crash

okay. so i just watched the movie crash. the 2005 movie, not the david cronenburg movie of the same name. and wow. i don't know if you've seen it. but it was really good.
po
okay. first. and this is by no means the first time i have realized the following. but i have led such a privilleged existence. and i don't (just) mean economically. growing up in canada, in a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic city a simple view would be that i come from a world where racism is not a very big deal and where we embrace cultural differences. however - i am not that naive. i come from an upper middle class existence where racism and intolerance and disciminatory treatment are hidden and assumed. the women who clean your houses and race your children. the men who sweep your floors and work behind the counter at the convience store. people we see every day and don't see.

but even more than that - not living in a multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, economically varried neighbourhood - if there were racism etc. would i even see it? not really. but that's not true. i bet if i lived in the same neighbourhood and was black, or arab, or indian (native or from india) i would notice it. maybe not a lot. maybe not everyday. but i would. I went to a high school where everyone was white. i have lived in kingston, belfast and victoria - each city whiter than the last. i have the luxury of a) being in the majority and b) living in a country/city who perpetuate the myth of racial harmony and the "tossed salad" ethic.

now i am also not trying to suggest that toronto in any way resembles the los angles presented in this movie (which i am taking for truth - but clearly i cannot know this, hence the caveat) but i am saying that in some respects we have ourselves convinced that it doesn't exist - when maybe in fact it does. or maybe it doesn't.

the other thing that i was thinking about (relatedly) is how naive i am. by which i mean i think that the world should work - that there should be mechanisms in place to combat racism, sexism, homophoiba, and that people should be held accountable for their actions. but i don't think there is - really. and the thing with this stuff is that it's so systemic and systematic that on some level it can't be addressed (just to state the obvious) and i don't know what the answer is.

minority policing in minority communities - this makes so much sense on the one hand - on the other hand people claim that it is reverse racism (or something like that). Having women and minorities in parliament. i like to think it makes a difference - but does it? Once people are in a place where they have become part of the instituion, machine, at some level they must have accepted the status quo.

incidently - there is literature of "critical mass" - the amount of women needed in a parliment, legislature to affect change - it's around 40%.... imagine.

the other thing which this film did really well is it showed the multi-dimensional nature of human beings. so well. we are all deeply fucked up and conflicted indivdiuals and you never know how you will act under any circumstance. you just don't. even if you are lucky enough to know how you would want to act - actually behaving in that way is something else entirely. If you were walking down the street and you saw someone being beat up would you step in? Someone you know makes a gay joke. someone you don't know makes a gay joke. when does humour show integration into a cultural fabric and when does it mask fear and hatred? what do cultural sterotypes accomplish? if they are true why shouldn't we use them - or do we perpetuate them?

we reify (definition: To regard or treat (an abstraction) as if it had concrete or material existence) identity as though it were real. something that exists in the abstrat. but it doesn't. i'm not saying that individual's don't have their own identities, but i am saying that identity is not something that you can hang your hat on (so to speak). It has only the value attached to it, which we attach to it and signifies only what we want it to signify. yet somehow it seems inescapable. and i don't think that's okay. but we all already know how much i don't like labels. the thing is they are so goddamn useful in affecting actual political change. crucial in fact. oh my god. this stuff is all far too complicated. who would stupid enough to actual try to study it. it just makes no sense and there are no answers. well. no realistically implementable answers.

it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye.