I hadn’t even heard of this movie, being under my rock as usual, but I just watched the trailer, prior to reading Antoine Allen’s take on it, and it’s high tension, and manages in seconds to make you hope with all your being, that for once in a horror film, the black person gets to come out alive, and maybe a hero, too. So I’ll be watching this, to be sure. It seems it has white people rather riled up though, who tend to get riled up about some absurd stuff, like claiming the show Luke Cage is racist because the cast is primarily black. Uh…does it really have to be pointed out the 99.9 of all television shows and movies in uStates and other places have casts which are all white, or mostly white? Why is it okay for people of colour to have nothing else to watch for not only their lives, but whole generations of people of colour having no choice there? This extends to books, too. Trust me, white people, you can cope with one or two shows which don’t primarily feature white people. It won’t kill you. Think of every superhero, in comics, television shows, and movies. How many of them are white? Yeah. So you can be quiet now, okay?
The thriller and horror genre has pretty much been drained of all originality. However, Get Out strikes out to bring a new twist to the genre; we are calling this ‘Racism Horror”. Get Out is about an interracial couple going to ‘meet the parents’ for the first time. However, the Black boyfriend is confronted with more than just some ‘Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner” level of racial tensions. He becomes trapped in a town that seemingly has a more sinister agenda towards young black men. The film is directed by Jordan Peele from the Key and Peele show.
There has been even more shock and social media outrage by a section of the white community and probably a minority of Black people who do not ‘get’ the trailer either. Namely, both of those whom are not or choose not to be aware of the history of racism in America. Yet, there are also some who are aware of the somewhat sensational point this horror film is making. Watch the trailer so you can gauge where their outrage or misunderstanding may have been born from.
The trailer ends with a one-liner that will no doubt be filling meme across the internet before and after people are glued to their seats fearfully watching this thriller:
If there is too many white people I get nervous– Get Out.
As expected this line and the general premise of the film has produced complaints from some people. Some people have been shocked by the trailer and others have said it portrays the genuine fears that black people sometimes have.
But remember, the old adage, it’s ok to be quasi-racist as long as you have a member of the opposite race as a close friend. Jordan Peele is already Black, so he can’t say “my best friend is black”. On the other hand, Peele has more than a best friend whom is white, he is married to a White woman ie he has a super best friend. But, in all seriousness, it can be argued that the film portrays the fear that Peele subconsciously had when he first met his wife’s parents. Are those fears only limited to interracial couples? Are those fears valid or invalid? Probably not! If we look at history we can see how these fears may have manifested over time.
The question becomes, just how far from reality are the themes of this racially charged thriller? Well, here are some examples from history of the mistreatment Black people have faced by sections of the White community; all after the end of slavery.
1. In 1919, in the wake of World War I, Black sharecroppers unionized in Arkansas, unleashing a wave of white vigilantism and mass murder that left 237 Black people dead after mass lynchings.
Four more examples follow, with disturbing photographs. If you aren’t well versed in the history of horrific racism in uStates, you definitely need to click over and read every word of the article. If some white people are so in need of being outraged, you need to get outraged about the right things. I’ve known more than one black person who has mentioned a low level fear when surrounded by white people. There’s a reason for that fear, and there’s a reason for the mistrust which fuels it. These things don’t come out of nowhere for no reason. There’s a deep bedrock of reason, and it you don’t know it, please educate yourself.
[…]
In short, movies like this expose the subconscious fears of the subjugated minority and highlight a lack of awareness from the other members of the same society. Get Out it is basically the horror version of Guess who’s coming to dinner. If people have a basic knowledge of history then they shouldn’t be shocked by this film. It only shows racism from a horror perspective. Therefore, if art is supposed to imitate life, this film is merely a reflection of an aspect of life. Thus, people should find society’s racism more shocking than this film that for the first time depicts an aspect of life from a horror perspective. So, yes it is sensational but that ‘Horror’; people need to discuss the issues it raises- rather than simply complaining for the sake of it.
Click on over and read the whole article, it’s excellent, and contains a lesson that people inclined to complain or be dismissive truly need to learn.
Killing black people used to be a hometown get-together for white people. Sorry, but there’s not enough rug to sweep that history under.
Funny how the same white people who correctly acknowledge the horror of being an ISIS prisoner (which includes slavery) are the same white people who dismiss black slavery.
Also: It’s not difficult to piss white people off. Holy batman jesus are most of us whiny, fragile infants.
Nonono, this violates the laws of white people narrative:
1. No black heroes of any gender
2. You can have white villains as long as you have white heroes.
3. Black side kicks are allowed if their either help the white hero or are saved by him.
4. Choice of pronouns intentional.
“If there is too many white people I get nervous– Get Out.”
I’m white. When I was a kid, we lived in a couple of countries where we were very much paler than almost everybody else. Now I live in one of the most multicultural, multiracial communities in Canada, which I chose deliberately. I had a young son and couldn’t afford to show him the world, but we could live where the world came to us. When I read that one-liner, I cracked up, because it’s exactly how my son and I feel.
I’m too much of a coward to watch the movie, so I really hope you give it a blow-by-blow review and include reporting on the yelps of privileged white pain at the most pointed bits.
P.S. I wish Antoine Allen could sort out when to use “who” and “whom”.
Fledanow:
I’m not about to take on someone who speaks actual English as opposed to American, and I’m hardly any sort of writer myself, so I’ll leave that one to someone else. :D
Also, I will not be seeing this in the theater, as much as I’d like to support the box office numbers. I’d be surrounded by white people, and they make me fucking nervous as hell.
I don’t know why there’s all this focus on history. Seeing the trailer, I immediately though of how so many of my fellow white people these days go on and on about “you have to be nice if you want anyone to listen to you” or “be more like MLKJr” or “if you disrespect a cop, of course you’re going to get shot” and just the whole ridiculous lie about how if black people were only more accommodating of their oppressors they wouldn’t be oppressed.
Which isn’t to say it’s meaningless to point out how similar or worse has actually happened in history, but the premise seems plenty contemporary. The black people you see in the town are what too many white people today want black people to be.
A. Noyd:
Oh yes, but when you try to point that out (as I have done several times regarding white people and Indigenous people), many of them get so damn bristly, and slam their brains shut so fast it’s amazing they don’t collapse their skulls, there’s no getting through to them at all. They will find all manner of reasons to take offense, and just get worse and worse and worse.
As always, many white people have to be gentled into such things, before just bluntly pointing out reality.
Oh god, it’s so frustrating. I live in Manitoba, a centre of bigotry and racism against indigenous people. I know it’s my job, as a white person, to call out other white people when they express these beliefs and attitudes but it takes about 30 seconds until I am ready to simply stop any attempt at dialogue and just slam them upside the head with something big , wide, and hard. All the while that they are denying being the slightest bit racist, they are at the same time enjoying their bigotry, delighting in it, and intent on maintaining a death grip on this essential part of their identity. I don’t have the skills to break through.
Putting it on the list of films to watch while home alone during one of those weekends Husband and the kids are out in the country. Husband’s not a huge fan of horror, but for some reason I like to watch them alone. Plus, if it’s riling up the white folk, it can’t be all that bad.
Remember what I said about who actually seems to need an awful lot of safe spaces?
Giliell:
I do, and it’s truth. Not just safe spaces, but padded safe spaces.
This is going on my list.