Star Wars, Racism, and Sexism.

The Empire Triumphant: Race, Religion, and Rebellion in the Star Wars Films  by Kevin J. Wetmore Junior. 

Let me begin by saying this: I am not a huge fan of George Lucas.  Largely because of the almost incestuous Luke and Leia story line and because he wanted Marion Ravenwood to be too young to drive when Indiana Jones seduced her, I suspect he may be a pervert.  Even so, I feel the need to defend him from baseless accusations.  

The author starts out by saying he isn't calling George Lucas a racist, and then proceeds to list all the reasons the Star Wars Universe (created by George Lucas, remember) is as racist as a Klan rally.  His logic is not consistent, he relies on revisionist history, and worst of all - he criticizes another author for doing the same thing he is.  The other author "ignores evidence that contradicts his interpretation".  

The author claims filming in Tunisia for the backwards world of Tatooine means  Lucas believes Tunisia to be backwards.  Yet it doesn't occur to him that the primitives of Endor were filmed in California, which would mean Lucas thinks of Californians (including himself) as primitive. 

Aspects inspired by Asian culture are "appropriation" if used on a good guy and "stereotyping" if used on a bad guy.  Lucas has never made a secret that he was heavily influenced by Japanese movies.  The Jedi are analogous to Samurais.  What this guy is calling Appropriation is actually Imitation - the highest form of flattery.    

He claims that there is no sex in the Star Wars Universe and then tells us Vader sexually threatened Leia on the Death Star (Interrogation Scene), that Lando was a horny stereotype, and even compares Luke to Oedipus.  

At one point, he says the characters never go to "a performance", yet we see Palpatine at what seems to be an opera.  There are "no aliens" in the capital city - except for those interacting with the White Males the author keeps ranting about.  He even goes so far to take literally Luke's petulant comment to C-3PO about being farthest from the bright spot in the center of the universe!

Now that I've poked all kinds of holes in his logic, shall we move on to his claim of racism?  First is the lack of color - everyone is white.  Mace Windu and Lando?  Tokens.  Even Padme's right-hand-man, a black man named Panaka, is dismissed as tokenism.  My favorite one, though, is the claim that Vader is black.  Never mind he has white skin under the armor, and white offspring, Darth Vader is clearly an Evil Black Man.  One who sexually threatens the virginal white Princess.  

Jar Jar Binks is a "Gungun" according to this book.  "Gunguns" are black stereotypes who were not allowed a voice in the Senate.  In truth, Gungans (note the spelling) were isolationists.  They  didn't want to be in the Senate.  They were also Quasi-Jamaican, and not all Jamaicans are black.  

The Neimoidians were inscrutable and had almond-shaped eyes, so they must be Asian, thus making Asians evil.  Watto was greedy and had a big nose, so he must be Jewish.  The Jawa, by merit of the words sounding similar, were Jews - even though their behavior more fits the stereotype of a Gypsy. And the Tusken Raiders are Arabs, Bedouins to be precise, because they are nomadic and dress for protection from the desert in which they live.  

Ewoks and Wookies are American Indians, which makes Chewbacca Tonto.   Or maybe Friday, since he was a South American "savage" tamed by the White Man.  Any tribal society, in harmony with nature, MUST be American Indians.  

Then there's the mean way Lucas portrays women.  All they can do is have babies (Shmi and Padme) or get saved!  Did you know Leia was rescued from Jabba The Hut?  Never mind it looked like she was participating in a plan to rescue a White Male...  All those bad guys either of the leading ladies shot?  They don't count.  The female Jedis we saw? Tokenism.  

I will grant that the Star Wars universe could use more color and that females are under-represented. What this book does goes beyond that.  Star Wars is a tale meant for children.  As such, things are simplified and a resemblance to established stereotypes is going to happen.  And of course George Lucas tells a story from a Eurocentric viewpoint - he is descended from Europeans and raised in Western society.  

Public Unisex Restrooms

I remember being a small child and asking why my brothers had to go into a different public restroom.  All the toilets were in little stalls, after all, and no one could see each other.  The reason given was that the urinals are not in stalls, and that some people will "peek" at the opposite sex.    

Forty years or so later, I still don't get it.  Urinals can be done away with, or put into stalls, or hidden in secluded corners.  I've been peeked at - by adult females and by children of both sexes.  So it's clearly not simply an "opposite sex" thing.

I also speak from the parental (more or less) point of view.  A female parent (or parental facsimile) can't go into the men's room, but may not feel safe letting the boy child go by himself.  Even if said boy child is "old enough".  Even parents who might take a boy into the women's room are reluctant to take a girl into the men's.  Those open urinals, I suppose.   Never mind that only Ron Jeremy might be able to use a urinal from a distance that would allow a sighting.

Which leads me to nudity.  There is nothing evil about any body part in and of itself.  No one's eyeballs have ever boiled from glancing at an unexcited reproductive organ, unless I missed that X-men comic.   Most people tend to shield those parts from view, anyway, even at the urinals.

The people who would hurt your child are not always of the opposite sex, nor are they always sexually motivated.  Sex-segregated restrooms do little or nothing to protect them.  In fact, if these predators target a woman's male child in a unisex restroom, she will be there to protect him.

I can't tell you how many times I've used a men's room because I was about to burst and the wait for the women's was forever.  Having a unisex restroom, smaller than the two combined would have been but larger than either alone, would make the wait shorter.  Builders could save at least the cost of that dividing wall.  A unisex restroom wouldn't need to be closed for cleaning - there's no issue of what sex the janitor is.

Unisex bathrooms simply make more sense, especially in a world where those lines are becoming more blurred every day.  Save money, time, and space.  Build unisex bathrooms.

Perception and Racism

My nephew-in-law is a black man.  He's been dealing with racism for his entire life, and now he sees it where it may not exist. I can understand this, as I do the same thing with Welfare.  If he and I were standing in line at the grocery and the cashier was rude to the food-stamp-using black person before us, we would jump to different conclusions.

Another example, from fiction.  Professor Slughorn is surprised by a student who was born to Muggles - non-magical people - excelling in his class.  Harry Potter, angry, responds with "One of my best friends is Muggle-born and she's the best in our year."  The first few times I read this, I thought Slughorn was in the wrong.  But what if his surprise came, not from the bloodline, but from the notion that a Muggle-born has no exposure to magic until the age of eleven?  Imagine a child raised with no exposure to music suddenly becoming a virtuoso!

I'm sure there are many others, but I'll get to the point.  We do not know the motivations of strangers. The cashier in my first example could have been rude for any reason - maybe even just be a rude person.  When I was a cashier in a grocery, there was a woman who came in regularly.  She always tried to buy twice as much food as she had money for.  Every time.  Had I been rude to her, it would have had nothing to do with her race or method of payment.

I had a chat the other day, with a ten year old, about "The N Word".  He said that sometimes people use it to mean "friend".  One woman I knew used it the way I use "Black".  Some folks use it as they do the term "White Trash"- but for black folks.  But the problem is, the perception of it as a slur is simply too strong, so I told the kid to never use it.

The same is coming to apply to the word "Redskin".  I've read lots of historical documents where that word was used simply as a synonym to "American Indian".  Clearly, having it used as the name of a sports team is intended as a compliment.  Those who the term applies to need to pull a Hermione Granger (back to Harry Potter) - she embraced the wizarding slur "Mudblood" as a badge of honor.  Basically... "Damn straight I'm a Mudblood.  Mudbloods are awesome."  It's too late, I fear, to save the N word, but the R word still has a chance.  

I'm not going to tell you racism doesn't exist.  We do, though, need to keep a calm head about our own perceptions.  That guy cut you off in traffic, not because you are a different color, but because he would have cut off his identical twin. That lady who tells you that your half-black children are beautiful means well, even if she is kind of ignorant.

Come to think of it, this advice applies to life in general.  Don't assume to know why people do things.  I bet everyone reading this has a different take on why the stick people family on my truck is huge.  Some of you, those who know me best even, might be wrong.