Media acts as a reflection of the society it inhabits. The entertainment we consume is not created within a bubble, it is created with the biases, prejudices, and influences that exist within a given society. Many of the prejudices within our work is communicated implicitly and may not even be the intention of the writers and directors, but the message is still absorbed by viewers. Even the most progressive works have issues within them that we as a society have yet to tackle, so it’s important that we continue to critique the works we see to move forward toward a more inclusive and equitable depiction of society.
With that said, one trope that I had unconsciously noticed growing up but never registered until last year was the double standard and racial bias that occurred in the treatment of BIPOC character story arcs. I noticed that in a lot of shows and movies, white characters or characters who were oppressors were given better outcomes than BIPOC characters or characters who had been oppressed when bad deeds were committed. It was a difficult trope to capture because it is so ingrained in our collective psyche and it exists in even the most progressive pieces of media. What this communicated to me, was that our implicit biases need to be continuously checked because it puts a great amount of pressure on populations of color.
Avatar the Last Airbender is undoubtedly an amazing show. It is incredibly inclusive with various disabled characters, an exploration of various Asian and indigenous cultures, and a lesson in the way war affects every aspect of life. It has done wonders in being both educational, entertaining, and progressive, however there does seem to be some implicit biases that presented themselves in the fabric of the story. The colonizers of the show were given better outcomes than their victim-turned-villains. Specifically, Zuko and Iroh were given much more sympathy than Jet and Hama when it came to the outcomes of their bad-deeds, and in general were written with more likeable characteristics than their counterparts.
Zuko was given a three-season redemption arc that allowed us to empathize with him throughout the entirety of the show despite him being an antagonist for most of it. He was undoubtedly traumatized both by his upbringing and brainwashed by the ideologies of his nation, but he was given the opportunity to heal and change his ways throughout the show. He was beloved as a character, so even when he made mistakes that hurt others his character was given just as much space to do good deeds to help us like him. I personally love Zuko and I think his redemption arc was the best in cinematic history. However, I can’t help but notice that the same care and attention to the writing of Zuko’s character and arc was not paid to Jet.
Jet was also created as a likeable character. He acted as a father figure to the freedom fighters and protected them like family. He was also traumatized by his past when the fire nation killed his parents, so he used that pain to fight the fire nation. After some time had passed and he realized the error of his ways, he attempted to turn his life around. This was around the time that Zuko was beginning his transformation. When Jet attempts to expose Zuko, we are conditioned to side with Zuko even though Jet is technically right. From Jet’s point of view, a fire bender entering Ba Sing Se, the last safe haven for refugees, is incredibly dangerous. Technically, he was right to try to report him. A fire bender entering Ba Sing Se could signal an attack by the fire nation. After this incident, he is again traumatized by being brainwashed before dying while fighting Lee Feng. Although his character was given the opportunity to be redeemed by helping Aang, he still dies before we can see a fully-fledged healing process from him. I am not condoning his actions. He was wrong to profile every fire nation person as evil and view the earth kingdom town as collateral damage during his freedom fighter days. However, I think the way his story arc was written did a disservice to the discussion on how victims of systemic trauma should be handled as characters. In the beginning he was portrayed as deceptive, when he was trying to heal he was portrayed as crazy or the antagonist to Zuko’s redemption, and in the end he had a brief moment of clarity where he was able to help the Gaang. He died after that brief moment, but he was never truly given a chance to heal. RIP Jet.
I think the strongest comparison is Iroh versus Hama. Iroh is literally a colonizer. He was a fire nation general who led the most successful attempt at the siege of Ba Sing Se before Azula’s infiltration. The only reason that he stopped playing his part in the war was because he lost his son in that battle. Throughout the show he is depicted as wise and having already learned how his nation’s ideologies are wrong. He is essentially fully formed and mainly present to help the next generation. He also never pays for his war crimes and lives the rest of his life owning a successful tea shop. I love Iroh, but this is a bit unfair considering how Hama was treated. Hama was a water-bender in the Southern Water Tribe who fought countless battles against the fire nation. Their sole purpose for attack was to capture and imprison water-benders to relinquish their threat against the fire nation. She was the last water bender in her tribe before she was captured and tortured for years. She learned to blood bend to free herself before settling in the fire nation in secret. Her character was written as evil and vengeful. I think it was completely the wrong move to paint Hama’s character as evil beyond return because ultimately her trauma was on par (if not worse) than Aang’s. I’m not condoning her actions, but I think it’s telling that the show writers decided to depict an indigenous woman’s coping strategy as unleashing evil on random fire nation villagers. More often than not, real oppressed people’s response to trauma is to stay away from their oppressors rather than seek out revenge because they are aware that the power structure is in favor of murdering or torturing them. To me, the way her character was written felt like an oppressor’s fear more than an actual outcome of trauma. It’s unnerving because if this same story were set in the context of our world, I think we would be much more aware of how problematic that story arc actually is.
Another instance of this implicit bias we have that make BIPOC characters irredeemable villains while white characters are inherently good is actually in Black Panther. This is another case of a movie that I absolutely love, that has done so much for positive representation and diversity, and that is ultimately a love letter to Pan African culture. However, I couldn’t help but notice that Killmonger’s motives and Ross’s presence in the movie felt strange. I’ll start with Ross.
Ross is a CIA agent who sides with T’Challa to help save Wakanda. There is so much wrong with the fact that a CIA agent is helping to re-stabilize a foreign nation. The CIA is the antithesis of positive development in foreign nations so his place in the story is just honest to God propaganda. If you don’t believe me, here are links to the history of CIA involvement in foreign governments. This is not an exhaustive list:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Central-Intelligence-Agency/Activities
Killmonger’s motivation and the outcome of his story arc are of importance because they are essentially another version of dreamt up fears that colonizers have had throughout history. Slave owners in the antebellum period would fear that enslaved peoples would rise up and do onto them what terrible atrocities they had done to their slaves. It was a gut-wrenching fear that in-part caused them to be even more cruel to relinquish any desire to overthrow the established order. This fear still exists in circles that endorse the ‘race war’ theory and those who fear the prediction that the white population will become the minority in a few decades. Black Panther the movie was obviously not written by a person who endorses these beliefs or fears, and there was an obvious social commentary that was taking place. However, I wanted to interrogate how his motivations and arc contrasted with Ross’ in a way that may be implicitly communicating the wrong message to audiences.
Killmonger’s character was written as a traditionally disadvantaged black kid in the U.S. He was poor, his father died when he was young, and he was taught everything about the disadvantages and hardships he would face because he was black. His character’s motivation was coded as Black Panther Movement inspired, but went a step further. In the film, he aims for imperialism. He says ‘the sun would never set on the Wakandan empire’ which evokes the British imperialism that started this problem in the first place. It’s veiled as Black Power and respirations, but executed as violent colonization. I found it interesting that they chose to have a villain with this motivation because it reminds me of the Hama issue I spoke of earlier. Usually, oppressed peoples seek equality. The Black Panther Movement was about ending police brutality and giving jobs to black people. Their main contributions to society were popular community social programs, including free breakfast programs for school children and free health clinics in 13 African American communities across the United States. They were demonized by the FBI and deemed “one of the greatest threats to the nation’s internal security” despite being a small group who protected their community and instituted social programs. The FBI worked to dismantle the free breakfast programs for school children program because it was a ‘threat’. This type of community advocacy is the opposite of the message that is typically taught to us about POC fighting the power. A violent overthrow of white civilization via POC is a dreamt up fear by white slave owners that still exists for racist people today. So, the choice to make Killmonger so radical that he became a colonizer himself was an interesting choice.
Black Panther was released during the Trump Era. Border Walls, America First, and fascist propaganda that demonizes POC was at its peak. The message to lend aid to other nations and open up rather than be isolationist was a social commentary that was being made. It is a valid question as to why Wakanda would decide to remain isolated and quiet while African brethren were being stolen and enslaved. We are made to question who was actually right in this instance, because Killmonger makes a valid point. The issue is that despite him making a valid point, his trauma is still used as a ploy to make him irredeemably evil. Another point that was made was why T’Chaka chose not to bring Erik back to Wakanda. There was an air of ‘if he had, maybe we wouldn’t be in this mess’. In essence, if Erik hadn’t experienced all of the hardship that he did, if he had grown up in Wakanda and been safe and un-radicalized he would not have become so twisted. Which again, plays on how systemic trauma could make someone so angry and vengeful that they would turn the tables on the current order. Marvel chose to have Killmonger’s plan as a repeat of history so it would be undoubtedly wrong, but provoke enough thought to end with the social commentary that rich nations have a duty to help poorer nations. This choice seems like more bias against oppressed groups. It seems like we are again being told that systemic trauma that is not forgiven can manifest as vengeance that is irredeemable, even though that doesn’t happen in reality. It was an interesting choice, especially when coupled with having Ross, the United States CIA agent, help Wakanda re-stabilize itself.
Now, not every character has this same outcome. In ATLA, admiral Zhao met his end justly. Also in Black Panther, Shuri calls Ross a colonizer which points out their awareness of his presence in the movie. There is awareness of the real world implications of their choice in writing. However, I think that most of these issues are done implicitly so even the methods used to mend the situation are a bit too small in comparison. Admiral Zhao and Hama were both examples of people who used their power and resources to cross a sacred boundary. Zhao killed the moon spirit which would alter the balance of the spirit world to the physical world. Hama blood bent and took away the bodily autonomy of the people she controlled. Both of these actions are evil, however I can’t help but note that the circumstances and motivations are vastly different. I’m not condoning either one, but Zhao came from a place of privilege while Hama did not. Zhao was greedy and selfish. He didn’t care about the balance of the spiritual world, he just wanted to be remembered in history books so he committed terrible atrocities. Again, I don’t condone it, but Hama was acting out of trauma. I still think its problematic that the writers wrote her character to cope this way, but she was acting from a place of extreme trauma. It doesn’t excuse her actions, but I personally think a person who has gone through so much and started out disadvantaged deserves more than just being locked up again. Zhao deserved to die off because he was rancid to the core. With Black Panther, the ‘colonizer’ comment was just too little given the large role that Ross played in stopping the Vibranium from leaving Wakandan Borders. He is held up as a hero as well because he chose to endanger his life by staying to destroy the planes despite an enemy plane shooting directly at him. That comment does too little to rectify the reality that the CIA should not be painted in a positive light in this instance (if at all).
I don’t think that this tendency to over-value white / opressive characters over POC / oppressed characters is always explicitly intended. I think much of the time it is an implicit bias that makes its way through the medium. Regardless, we have to be able to question why writers wrote characters and story arcs in a certain way. I think having these conversations makes us more critical of the media we consume and make us more aware of the message we may be implicitly internalizing. Black Lives Matter Protests were portrayed by the media to be angry uprisings that were incredibly dangerous when in reality most of them were peaceful marches. News outlets called the protests ‘riots’ and made them seem dangerous. The national guard was called and in general there were strong police responses to these protests. However, the protestors were the ones who were in real danger. Police would respond with tear gas and flash bangs while the insurrectionists at the capital were let inside. So, why was Killmonger demanding a violent overthrow of the established order while Ross was allowed to be a hero? Throughout history, POC have called for racial equality and access to the same opportunities and protections as white citizens. Generational trauma and poor experiences with racist people have led many POC to avoid encounters with police and racist people. BIPOC activists work to educate and advocate for POC in response to their trauma, it’s very rare to see people of color actively seeking out revenge on white people. (If anything, it’s more often a white person committing a hate crime against POC) So, why were Hama and Jet coping by going out of their way to hurt random fire nation civilians?
These distinctions are important to make because they inform how we view reality as well. It’s important to view media with a critical eye and demand more POC in all areas of power for production. We need people of color in the writers room, producing, being directors of agencies, and everywhere in between. We need to be aware of cultural studies theorists because much of the problems we see today have been discussed by theories already. We also need to analyze why we keep pushing this narrative because it paints a picture of reality that is simply not there.
Bibliography
- https://medium.com/@galemalio/3-examples-of-racial-bias-in-animation-storytelling-4460863aebf5
- https://strongerstories.org/2020/06/06/cognitive-bias-storytelling/
- https://www.purefandom.com/2018/03/08/killmonger-villain-or-alternative-hero/
- https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/02/black-panther-erik-killmonger/553805/
- https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/06/22/black-america-should-stop-forgiving-white-racists/
- https://www.history.com/topics/civil-rights-movement/black-panthers
- https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/24/harry-potter-race-muggles-black-hermione
- https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/applied-and-social-sciences-magazines/white-fears-rebellion
- https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/04/us/blm-protests-peaceful-report-trnd/index.html
- https://www.colorlines.com/articles/3-stats-department-justice-disprove-racist-talking-points-crime