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lonesparkMy kids borrowed the film The Last Airbender from the library and watched it. I know I did this to myself by watching it, but at least it was mostly free? Anyway, ha, I share with you my pain and rage.
I am having a hard time deciding whether to rant first about the HORRIBLE RACE ISSUES or the OVERALL TERRIBLENESS of the movie. I think I will go with terribleness, because it seems to me that the whitewashing bullshit just goes hand in hand with a fundamental misunderstanding of, and disrespect for, the source material.
(Is it always this way with whitewashing? I feel like it is, but maybe there are counter-examples?
I'm thinking about fantasy worlds like Earthsea or The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, where there are pale-skinned people in the story, so by whitewashing you are/would be not only sending the message that people of color are not allowed to be protagonists and heroes; you might also be planting the suspicion, in the minds of people familiar with the source material, that the whitewashed characters are actually Kargish/Arameri/etc.
But anyway, that doesn't really apply to AtLA world.)
I am having a hard time deciding whether to rant first about the HORRIBLE RACE ISSUES or the OVERALL TERRIBLENESS of the movie. I think I will go with terribleness, because it seems to me that the whitewashing bullshit just goes hand in hand with a fundamental misunderstanding of, and disrespect for, the source material.
(Is it always this way with whitewashing? I feel like it is, but maybe there are counter-examples?
I'm thinking about fantasy worlds like Earthsea or The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, where there are pale-skinned people in the story, so by whitewashing you are/would be not only sending the message that people of color are not allowed to be protagonists and heroes; you might also be planting the suspicion, in the minds of people familiar with the source material, that the whitewashed characters are actually Kargish/Arameri/etc.
But anyway, that doesn't really apply to AtLA world.)
