Asia Finest Discussion Forum _ Debate / Philosophy / Religion _ Western Genocide
Posted by: TheHero Nov 9 2007, 10:56 AM
Warning - some nudity and violence
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnyKMT7k7Nc
Part II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfONX0yoOQA
Another interesting analysis: http://www.drummerman.net/shining/essays.html
American paradise built on dead indians. This movie could also be referring to western (more specifically Anglo) crimes in Asia or Africa.
Of course, you know there's two sides to the story. But Kubrick presents some interesting symbolism and cryptic ideas.
Question: Do westerners overlook (The Overlook Hotel) thier past? Are westerners trying repress the truth about thier past?
Posted by: Jor Nov 10 2007, 06:10 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnyKMT7k7Nc
Part II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfONX0yoOQA
Another interesting analysis: http://www.drummerman.net/shining/essays.html
American paradise built on dead indians. This movie could also be referring to western (more specifically Anglo) crimes in Asia or Africa.
Of course, you know there's two sides to the story. But Kubrick presents some interesting symbolism and cryptic ideas.
Question: Do westerners overlook (The Overlook Hotel) thier past? Are westerners trying repress the truth about thier past?
I remember seeing this in a theatre which is the way it was meant to be seen. It's kind of like the "The Sting" that way. "The Sting" has to be seen in theatre to really appreciate what George Roy Hill was doing. I feel the same way about "The Shining." The movie is actually nothing like King's book but is a whole different study in its own right. And the racial-class undertones of the movie were pretty apparent to me even then. And the way the depth of Jack's profound madness is revealed when Shelley Duval looks at the typed pages of his book-in-progress and sees nothing but "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy" typed over and over and over. No other words or phrase appears--just hundreds of pages of that little adage typed over and over again in all sorts of patterns. It's a creepy moment because Jack has been working on that novel long before he and his family took on the job as caretakers of the Overlook for the winter. You realize he's been sick for a very long time. That it isn't the hotel that's doing it to Jack, Jack is doing it to himself and has been for a long, long time--since birth. He was born in madness to reach a destiny of violent madness that was his since the country's founding and based on psychotic racial/class hatred.
The person in the bear costume blowing the man that Shelly Duval's character sees from the hallway is fairly obvious, I think. Someone wearing a bear skin would sumbolize an Indian. But he has been reduced to a pitiful caricature of himself as he has been subjugated and brought to his knees before the white man. He's now just a pathetic, silly-looking clown existing only for the pleasure of white people--his own human identity obscured, wiped out, inconsequential under the bear caricature. He's there to give pleasure to whites, he has no other purpose.
Danny is kind of a shaman. He has this power of communication beyond our everyday world. He represents a part of us that never dies. It's been beaten under and sublimated--corrupted by religious crap--but, in the end, we're all shamans and that power is awakening within us again. It is our connection to the people we subjugated, enslaved and cheated to achieve on our own greatness. And sooner or later there is payback. Soon, all we've buried will bubble to the surface.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 10 2007, 07:37 PM
The white woman in room 237 whom Jack is attracted to turns out to be hideous and diseased. Rob Ager attributes this to the diseases brought by the European settlers but the analysis does not seem to fit. Is Kubrick hinting at some primary schism between the sexes in western society that makes Jack opt for the nagging Native Sherry? Also, Jack is not even aware of his third option represented by the portrait of the beautiful black woman in the black man's bedroom; this is the only woman that is not flawed in any way. Jack hacks the old black man to death (he is the only person to die in the movie), removing the obstacle to access to the black woman. There are no active references to native men and the one black man is physically removed by the end of the movie.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 11 2007, 12:41 AM
This is a superior analysis of the bear scene.
I checked the youtube comments under this scene and the only thing anyone could come up with was that Kubrick was crazy to put this scene in so out of context. (of course, we know that Kubrick knew exactly what he was doing). They also pointed out that the original Stephen King book states that the hotel owner was a bisexual who challenged someone at the costume ball to dress like a dog in return for a sexual favor. Of course, Kubrick has completely reworked the novel to conform to a Native American theme and, in that case, this scene would be the only instance of an active Native American male presence in the film. Shelly is thus viewing the deracination of her kinsmen.
Posted by: Jor Nov 11 2007, 12:49 PM
One of the primary themes of The Shining is that of an opulent, beautiful facade covering depravity, violence and murder. And I suppose we could add disease to that as well. The Overlook is America itself "overlooking" its horrible past. What the European brought to America was disease both of body and spirit. Yet, we hold up the white woman as the standard of beauty. But when we look beneath, Jack sees the white American for what he or she is--a hedonistic, diseased corpse (i.e. spiritually dead, living only for sexual gratification). Shelly Duval's character represents the real woman--the one who cleans the house, takes care of the baby, makes sure the bills are paid, stands by her man, etc. but she is not the glamorous beauty of Jack's fantasy (white) woman. She's quasi-native in the sense that she's real not a fantasy. And for this, Jack hates her.
It's precisely the same thing you see in those white mwn that live in Asia and only look at Asian women and these women must be pure Asian--not half nor able to speak English. When she reminds him of the "real" women he left behind for the fantasy Asian white-man's whore, he hates her even more than he hates the white women he has turned his back on. He just wants to bash her brains in--just bash 'em--smack!--right the fu-k in!
Scatman Crothers is not the only character to die in the movie since Jack dies only a few minutes later. I don't think his death was the removal of an obstacle keeping the white man from black women--especially since it is the white man himself who keeps his distance ("If I married a black girl, my parents would kill me!"). Rather the death of Crothers's character is the white man removing the one who upsets his empire so to speak. When the black man is the servant, everything is fine; but when Scatman shows up as the rescuing hero, this is too much because he is usurping the role the white man holds for himself but which he knows is only a sham. I believe they cast an older man to play him to represent that the black man is "older" than the white man. That he was here long before--not America really but the world. The black man has been in the world much longer. It ties in with the butler guy in the bathroom scene telling Jack, "You're always been the caretaker here and I should know...I've always been here." But blacks were in the world long before then and Indians in America long before. And neither tore up the land and polluted the water and enslaved the world's people. The white man is a newcomer, a marauding interloper and his greatest fear and regret is that he is not the originator but a thief. So he kills the earlier ones and dons their clothes, so to speak.
But to make the fantasy as the world's originator and hero stick, he must forget what he has done. He gets a kind of amnesia. And, of course, this means that he will do it again. And again. And again.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 11 2007, 01:43 PM
Right. And the one instance where he tries to produce an original work (the "novel" that Jack types up) turns out to be a nonsensical monoculture.
Posted by: Jor Nov 11 2007, 03:34 PM
Yes, Jack's novel is just a bunch of pop culture crap. He can't churn out anything else but line after line of the same old cliche. He pins this inadequacy on his wife--she's the cause because she doesn't serve him but rather wants to be his equal. Because of her, he has responsibilities and bills. He can't do what he wants, he can only dream of it. And so all this work has made Jack a dull but very angry and resentful boy.
What everything boils down to for Jack is control. He needs to feel like he controls everything--the caretaker. He views this as a position of responsibility and strength. But he is weak spiritually and easily swayed by those he views as real men--the men in charge, the military, the government, the corporate heads, the king-makers. Delbert Grady speaks for them. He tells Jack that he--Jack--is the caretaker and always has been and this he knows because he's been three along with him. IOW, Jack is being manipulated by these men but willfully so. He allows it. He likes to be told he has always been the man-in-charge especially by those who put him there.
As a modern man, Jack looks to his innate authority as something bestowed by more powerful men than he--the modern man's gods. Such men are taught to look with contempt on those whose authority was given them by "god," by natural forces, by the universal order. The caretaker was never Jack and deep down he knows this. But the higher authorities speaking thru Grady will not allow Jack to make this connection. HE is the caretaker and anyone who gets in the way of that must die. They maintain their power by exploiting weak men like Jack to do their killing for them. Men that like to believe they are strong and are willing to do anything to prove it. Men who believe in intimidating and blaming their women for everything that is wrong about themselves. They remind that it is his duty to "correct" the situation.
The date in the photo of July 4, 1921 is significant not only July 4th is American Independence Day when the white American took over the country but the 1920s heralded in a new age in America. we call it the Jazz Age today. It symbolized a change in the sociopolitical fabric were the white man was no longer the undisputed master. Blacks and women were given the vote (women only having won the right the year before the photo's date). It was when women bobbed their hair, wore short skirts and demanded equality--no longer pleasure-givers or domestics. IOW, the modern white man wanted all women, white especially, subservient to him. They were no less chattel than any other slave or servant. He sees her as part of, if not the primary reason for, his downfall. So along comes Grady who says, "Real men know how to deal with uppity women trying to tell them which way the wind blows."
When the subject of the true caretakers of the world--the black man--comes up, he is spoken of contemptuously as being nothing more than "a n-igger cook." And Grady lets Jack know that we know how to deal with uppity n-iggers around here, don't we? Jack's attempts to maintain his control are themselves out of control. His attempt to be the rescuing hero are hopelessly foiled because it is he whom the world needs to be rescued from.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 11 2007, 05:39 PM
There is another layer to be found here. "All work and no play" is a reference to Genesis where the Lord God rests on the seventh day. The monoculture is the sham "tradition" of monotheism. Jack is the Lord God who has been denied his due by all the assorted natives and other characters. I can read these references further in a similar vein.
Posted by: TheHero Nov 11 2007, 06:47 PM
Actually, Stephen King didn't like the movie. Kubrick added all the political stuff; But he did a good job.
A good comment on unequal relationships. I'd say some inter-racial relationships are fine but those based on power inequality are not. But you know there's always some inequality. I guess the extremes are wrong.
Posted by: Jor Nov 11 2007, 08:23 PM
Interesting observation. It would indicate that the hallowed day of rest is absent. That everyday is now like every other. And if you were living at the Overlook as caretakers, it would certainly get that way. I think of the Torrances as a kind of Adam & Eve except Nicholson plays a dual Adam/Cain role. Or more likely that Kubrick sees Adam and Cain as different aspects of the same entity. The same with Eve and Abel. In fact, the Genesis story is entirely centered on Adam and Cain. Eve and Abel were of secondary importance--he as a sacrifice and she as a helpmeet. All the subsequently biblical characters and indeed all humankind is traced down from Cain. Abel served his purpose and is then gone and the same for Eve since we don't know what happened to her.
One of Cain's descendants is Noah and the movie's plot is also a sort of ark-in-the-flood thing. Here the flood is the great deluge of snow, the Overlook is the ark, and Jack is Noah--the one who must guide the ship through the harrowing storm, the caretaker of all future life on earth. The twist is added to the plot by supposing what would happen if Noah decided to kill everyone aboard the ark. They'd be trapped. And this makes sense in that the whole human race today would be descended from Noah's family, the only family to survive the Deluge. We are all descendants of Jack the caretaker. Born from his madness. And hence we slaughter each other. The story is an allegory.
Kubrick doesn't seem though to be offering much hope. He seems to be saying this is how the human race works and it will ever thus be. But perhaps the "shining" aspect helps out being something that subverts this human pecking order we've established that's eating up the world. The shining "talent" as Grady calls it, offers a new way of living but one that directly threatens the status quo. So it must be killed and everyone kept in a state of psychosis that prevents us from knowing that we shine.
Posted by: Jor Nov 11 2007, 08:38 PM
A good comment on unequal relationships. I'd say some inter-racial relationships are fine but those based on power inequality are not. But you know there's always some inequality. I guess the extremes are wrong.
I was basing that response off online forums I have visited that are for these types of white men. I actually read a post of this Asianphile that was talking about this beautiful girl he saw in Korea and how she was so perfect...until she opened her mouth and spoke in perfect English. He said that he immediately lost all interest in her. Post after post of white men living in Asia seeking women that absolutely must not violate their fantasy world of cute li'l Asian girl with exotic feminine innocence who naturally sees white man as superior and most desirable of men. So it wasn't some Asianphile straw man i was setting up, I was basing it on actual people I've encountered.
Posted by: Jor Nov 11 2007, 11:03 PM
Another thing that tells us the genocidal violence is a repeating cycle we create by forgetting the past, we see another clue in the photo shown at the end. Taken in 1921 when the Nazi party was just getting started, one of the revelers standing behind the smiling Jack is one who resembles a scowling Hitler. The resemblance is obvious and it would be silly to think this was just happenstance. The photo was showing us the Jacks that were yet to come.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sinBkgrqnRg
This scene encapsultes the entire movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vulNlhUI6m0
Posted by: TheHero Nov 12 2007, 09:36 AM
The original theme of the movie was alcoholism. However, Kubirck made it political. Nonetheless, alcohol is still a major theme. Remember, alcoholism was a major problem among Indians after the white invasion. And still is a major problem.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sinBkgrqnRg
This scene encapsultes the entire movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vulNlhUI6m0
Your probably reading more into the movie than is warranted. However, that's an interesting observation anyways. Actually, the scene does encaptulate the movie. However, I don't think Hitler is in there.
Danny symbolizes the rebels of conscience.
When the subject of the true caretakers of the world--the black man--comes up, he is spoken of contemptuously as being nothing more than "a n-igger cook." And Grady lets Jack know that we know how to deal with uppity n-iggers around here, don't we? Jack's attempts to maintain his control are themselves out of control. His attempt to be the rescuing hero are hopelessly foiled because it is he whom the world needs to be rescued from.
The religious right calls it "family values."
White masters had sex with many black women. There was a lot of black-white sex (coming from black women not men) in US history. African-Americans themselves have a mixed heritage. White men were definately not keeping thier distance. But of course it wasn't all rape or coerced.
But you might only be referring to legal marriage.
Posted by: Jor Nov 12 2007, 12:00 PM
I never said Hitler was in the bathroom. Someone who looks suspiciously like Hitler is in the photo at the end standing a couple of people behind Jack. It is obviously intentional because he is the only one scowling at the camera. He is the next Jack that will make his maniacal, genocidal appearance.
There is also a parallel of the photo being dated 1921 and there being 21 photos on the wall. The age of majority.
The photos are flanked between two Indian tapestries. The wall is white on top and dark on the bottom symbolizing America's racial/class order. The dark paneling has crosses on it--a graveyard. IOW, whites came to power in the country by killing and brutalizing the "darker" folk.
And that is America's true Independence Day.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 15 2007, 07:20 PM
The crosses are a reference to the conversion and christianization of the natives. The Hitler reference looks backward to Old Europe and the continuation of the Old World Dynamics of Anti-Semitism in new forms in the New World. Rome was built on the ashes of the Semitic Carthaginian and Phoenican Empires.
Kubrick looks forward to the bleak future of the sham Western edifice in Eyes Wide Shut. Of course, this work was sabotaged (drastically re-edited) by the Studios.
Posted by: tinman01 Nov 16 2007, 12:05 AM
Hmmm when I watch a movie I don't really watch for symbolism. That said I watched these clips. I honestly don't draw the same conclusions. Moreover even if a director intensionally used subliminals to communicate a meesage I wouldn't really care about his opinions.
Guess I am dense.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 16 2007, 02:23 AM
Hannibal is the other famous 'dark one' who breeched the icy barrier to make an assault upon the "Shining City on a Hill". Freud had a special fascination with Hannibal as a representation of Semitic vitality before the European depredations came to the fore. Kubrick would have been acutely aware of this scenario given his Austrian Jewish background.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 16 2007, 03:00 AM
The Icy Deluge is a Persian Zoroastrian narrative of Yima who built an enclosure (vara). It is well known in our Indian circles that this narrative refers to the Kashmir region (from where the Iranians came originally) and is a parallel to the narrative of Manu. I doubt Kubrick would have been aware of these.
Kubrick is not referring generally to the human conditions, but only to foundations of western civilization.
SN Balagangadhara has stated that, in Asia, the Creator has no claims rights over the Creation just because he is the Creator. The same also held true for the North American natives and their view of ownership of nature. As far as this aspect goes, the Caretaker Jack is enforcing the Christian European view of the Sovereignty of the Creator (who passes on his claim right and sovereignty to his 'believers'). But Jack knows that this sham western claim right over the native land is untenable. Jack's entire enterprise is to hold up his crumbling claim rights from the gaze of the converted and deracinated (represented by Wendy) who can at any moment realize the perpetrated sham (represented by the sham novel (ie bible/native treaty) that Jack has penned.
I am referring to the ideas presented in the following: http://colonial.consciousness.googlepages.com/%22...weshallnotceasefromexploration...%22
Posted by: Jor Nov 17 2007, 01:43 PM
I notice too that during the final scene of Jack pursuing Danny through the maze that in spite of the extreme cold, there is no vapor coming from their mouths. I don't think this was an accident. Kubrick seems to be saying that even the "real" characters are ghosts.
Another odd thing is how the sound of Danny's Big Wheel rolling over the floor keeps cropping up. You hear it, for example, in the scene where Shelly Duvall sees the man in the bear costume blowing the other man and hear it again at the end when the camera is showing Jack frozen to death just before the scenes cuts to the inside of the hotel showing the photos on the wall.
The sound of the wheels of history turning? The frozen Jack meaning that he's not dead. He's just inert---for now. Soon, he will thaw out and the wheels will start rolling again.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 18 2007, 01:14 AM
The silence of the wheel as it rolls on the native carpet is the silent massacre of the natives, and the din of the wheel as it rolls on the hardwood oak flooring is western dominance and dynamism (according to an online source).
Danny's cycle is the wheel of history (or time). According to standard Marxist theory, the engine of history is the dialectic (the silence and din of danny's wheel). In the standard western parlance, Asia is the silent female and the West is, of course, the heroic counterpart.
Danny spots the murdered twins while on his cycle. The twins are duplicity (dualism), and of course the precocious child instantly spots the duplicitous lie (online source). Could this be the sham perpetrated on the native? The sham being the western assertion that the Native complements the Western, that Asia completes the West, that the supposed passivity of Asia is necessary for the West to map itself onto meaningfully; and that history thus progresses through the dialectic of the west acting upon the body of the passive Asia. In our Indian circles, we always remark that there is no concept of the 'Other' in Dharma, that is, in Asia. And we always are astounded as to how the 'Other' is so central to the Western mind.
Danny is the Prescient Shaman, the awakened Consciousness, the precocious half-breed, the one able to communicate with the dark ancient one and rally him to aid. He wears the Apollo shuttle emblem (?).
There are three white authority figures in the movie: Ullman (the believer), Grady (the grand manipulator), and Jack (the willing agent). Jack is the only one that expresses a liberal sentiment ('the white man's burden' line to the bartender); the other two are either absolutely self assured of their supremacy (Grady) or oblivious to the very question (Ullman). Again, in our Indian circles, we are absolutely astounded by the rank hatred of the 'liberal westerner' to Asia (as typified by Albright, Nussbaum, Kipling, Marx, Witzel, etc). If Jack is the Liberal westerner who frequents Asia with a veneer of internationalism and who fetishizes Asia and occassionally "bashes" in Wendy, then JAck is the very engine for western expansion. Marx has been more successful than Bush in expanding the frontiers of the western model. Jack will thaw out and continue the trek west.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 18 2007, 03:21 AM
What everything boils down to for Jack is control. He needs to feel like he controls everything--the caretaker. He views this as a position of responsibility and strength. But he is weak spiritually and easily swayed by those he views as real men--the men in charge, the military, the government, the corporate heads, the king-makers. Delbert Grady speaks for them. He tells Jack that he--Jack--is the caretaker and always has been and this he knows because he's been three along with him. IOW, Jack is being manipulated by these men but willfully so. He allows it. He likes to be told he has always been the man-in-charge especially by those who put him there
So, Ullman (the believer) recruits Jack (the agent) for Grady (the puppetmaster). Kubrick seems to have given the entire dynamics of the western civilization in this 'triple' relationship. Ullman never interacts with Grady but they have a tacit understanding through ____???___________. The one inkling of hope in Jack's utterance of 'White man's burden' is just a drunken illusion, a cruel inside joke between Jack and the Bartender (planted by Grady?).
Posted by: TheHero Nov 18 2007, 05:29 AM
Danny's cycle is the wheel of history (or time). According to standard Marxist theory, the engine of history is the dialectic (the silence and din of danny's wheel). In the standard western parlance, Asia is the silent female and the West is, of course, the heroic counterpart.
Danny spots the murdered twins while on his cycle. The twins are duplicity (dualism), and of course the precocious child instantly spots the duplicitous lie (online source). Could this be the sham perpetrated on the native? The sham being the western assertion that the Native complements the Western, that Asia completes the West, that the supposed passivity of Asia is necessary for the West to map itself onto meaningfully; and that history thus progresses through the dialectic of the west acting upon the body of the passive Asia. In our Indian circles, we always remark that there is no concept of the 'Other' in Dharma, that is, in Asia. And we always are astounded as to how the 'Other' is so central to the Western mind.
Danny is the Prescient Shaman, the awakened Consciousness, the precocious half-breed, the one able to communicate with the dark ancient one and rally him to aid. He wears the Apollo shuttle emblem (?).
There are three white authority figures in the movie: Ullman (the believer), Grady (the grand manipulator), and Jack (the willing agent). Jack is the only one that expresses a liberal sentiment ('the white man's burden' line to the bartender); the other two are either absolutely self assured of their supremacy (Grady) or oblivious to the very question (Ullman). Again, in our Indian circles, we are absolutely astounded by the rank hatred of the 'liberal westerner' to Asia (as typified by Albright, Nussbaum, Kipling, Marx, Witzel, etc). If Jack is the Liberal westerner who frequents Asia with a veneer of internationalism and who fetishizes Asia and occassionally "bashes" in Wendy, then JAck is the very engine for western expansion. Marx has been more successful than Bush in expanding the frontiers of the western model. Jack will thaw out and continue the trek west.
Jack becomes less liberal as he gets his drink on
There are some sincere liberal westerners. Jack is somewhat racist as most westerners are (and easterners). However, if he rejects alcoholism and listens to his son then maybe he will gain salvation.
I mean come on. Asian girls are hot. The fetish isn't bad but wife beating is.
Asians want ESL teachers. Many Asians opposed Communism. Asian people run the prostitution / porno industry. Also they are the biggest consumers of that industry by far.
I'm not saying colonialism and anti-Asian racism is good. I'm only saying that Asians are in on it. Such bad things are not possible without the cooperation of natives (or Asians as in this case).
BTW: As for Communism, it's not a good system as many on here probably agree. That doesn't necessarily mean the USA always acted in a pure interest.
We (the west) can't just ignore the east. If the west ignored the east they would hated 100 times more.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 19 2007, 12:12 AM
There is a definite qualitative difference between East and West, which is what I had tried to foreshadow by posting the link to Balagangadhara's work. Briefly, the West is systematically ideological, that is, Western actions are based upon "theory", eg the theory of race. Ideology as a causation for action is alien to Asia. Asia neither likes nor dislikes; Asia is indifferent to what does not immediately concern it - that is, Asia is practical.
I cannot possibly do full justice to these ideas so i will just post a few relevant links:
http://colonial.consciousness.googlepages.com/%22...weshallnotceasefromexploration...%22
http://colonial.consciousness.googlepages.com/theheatheninhisblindness
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheHeathenInHisBlindness/
http://s-n-balagangadhara.sulekha.com/blog/post/2002/12/on-colonial-experience-and-the-indian-renaissance.htm
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 19 2007, 10:37 AM
We will ponder your proposition and when we decide we will let you know. But should we accept it, I here and now make this condition that we will not be denied the privilege without molestation of visiting at any time the tombs of our ancestors, friends, and children. Every part of this soil is sacred in the estimation of my people. Every hillside, every valley, every plain and grove, has been hallowed by some sad or happy event in days long vanished. Even the rocks, which seem to be dumb and dead as the swelter in the sun along the silent shore, thrill with memories of stirring events connected with the lives of my people, and the very dust upon which you now stand responds more lovingly to their footsteps than yours, because it is rich with the blood of our ancestors, and our bare feet are conscious of the sympathetic touch. Our departed braves, fond mothers, glad, happy hearted maidens, and even the little children who lived here and rejoiced here for a brief season, will love these somber solitudes and at eventide they greet shadowy returning spirits. And when the last Red Man shall have perished, and the memory of my tribe shall have become a myth among the White Men, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe, and when your children's children think themselves alone in the field, the store, the shop, upon the highway, or in the silence of the pathless woods, they will not be alone. In all the earth there is no place dedicated to solitude. At night when the streets of your cities and villages are silent and you think them deserted, they will throng with the returning hosts that once filled them and still love this beautiful land. The White Man will never be alone.
Let him be just and deal kindly with my people, for the dead are not powerless. Dead, did I say? There is no death, only a change of worlds.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 19 2007, 12:19 PM
Amazingly, the opening sequence shows a yellow Volkswagon Buggy, probably the foremost symbol of the "liberal" westerner.
Posted by: TheHero Nov 21 2007, 11:23 PM
Many liberals are not as liberal as you think; Alot of conservatives are not as conservative as you think.
Ironically, Hitler started Volkswagen.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 22 2007, 12:28 AM
Ironically, Hitler started Volkswagen.
Hitler was quite the ruffian, a very stark contrast to his ideal of the genteel and aristocratic Bismarck. So the bourbon-drinking Jack would be Hitler, and the Advocaat-drinking Grady would be Bismarck. Grady says they have "always been here", presumably together. So Jack and Grady are two sides of the western enterprise. Grady has already done his dirty work, and Jack has yet to do his.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Nov 22 2007, 02:05 PM
The other thing about Hitler is that he was a cultural dilettante in his early adult years, as evidenced by his application to study classical painting in some Viennese Academy; a failed painter just as Jack was a failed writer. He was also never reconciled with modern decadence represented by the Semitic Other, the relativistic Freud. Grady passed the baton onto Jack and as such the movie is about the progressive mutations in western ideology and power structure, eg from Christianity to Liberation Theology; the mutations happen on the surface but the same racist core is always intact.
Posted by: Yuyutsu Dec 6 2007, 06:51 PM
Catholics through sheer incompetence allowed the native genetic element to survive in the Americas (S. Am). The Protestants, on the other hand, made a clean sweep of the Natives with absolute and total replacement (N. Am). Grady is the Catholic past and Jack the Protestant future. But when we get a temporary reversal with the maverick Catholic Hitler refusing to fade into the past in lieu of the sober Protestant Bismarck, the system is forced to make a crude correction with Protestant American intervention.
Posted by: TheHero Jan 9 2008, 10:27 AM
There were more native Americans in Latin America than Anglo America (when the Europeans arrived). The tribes in North America were hostile (with some exceptions) in comparison to many peaceful tribes in South America (who accepted slavery). However, the main factor of survival for the Latin American Indians was thier sheer number.
The Latin American Indians intermarried with the Euros which allowed for better disease resistance. This intermarriage was possible because there were so many more natives than in Anglo America. I'd say if there were less natives then the Spanish settlers would have brought more Euro women.
However, I do agree the Euro treatment (especially in Anglo America) of natives was cruel and wrong.
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