De Ana Jones

About De Ana Jones

De Ana (contributing columnist) is a writer and podcaster based in Southern California.

My Stormtrooper is Black, Just Like My President

Why John Boyega’s starring role in “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” will be so important.

It was announced a couple of years ago, shortly after Lucasfilm was officially sold to Disney, that there were going to be new Star Wars films on the way. As the months passed, actors, writers, and directors were announced. While we were all excited about the return of Luke, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca and everyone’s favorite ‘droids — R2D2 and C3PO — not everyone was entirely on board with J.J. Abrams being brought on to the project. At the time, the movie seemed like it was a long ways away, and something that we shouldn’t get excited for just yet.

Then, in November 2014, on the day after Thanksgiving, a teaser trailer was released. In the trailer we see the usual trappings of a Star Wars film, as well as as new characters, and even a little round and rolling ‘droid by the name of BB-8. The trailer brought a lot of excitement to some, but a certain segment of people were upset. Why? Because of the appearance of actor John Boyega in a Stormtrooper costume. Apparently, they believed very fervently that Stormtroopers are supposed to be White.

John Boyega in Stormtrooper armor in the November 2014 trailer for "Star Wars: The Force Awakens."

John Boyega in Stormtrooper armor in the November 2014 trailer for “Star Wars: The Force Awakens.”

(Editor’s nerdly note: Canonically, within the movies, Stormtroopers do not have a defined skin color or origin and are never seen without their helmets on. There is no reason to believe they were all White. Their predecessors in the clone troopers of the Grand Army of the Republic were all clones of Jango Fett, played in the films by part-Maori actor Temuera Morrison.)

On April 16th, the second teaser trailer for the movie was released, and John Boyega is again seen in the Stormtrooper armor, as well as in regular clothing and looks to be one of the lead characters in the film. It is still unknown whether or not his character is actually a Stormtrooper or in some kind of disguise (like Luke Skywalker and Han Solo in the original “Star Wars” film from 1977).

Why is this exciting? Because the Star Wars films, despite being diverse in their supporting or background casting, have yet to show as much diversity in casting their main characters. Although characters like Mace Windu and Lando Calrissian are iconic and have interesting backstories on their own (if you have time to read all of those books), none of the Star Wars films can even pass the first rule of the Racial Bechdel test. That test being: It has to have two People of Color in it, who talk to each other, not about White people.

While casting John Boyega as a main character alone doesn’t fix the issue automatically, it is a great starting point. Main characters in movies have character growth, personal histories, and, most importantly, storylines that are about them. Those backgrounds generally also imply other People of Color, who can potentially be introduced as well. John Boyega’s character therefore likely means interaction with other POC side-characters, who potentially focus on something other than the usual white protagonists you see so often in films. Especially in Sci-Fi.

This also isn’t the first time this specific actor has starred in a sci-fi role. Many people will remember John Boyega as the critically-acclaimed breakout star of the 2011 film Attack the Block.

That film was much less Space Opera than the Star Wars franchise and instead deals with a group of teenagers from the slums fighting off an alien invasion. That film also has not one but three main characters of color, and a diverse enough background cast that it passes the Racial Bechdel test on multiple occasions with flying colors. Aside from that, John Boyega’s performance as that main character Moses is compelling. He’s the type of anti-hero that many other gritty movies hope to portray.
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Op-Ed | On McKinney, Cosby, and Misogynoir

The following essay appears in full at HoodFeminism.com. It was made possible in part by Arsenal For Democracy.

Weeks ago in McKinney, Texas the police were called about a disturbance at a neighborhood pool party. In one of the many viral videos, there’s an officer running around cursing at teenagers – mostly Teens of Color. In the video you distinctly hear them ask why they were being detained and why they were being told to leave a party to which they’d been invited. Notably, they were asking politely. A bikini-clad girl looking for one of her friends is told to leave with another group of girls; as they leave, the officer becomes upset and grabs the girl, slamming her to the ground multiple times, while her friends ask why she’s being arrested. When her friends attempt to help her, the officer pulls a gun on the group.

Aside from the obvious racism, it’s important to pay attention to the racialized misogyny (misogynoir) that also takes place. Looking at the videos, it’s clear to see that the officer, David Eric Casebolt, was being excessive in his attack on the girl, Dajerria Becton. It’s scary to see a grown man be so violent towards any small, bikini-clad 14 year old girl – the officer treats Miss Becton as if she were a much bigger, much stronger person. It’s even more alarming when you realize that Casebolt was specifically targeting teens of color.

If that girl hadn’t already learned before — if any of those teens hadn’t already learned before — they learned that day that being Black in public is considered a threat to the police. Even if you’re doing nothing wrong. Even if you’re only 14. Even if you obviously have no weapon. Even if you are polite.

If a group of teens can have the police called on them for being at a pool party they were invited to, the problem isn’t them — it’s the belief that simply because they are there they are causing trouble. This is especially true for Black girls, who have to live at the intersection of racism and sexism that denies them their girlhood. As is evident from the altercation that got police called to the neighborhood in the first place.

Continue Reading at HoodFeminism.com

Valiant LA Times colonialists reach Black Twitter’s shores

If given a pen and endless amounts of paper and ink (or a computer since I live in 2015), I wouldn’t be able to accurately explain what Black Cool is. It’s ever-changing: a prism that separates into so many different cultures and subcultures. It’s extremely valuable, but the people who make it aren’t considered as valuable. It’s a coveted resource, and it has shaped Pop Culture the world over.

In the age of the internet, Black Cool travels fast. Words that used to take years to become part of the Pop Culture Lexicon now take days. White teenagers and major consumer brands adopt and discard the language like a fad, without regard for its originators or intended use. Black dances, fashion, humor, and much more have all become openly accessible to more than just Black people. That has become both a blessing and a curse.

On the internet, Twitter reigns supreme for disseminating information. The medium is proportionally more popular among People of Color than it is among White people, especially among younger users. Over the past few years more and more attention has been brought to what’s referred to as “Black Twitter.” The way it’s talked about you’d think Black Twitter was one, uniform group, much the way Black people are stereotyped. However Black Twitter itself is a prism, the epicenter of Black Cool on the internet.

And Black Twitter is being stalked.

On July 6th, it was revealed that the L.A. Times hired a reporter to “report on Black Twitter.” The release memo goes on to explain the reporter’s credentials, his schooling and his experience with social media. The memo does not say the exact purpose of having someone report on Black Twitter, other than to “create stories with and pull stories from” the Black Twitter community. Admittedly the L.A. Times could have good intentions, but the way this is being executed is unnerving.

With all of the appropriation that happens on the internet, this seems disingenuous. It almost seems as if the L.A. Times is attempting to mine Black Twitter for headlines. While news media should be looking for stories that affect people of color, and should be hiring people of color to share our stories, hiring one man to cover all of Black Twitter seems sterile. News sites like Buzzfeed — while they too have their issues at times — has multiple Twitter-active Black people on their staff. Those writers organically engage with Black Twitter often and are part of the larger community. Because of this, they have a better idea of when something crosses the line from interesting to exploitative. Also because of this, when they do cross that line or mess up in any way, Black Twitter has an avenue to check them, and many times they listen. It’s not just one person reporting back to a newsroom of disaffected people, it’s genuine, flawed, human interaction.

Black people are people, not animals in a zoo. Black Twitter is not an observatory where you can watch Black people interact in their native habitat, and media needs to stop treating it as such. This attempt to mine Black Cool from Black Twitter, by minimal interaction with it, treats Black people and our culture like a commodity. Black people deserve better representation. We also deserve to have our lives interpreted in as complex a way as our culture is. More than that, we deserve our privacy and the right to keep and protect what we created for ourselves. Our bodies and cultures are not just here for you to study. Sadly, too much of history has involved exactly that. Little wonder that the L.A. Times announcement has been greeted with such skepticism.

"The Colonization of Black Twitter by the Los Angeles Times in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Fifteen" (Credit: Bill Humphrey for Arsenal For Democracy.)

“The Colonization of Black Twitter by the Los Angeles Times in the Year of Our Lord Two Thousand Fifteen” (Credit: Bill Humphrey for Arsenal For Democracy.)

When will White violence be addressed?

Last week, the Supreme Court made same-sex marriage in all 50 states in the U.S. legal. Right wing and conservative newspapers, websites and news broadcasting companies referred to this as an attack on Christianity. They fumed at the idea of gay marriage, saying it would ruin good Christian values and negatively influence young children. Yet in the weeks since the Emanuel AME church shooting in Charleston, 8 churches and counting have been set on fire, with almost complete media silence. It seems odd that this isn’t also considered an attack on Christianity.

In April, a “riot” broke out in Baltimore after weeks of peaceful protests went unheard. Hours of news footage replayed images of damage to police cars and the burning and looting of a CVS, while news anchors and viewers at home chided those involved. How could those people destroy their own neighborhoods this way ? — was their lament as they ignored the much deeper systemic problems in the city. Yet when 8 churches across the Southern U.S. burned, no one mourns the loss of property.

In Texas, the police were called and harassed teenagers at a pool party because of the perceived threat of their presence. They were accused of general misbehavior and were considered a threat to the other (white) residents there, and a 14-year-old Black girl was slammed to the ground by a police officer. Yet when nine people were murdered during Bible study, their killer was arrested unharmed and treated well.

There’s a very strict yet unspoken code of conduct that Black people have to live by in order to be even considered human and worthy of life in the U.S. That list becomes stricter and stricter with each passing day. It’s inhumane that perceived violence by Black people seems to bother White America more than the actual violence that happens to Black people daily from White people.

Instead of the violence towards us being addressed, we’re told the ways we must act in order for it not to happen. But as the list gets stricter, Black people in the U.S. are still being killed by police, racism, White supremacy and violence at an alarming rate.

June 18, 2015 – Arsenal For Democracy 132

Posted by Bill on behalf of the team.

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Topics: Charleston Shooting; Women’s World Cup. People: Bill, De Ana, and Nate. Produced: June 22nd and 23rd, 2015.

Discussion Points:

– Charleston: Media narratives, campaign contributions, Confederate Flag
– Women’s World Cup: How U.S. women’s soccer became a major force and how the rest of the world caught up.

Episode 132 (51 min):
AFD 132

Related Links

AFD by Greg: “How we talk about the racists among us”
The Guardian: “Scott Walker to forfeit donations from group cited in Dylann Roof ‘manifesto'”
NBC Sports: “For Colombia, Women’s World Cup performance a chance to advance role of females in sports back home | ProSoccerTalk”

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RSS Feed: Arsenal for Democracy Feedburner
iTunes Store Link: “Arsenal for Democracy by Bill Humphrey”

And don’t forget to check out The Digitized Ramblings of an 8-Bit Animal, the video blog of our announcer, Justin.

Zoe Saldana still shouldn’t be playing Nina Simone

Representation is important. This mantra is something that you’ve probably seen and heard a lot all over the internet and from many People of Color in media, literature, science, and many other fields. Twitter alone has sparked so many movements to broaden the diversity: in video games with #INeedDiverseGames, in television shows with #DiversifyAgentCarter, and in publishing with #WeNeedDiverseBooks.

There is an obvious and vocalized need for diversity in everything we indulge in. But despite the calls for it and even with the attempts by different industries to give the people what they want, there are still so many mistakes being made.

A few years ago it was announced that there was going to be a biopic about Nina Simone. (The film made its Cannes Film Festival debut in May 2014 and was recently slated for release some time this year.) The movie, we were told, would be starring Zoe Saldana. This casting choice made many uncomfortable for several reasons.

Issues like Colorism and Eurocentric beauty standards are still a very open wound amongst Black people. Nina Simone was, famously, a dark skinned woman with very “African” physical features. Having her portrayed by Zoe Saldana, a lighter-skinned woman with more “acceptable” features (by White standards), is both insulting to Simone and a dishonest portrayal.

Left: Nina Simone, 1965 (credit). Right: Zoe Saldana, 2010 (credit). Composite image by Arsenal For Democracy.

Left: Nina Simone, 1965 (credit). Right: Zoe Saldana, 2010 (credit). Composite image by Arsenal For Democracy.

Subsequently released pictures of Zoe Saldana during filming showed her with darkened skin, a prosthetic nose, and an afro wig. These added even more insult to injury.

A lot of people will say that Saldana’s blackness should be enough, but that is still dishonest. Hollywood is an industry that already has issues with whitewashing characters of color (i.e. simply casting a White actor) and centralizing White characters in stories about People of Color’s issues. It also has a problem with how it casts characters of color in their films.

Characters that are initially described explicitly in their original novel or comic book sources as medium to darker skinned are cast with much lighter-skinned actors and actresses in the movie adaptations. Characters like Storm in the X-Men (who in the comic books ranged anywhere from medium to dark brown) and Christina in Divergent (who was described as dark brown in the books) are played by Halle Berry and Zoe Kravitz respectively, who are both very light skinned actresses.

People of African descent across the diaspora come in a wide range of skin tones in real life, but it seems that Hollywood only wants to present the section of the spectrum that is palatable to White people. This continues to reinforce the painful social norms, even within Black America, that have often prized lighter skin tones over darker.

In a film about Nina Simone, a woman who was well aware that her Black features were offensive to the White gaze, it’s impossible for the creators to not understand that this would be an issue. Yet the solution that they came to — based on the photos we’ve seen — made the situation worse. Darkening Zoe Saldana’s skin and having her wear a prosthetic nose is akin to, if not blatantly the same as, blackface.

Although the film is meant to honor the late singer, you can’t ignore the original history of blackface and how it was used to humiliate and mock Black people — and explicitly linking the darkest skin tones to other negative tropes. And yes, it was even performed by Black people, putting down those who looked the least like the majority-White society.

To ignore this context when making a movie about a woman whose life was shaped by her blackness — indeed her dark-skinned blackness specifically — isn’t honoring her life and legacy. It’s ignoring it.

Representation is important, but dishonest representations do nothing to break the status quo. It’s not enough to have one small portion of the blackness spectrum — of appearances and, by extension, life experiences — be what represents all of us.

May 6, 2015 – Arsenal for Democracy 126 Baltimore

Posted by Bill on behalf of the team.
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ArsenalForDemocracy.com contributors join host Bill to debate the Baltimore riots and whether peaceful protest can even achieve change in America anymore. Panel: Bill, De Ana, Greg, and Nate. Produced: May 3rd, 2015.

Episode 126 (52 min):
AFD 126

Related Links

“After Baltimore: In defense of riots” by De Ana
“After Ferguson: In defense of non-peaceful resistance” by Bill
“Non-violence has cost at least 2.7 million Black US lives” by Bill

Subscribe

RSS Feed: Arsenal for Democracy Feedburner
iTunes Store Link: “Arsenal for Democracy by Bill Humphrey”

And don’t forget to check out The Digitized Ramblings of an 8-Bit Animal, the video blog of our announcer, Justin.