If you think Obama's movie is bad, take a look at this:

[Wolseley]

Wow. I mean, just......wow.

"What's the most dangerous animal on the planet?" one of the key characters in the trailer asked the main protagonist.

"Sharks?" the as-of-yet unnamed main character asked.

"White people," the mentor figure stated. "When they feel uncomfortable. White people feeling uncomfortable precedes a lot of bad stuff for us.

"That's why we fight white discomfort everyday."

MSN

 

[mourningdove~]

It is sickening, absolutely sickening, how determined some people in this country are ... to get blacks and whites hating each other.

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

Upcoming drama-comedy "The American Society of Magical Negroes"
The premise of the movie, insomuch as what can be gleaned from the trailer, appears to be a magical society of black people who exist to keep white people content.

Why do they want to keep white people content?
"When they feel uncomfortable. White people feeling uncomfortable precedes a lot of bad stuff for us.

Interesting comedy. But makes light of a serious and painful problem. Thumbs down from me.

 

[RDKirk]

Well, back when I was a kid in the late 50s and early 60s, keeping white people comfortable was the primary lesson black parents had to teach their children about white people.

This was only a few years after Emmett Till (which was not a singular case). For us, encountering a white person on the street was akin to stumbling upon a bear in the woods. The thing black parents already knew was that the Emmett Till incident had only displayed to the world that a white person could murder a black child and walk away from it. So, surviving an encounter with a white person was an exercise in keeping that white person comfortable while getting away.

Hmm. Well, keeping them comfortable is still "the speech" black parents have to teach their teenagers about surviving an encounter with the police, but at least today it's the police and not every white person. That's undeniable progress.

The "Magical Negro" trope has a lot of history in American media. It's essentially how the media began inserting black people when the general white audience was hostile to the concept. It goes back to Bill "Bojangles" Robinson in the 1935 movie The Little Colonel, through Casablanca, and goes up and beyond to Star Trek with Whoopi Goldberg as the "Guinan" character.

Here is a description of what it is with a lot of examples (Morgan Freeman appears often in the list for recent examples).

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MagicalNegro

Here is a friendly conversation providing more detail:

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=13336830570A39140100&page=0

There is also the similar "Magical Indian" trope.

But from the above link, there is also this interesting tidbit of how Rod Serling inverted the trope. I love trope inversions.

• The Twilight Zone (1985): Inverted in the episode "Paladin of the Lost Hour", which has a magical white man help the young black protagonist find his destiny. In the short story upon which the episode is based, author Harlan Ellison states, "One of these men was black, the other white" and refuses to say which one is which. Of course, for a visual medium, they had to make a choice, and it seems that they deliberately chose to avoid the Magical Negro trope.

Frankly, it's less of a thing now with more black people otherwise appearing in the media in roles with more different aspects than merely being a tool for the white protagonist to learn how to be a better person.

I was rather surprised to see a movie pointing it out and apparently satirically playing it up. That in itself could be interesting and funny, if done with the right satirical edge.

But the troubling situation in the trailer was that the young Magical Negro protagonist's plot struggle lies in his falling in love with a white girl. That's disappointing. It would have been more fun if the white guy our Magical Negro was helping had fallen in love with a black girl who was actually providing more support to the white guy without being magical...and our protagonist was also smitten with her.

 

[Michie]

I just read this today.

Trailer for American Society of Magical Negroes is PANNED

The plot centers around the fictional society of black Americans who seek to make white people comfortable in their daily lives.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[mourningdove~]

I just read this today.

Trailer for American Society of Magical Negroes is PANNED

The plot centers around the fictional society of black Americans who seek to make white people comfortable in their daily lives.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Too divisive a theme, for the times we are living in ...

... and that, I believe, is the intent.

 

[mourningdove~]

Well, back when I was a kid in the late 50s and early 60s, keeping white people comfortable was the primary lesson black parents had to teach their children about white people.

This was only a few years after Emmett Till (which was not a singular case). For us, encountering a white person on the street was akin to stumbling upon a bear in the woods. The thing black parents already knew was that the Emmett Till incident had only displayed to the world that a white person could murder a black child and walk away from it. So, surviving an encounter with a white person was an exercise in keeping that white person comfortable while getting away.

Well, back when I was a young girl in the late 50s and early 60s, not getting 'hurt' by a black man was a lesson that white parents taught their daughters.

So, unfortunately, I guess we were all afraid of each other alot back then!

 

[RDKirk]

Well, back when I was a young girl in the late 50s and early 60s, not getting 'hurt' by a black man was a lesson that white parents taught their daughters.

So, unfortunately, I guess we were all afraid of each other alot back then!

Yeah, y'all had been getting that since "Birth of a Nation." It even applied to black children.

 

[Akita Suggagaki]

So, unfortunately, I guess we were all afraid of each other alot back then!

and I don't think we really outgrow it. I have tried.

 

[RDKirk]

and I don't think we really outgrow it. I have tried.

I do agree (and have frequently said) that the Baby Boomer generation, at least, as the last generation that had segregation inculcated at birth, will have to die off.

 

[mourningdove~]

Yeah, y'all had been getting that since "Birth of a Nation." It even applied to black children.

Thank you for that bit of 'history'. Never heard of the movie, before tonite.
But I researched it abit. Also found it on YouTube to watch.

I'm going to watch it. But a 3 hour long silent movie is soooo l.o.n.g........... I watched the first 30 minutes tonite.
I'm expecting I won't enjoy what I'll be seeing ... but maybe I'll learn some important things about our history, too.

None of my family was into the KKK. Didn't know any of them.
We were too busy for that kind of stuff ... just a bunch of hard working Italians!

Thanks again.

 

[mourningdove~]

and I don't think we really outgrow it.

You may be right. Or maybe not.
Yes, some of this stuff has been deeply ingrained in us.

But one thing I do know ....

"What is impossible with man is possible with God."
~ Luke 18:27

... and so I never give up hope!

 

[mourningdove~]

I do agree (and have frequently said) that the Baby Boomer generation, at least, as the last generation that had segregation inculcated at birth, will have to die off.

I have read where you've posted this before.
Initially, I found it to be very offensive. Yep.
But, the more I honestly thought about it, the more I realized that you are probably right.

Really, apart from the transforming power of the Holy Spirit working in our hearts and minds ...
it is impossible for us to truly change and become more like Christ.