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GUNGA_DIN_SYNDROME
June 13, 2007
I call it the "Gunga Din Syndrome":
a black character sacrifices Whenever I
themselves nobly for the good of introduce
the white people. this phrase
someone
This happens a lot to wants to
black second banana heroes argue about
in action movies... some detail.
My best example is So perhaps my grasp of
Quarrel in the first It's mildly this (rather simple,
Bond film, "Dr. No". disturbing straight-forward and
that in obvious) Kipling poem
I first heard the "Live and is weak.
observation made by Let Die"
Ken Primer talking (1973) this Myself, I think
about the movie character the trouble is
"Freejack" back on is alive that if you
Jan 22, 1992 in and well. start getting
rec.arts.movies, in anywhere near
a post titled "the (Less than calling someone And pointing
black guy buys it..." ten years racist they out a racist
later, and suddenly get touch in a
I've thought his noble interested in favorite work
about collecting sacrifice correcting your of art is an
examples of was already spelling. unforgiveable
this, and forgotten). tribal
keeping stats... We might call insult.
but that would At least that "spelling
require watching that version flame syndrome",
an awful lot of doesn't die but remember
bad movies. by the end that a good
of the movie. example of it
(And I'm still would be to
catching up on That's raise the
bad anime.) reserved objection
for another that you were
It could easily be black complaining
though that there sidekick about *grammar*
would be some (albiet not spelling.
interesting trends not a
you could document noble
in variations in sacrifice (And my propensity to
racial diversity and this time.) call things "Syndromes",
death rates of POCs is, of course,
in sync with current "Syndrome Syndrome":
events, or just an attempt at implying
fashions in script that your opponent is
writing... not simply wrong, but
*sick*: there's a vague
(You would think someone assumption of medical
out there must've worked authority without any
on this at some point, but actual supporting
most likely they did an citations.)
academic number on it: a
quickie, sloppy study,
with the most boring
write-up possible,
published in the most In a lot of ways, "close readings"
obscure place available.) are easier than "distant": the
sheer quantity of bad films over
There could be some the years... how to begin even a
tricky parts, in cursory survey?
categorizing
characters as "main" HOW_SOFT_A_WHISPER
or "secondary", in
catergorizing deaths
as "noble
sacrifices" or Getting a good
"tragic accidents". spell-checker
set-up would
also be adviseable.
(April 8, 1995)
(rec.arts.comics.misc)
Right, well this is the way I think it goes:
let's say you're a nice, relatively liberal,
reasonably intelligent white guy, and you
start writing stories. Your first impulse is
to start writing about white characters
("Write what you know"). Then you start
thinking "hey, there are no black people in
this story yet", so you make an effort to
include some. Now, the black folks in the
story are going to tend to be fairly minor
characters, since they're more or less after
thoughts. They may even be just redshirts,
characters written in so you'll have someone
to kill off. At any rate it's likely you'll
treat them more cavalierly then the main
characters (it's a tricky business, killing a
main character and getting it to work in a
story...).
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