disparities.)
As a white person, I can't possibly know what it's like to be that utterly excluded from the narrative - from the stories that inform and shape our lives as a society, but I really fucking hope I know that it's wrong. The idea that white is somehow "default" for all potential characters, or that white people can't identify with/care about characters of color (while people of color are constantly expected to identify with and care about white characters) is dangerous, painful nonsense.
A major film adaptation of a show like Avatar: The Last Airbender could have been a tremendous opportunity to challenge that status quo. It could have provided kids of Asian and Inuit descent with desperately needed role models. Instead, Paramount Pictures cast the heroes with unknown white actors - citing the usual tired excuse that these were the best actors for the job (as though there aren't any talented kids out there of Asian and Inuit descent who might have deserved those roles).
Whitewashing of this kind has a long and painful history in this country - here's another article which illustrates this practice throughout Hollywood history - and it's devastating to see it perpetuated again, particularly on source material that had so much potential for inclusiveness.
To add insult to injury: when the original casting was announced, all four of the major roles had been given to white actors. Later (officially due to scheduling conflicts), the role of Zuko--a villain who will become a hero later in the story--was given to Dev Patel, of Slumdog Millionaire fame. The roles of his father (the major, entirely unsympathetic villain of the series) and uncle, as well as the murderous admiral in the first story--all the major representatives of the imperialistic, genocidal Fire Nation--were given to actors of Indian heritage.
In other words, a story about a bunch of brave Asian kids fighting to save their world has become a story about a bunch of white kids trying to save the world from the evil brown people - going from groundbreaking to representing the worst of the status quo.
I'm starting to run out of words at this point, because frankly, the whole debacle turns my stomach. I'm a fan of the show, to be sure, but I really don't think you have to be, to find this upsetting. While I've been writing this, Roger Ebert tweeted a link to yet another article, which details the issues of whitewashing, yellowface, exclusionary casting language (something I haven't even touched on here), and so on - institutionalized racism, in other words. The writer explicitly states that ze is not a fan of the show. I've only just skimmed it for now, but it looks fantastic.
There's a lot more ground that can be and has been covered: issues of Paramount's intentions (see this article for more on their intensely problematic casting calls), the importance of real-world culture and race to "fantasy" worlds (something anyone familiar with Middle Earth, Narnia, Prydain etc should be able to acknowledge), discussion of the merits of "colorblindness" (yet another good article here) which lead to accusations of "racism" on the part of people who care about inclusive casting. I've also seen people argue that the characters in the cartoon show, particularly Aang (the lead), "look white" - showcasing an inability to "read" cartoon art combined with a cultural tendency to see white as the default. (Actually, what really boggles my mind is the dogged persistence some have shown to prove that some minor detail within A:TLA is not explicitly Asian, as though that would discredit the overwhelming Asian influence and also the controversy.)
I've barely touched on the core of this issue, but it's been done better and thoroughly elsewhere, and I encourage you to go out and read further.
What it boils down to, for me, is what I said at the beginning: please, do not give this movie your money. I don't care whether you're a fan of the show or not. If you just want to see a flashy, computer-enhanced fantasy movie, there are lots more to choose from this summer. (None of them look particularly great, but then, neither do the TLA reviews that have started coming out - even ignoring the casting issue completely.) If you must see it, find a way to see it without paying for it. Paramount and M. Night Shyamalan have been confronted over and over with the issues and concerns associated with their casting - not only by fan-organized groups, but by advocacy groups such as MANAA. The controversy has made it into the press repeatedly. Essentially: The Last Airbender has become a potent symbol of the struggle between inclusive advocacy and institutionalized racism. A dollar that goes towards supporting this film is a dollar that goes directly towards supporting institutionalized racism, in spite of intentions or ignorance.
When I've talked to people about The Last Airbender in person, I've been met with a fair amount of complacent shrugging - a whole lot of "what do I care? what does this have to do with me?" That's privilege talking. I understand that we all have to pick our battles; that this one movie may not be something you can focus all your energy or outrage on. But surely, you can care enough not to pay for one movie ticket. It's hardly a lot to ask.
As I noted above, there's an enormous amount of material out there on the topic; your best source of information would be the Racebending website, which is overflowing with information and resources. They have a primer on the whitewashing of The Last Airbender here, and most of my own thoughts on the topic have been informed by discussion and links posted at![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
racebending. Most of the articles I've linked come from them.
Here are a few more links I'd recommend:
These Are My Colors, by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ssj10.
a few (a lot of) words on racism and paramount and the last airbender, bystarweather (also contains a lot of great links)
The Last Airbender Movie, by Gene Luen Yang (amazing creator of American Born Chinese, co-creator of The Eternal Smile, and more).
New day in politics, same old racist world on the silver screen, by Derek Kirk Kim (another fantastic cartoonist). (An older post, made back when the casting was first announced, but I think it's an extremely important read - even with all the image links broken.)
And, here's a quick list of the specific articles I linked within my post, for convenience:
-Paramount Pictures – Diversity in the 21st Century? (Racebending.com)
-Yellowface: A Story In Pictures (Racebending.com)
-FacePainting (Floating World on tumblr)
-Caucasian or Any Other Ethnicity (Racebending.com)
-The Problem With Colorblindness (Faith Bell, guest contributor at Racebending.com)
Not that this is an excuse, but I'm pretty tired and overwhelmed with comic work right now, and I feel like I've completely run out of steam at this point - so I'm about to hit post. If you find anything problematic, and you have the energy/inclination I'd really appreciate it if you'd let me know.
Please, do not give this movie your money. The Last Airbender is an egregious example of institutional racism in action. That's really the important part, but just in case you've missed all the discussion and activism that's gone on since the casting was first announced, I'll try and provide a little background. This is not as thorough as I would have liked to be, but I'll also provide links to some fantastic resources and articles that are well-worth checking out.
As many of you probably know, The Last Airbender is a live-action adaptation of Avatar: The Last Airbender, a cartoon that began airing on Nickelodeon in 2005 and had enormous all-ages appeal. A:TLA is well-written, beautifully animated, full of well-developed characters (many of whom are female), possesses excellent and thorough worldbuilding, employs a fabulously wacky sense of humor which balances out its often deeply serious themes ... and it's set in a fantasy world based on a variety of exhaustively researched and respectfully portrayed Asian and Inuit cultures.
I can't overstate this: A:TLA was groundbreaking. In a cultural landscape dominated by distinctly European-inspired fantasy stories (stretching back to, and beyond, The Lord of the Rings), Avatar showcases four richly detailed fantasy nations whose architecture, written language, hair/costume designs, food, social mores, and spirituality are very clearly drawn from real-life Asian and Inuit culture. The show's creators have discussed their influences at length, as you'll see if you pick up a copy of The Art of the Animated Series (which I plan to do as soon as I can fit it into my budget - it's gorgeous). And the characters who populate that world, named Aang and Katara and Sokka and Zuko, Toph and Iroh and Suki and Azula ... they're Asian and Inuit too. (In spite of some truly bizarre claims to the contrary.)
How rare is it to see one strong, well-developed Asian hero in a major media property of any kind, much less four or five of them, heading up an entire cast full of distinct, well-developed Asian characters with their own histories, personalities, political alignments, strengths and dreams?
Here's an article that breaks down Paramount Pictures' casting choices, for some context there. (Paramount is the studio producing The Last Airbender, though they're hardly alone in perpetuating these disparities.)
As a white person, I can't possibly know what it's like to be that utterly excluded from the narrative - from the stories that inform and shape our lives as a society, but I really fucking hope I know that it's wrong. The idea that white is somehow "default" for all potential characters, or that white people can't identify with/care about characters of color (while people of color are constantly expected to identify with and care about white characters) is dangerous, painful nonsense.
A major film adaptation of a show like Avatar: The Last Airbender could have been a tremendous opportunity to challenge that status quo. It could have provided kids of Asian and Inuit descent with desperately needed role models. Instead, Paramount Pictures cast the heroes with unknown white actors - citing the usual tired excuse that these were the best actors for the job (as though there aren't any talented kids out there of Asian and Inuit descent who might have deserved those roles).
Whitewashing of this kind has a long and painful history in this country - here's another article which illustrates this practice throughout Hollywood history - and it's devastating to see it perpetuated again, particularly on source material that had so much potential for inclusiveness.
To add insult to injury: when the original casting was announced, all four of the major roles had been given to white actors. Later (officially due to scheduling conflicts), the role of Zuko--a villain who will become a hero later in the story--was given to Dev Patel, of Slumdog Millionaire fame. The roles of his father (the major, entirely unsympathetic villain of the series) and uncle, as well as the murderous admiral in the first story--all the major representatives of the imperialistic, genocidal Fire Nation--were given to actors of Indian heritage.
In other words, a story about a bunch of brave Asian kids fighting to save their world has become a story about a bunch of white kids trying to save the world from the evil brown people - going from groundbreaking to representing the worst of the status quo.
I'm starting to run out of words at this point, because frankly, the whole debacle turns my stomach. I'm a fan of the show, to be sure, but I really don't think you have to be, to find this upsetting. While I've been writing this, Roger Ebert tweeted a link to yet another article, which details the issues of whitewashing, yellowface, exclusionary casting language (something I haven't even touched on here), and so on - institutionalized racism, in other words. The writer explicitly states that ze is not a fan of the show. I've only just skimmed it for now, but it looks fantastic.
There's a lot more ground that can be and has been covered: issues of Paramount's intentions (see this article for more on their intensely problematic casting calls), the importance of real-world culture and race to "fantasy" worlds (something anyone familiar with Middle Earth, Narnia, Prydain etc should be able to acknowledge), discussion of the merits of "colorblindness" (yet another good article here) which lead to accusations of "racism" on the part of people who care about inclusive casting. I've also seen people argue that the characters in the cartoon show, particularly Aang (the lead), "look white" - showcasing an inability to "read" cartoon art combined with a cultural tendency to see white as the default. (Actually, what really boggles my mind is the dogged persistence some have shown to prove that some minor detail within A:TLA is not explicitly Asian, as though that would discredit the overwhelming Asian influence and also the controversy.)
I've barely touched on the core of this issue, but it's been done better and thoroughly elsewhere, and I encourage you to go out and read further.
What it boils down to, for me, is what I said at the beginning: please, do not give this movie your money. I don't care whether you're a fan of the show or not. If you just want to see a flashy, computer-enhanced fantasy movie, there are lots more to choose from this summer. (None of them look particularly great, but then, neither do the TLA reviews that have started coming out - even ignoring the casting issue completely.) If you must see it, find a way to see it without paying for it. Paramount and M. Night Shyamalan have been confronted over and over with the issues and concerns associated with their casting - not only by fan-organized groups, but by advocacy groups such as MANAA. The controversy has made it into the press repeatedly. Essentially: The Last Airbender has become a potent symbol of the struggle between inclusive advocacy and institutionalized racism. A dollar that goes towards supporting this film is a dollar that goes directly towards supporting institutionalized racism, in spite of intentions or ignorance.
When I've talked to people about The Last Airbender in person, I've been met with a fair amount of complacent shrugging - a whole lot of "what do I care? what does this have to do with me?" That's privilege talking. I understand that we all have to pick our battles; that this one movie may not be something you can focus all your energy or outrage on. But surely, you can care enough not to pay for one movie ticket. It's hardly a lot to ask.
As I noted above, there's an enormous amount of material out there on the topic; your best source of information would be the Racebending website, which is overflowing with information and resources. They have a primer on the whitewashing of The Last Airbender here, and most of my own thoughts on the topic have been informed by discussion and links posted at
racebending. Most of the articles I've linked come from them.Here are a few more links I'd recommend:
These Are My Colors, by
ssj10.a few (a lot of) words on racism and paramount and the last airbender, by
starweather (also contains a lot of great links)The Last Airbender Movie, by Gene Luen Yang (amazing creator of American Born Chinese, co-creator of The Eternal Smile, and more).
New day in politics, same old racist world on the silver screen, by Derek Kirk Kim (another fantastic cartoonist). (An older post, made back when the casting was first announced, but I think it's an extremely important read - even with all the image links broken.)
And, here's a quick list of the specific articles I linked within my post, for convenience:
-Paramount Pictures – Diversity in the 21st Century? (Racebending.com)
-Yellowface: A Story In Pictures (Racebending.com)
-FacePainting (Floating World on tumblr)
-Caucasian or Any Other Ethnicity (Racebending.com)
-The Problem With Colorblindness (Faith Bell, guest contributor at Racebending.com)
Not that this is an excuse, but I'm pretty tired and overwhelmed with comic work right now, and I feel like I've completely run out of steam at this point - so I'm about to hit post. If you find anything problematic, and you have the energy/inclination I'd really appreciate it if you'd let me know.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2010-06-30 06:06 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-06-30 06:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-06-30 08:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-06-30 09:36 pm (UTC)Anyway, back to the main post... I hate the idea that audiences couldn't connect to non-white characters because HOLY SHIT, THEY ALREADY DID!!! THIS IS WHY THE MOVIE WAS FUCKING WELL OPTIONED, BECAUSE THE SERIES WAS POPULAR AS SHIT!!! *rageface*
*ahem* My point is, it makes my brain hurt.
(And I don't even like Avatar. But this fills me with rage.)
(no subject)
Date: 2010-07-01 01:45 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-07-01 06:07 am (UTC)There is one black British dude.
I wish I were kidding
Wait, I take that back, Ben Kingsley is biracial.
There is always the possibility, of course, that some of the less well-known actors are X-British and that just isn't turning up in their profiles. But they sure all LOOKED white, or at best Spanish/southern Italian, with the exception of one I thought could maybe possibly be semitic of some stripe (possibly Jewish) (the youngest brother, Toby Kebbell) (fear my parentheses).
(no subject)
Date: 2010-07-01 05:31 pm (UTC)/sarcasm
That's sad. And angry face inducing.
Well, now that I know, I think that not just the lead should have been Persian, but other actors as well. Or at least Middle Eastern? I'm mean, if you can't get all Persians, maybe that would have been a better choice then all white (looking) actors? And one black guy? Yes? Maybe?
Ga! Anyway, thanks again for all the links.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-07-06 02:07 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-07-06 01:57 pm (UTC)Prince of Persia bothered me too, although I admit that it didn't get to me as much as The Last Airbender does (personal fan bias, tch). I certainly didn't go to see it, though, and I've tried to bring it up with people who did/planned to. So many people just don't seem to think of this issue at all. Naturally. :/
I can't tell if this is just my skewed perspective, or if The Last Airbender in particular managed to raise an unusual amount of awareness? (Not nearly enough, clearly, but still.) The folks who run