8/2/2019 Media Moment

1/1

Alicia Johnson

Culture Race & Media

E. Scott Tues. 6:30p

Media Moment

Red Tails

This weekend I watched the movie Red Tails, which is about a group of black men who are in the

air forces trail black division. I rarely hear about these men in our history books simply because as we

have learned this week minorities have been squeezed out of history books. A few things that made me

want to examine this film on a deeper level were the character roles that stood out to me. One role that

stood out to me was the light-skinned role. Terrance Howard and Cuba Gooding Jr. played the ones in

charge. Howard being a very light skinned man with light colored eyes most in charge and Gooding Jr.

being also very fair skinned leader of his troop. This stood out most to me due to the conversation wehad in last weeks class. Many people see light as being closer to white and better than being dark. I

remember you saying how your family looked down on you and your sister because you are the dark

children. Do you feel like this preference is also seen in school and the workplace?

Another role that stood out to me was Neos role as the guitar playing, tobacco sucking,

typical Negro. There is a part in the film where a white soldier asked if colored was, offensive

and he said yes the true term is Negro. They had him speaking in a very southern (some would say

uneducated) dialect. He was more-so a follower than a leader, very submissive and to the tee the

reason why scholars were saying that blacks were not fit for the armed forces. Lightning was also

another dark character who was portrayed as the loud mouth, sexually overstimulated, brute typically

seen in early 1920s propaganda. He went after a random Italian woman who he couldnt even

communicate with and more so snatched her right from under her mothers nose. There was no father

there to protect his poor white daughter from this muscular black man who captivated his daughter.

These are all roles that have been seen too many times and have been regarded as truth

because of their over usage. Light skinned blacks are more intelligent, the coon is submissive, a

follower, and there solely for entertainment, and the dark ones are brutes and savages in which we

ought to protect our daughters from. If these portrayals continue to be used, no matter how far back

the movie is supposed to be set, how can we ever move forward to get rid of them. Can we ever get

rid of them? Or are they a curse, striking the black community forever?