Sacha Baron Cohen, Guilty of Minstrelsy
It's minstrelsy because Cohen has taken on the the guise of a minority he secretly loathes in order to put them down.
Why did I write my last post on Borat then? Well, I find SBC screamingly funny in this Lenny Bruceish way. And I fell for the message—pogroms in America—because it was so well coded, coated by humor; and I think I was vulnerable to its orthodoxy. I wonder if I see it again if I'll feel the same. I think not; that I'm likely to see the prejudice plainly, and on behalf of fundamentalists, smalltowners and rodeo audiences, my fellow Americans, feel somewhat offended... (in the same way I'm appalled when Larry David and Jon Stewart talk about pogroms as a real possibility here). Thanks for the smart comments.
the real anti-semitic threat in the world today is not going to come from drunken imbecile crowds at rodeos or nascar.
the real threat is from islamic fundamentalism bent on jihad, an islamic bomb, and the eradication of the state of israel.
the lefties refuse to acknowledge this.
little philly weiss, an apostate ex-jew who devotes all his energy to attacking the state of israel, exposing the supporters of israel as a cabal with undue influence, and who incessantly attacks jewish influence and power, disingenously shows concern over the potential to incite despite all of his efforts in that direction.
I think rednecks aren't as sensitive as you fear they are. I mean, Borat is bad because it insults anti semites or something? what kind of bizarro world political correctness is this.
speaking of minstrelsy, I had a black films class in college, the teacher played some amos an andy episode and the whole class, mainly black, howled with laughter. let the people allegedly insulted make this case if it's so
Cohen isn't the first to imagine using minstrelsy as cover and ruse (cf. Lee's Bamboozled). He's merely the first to do so in elaborately staged hoaxes.
That these seem so real to their victims is a measure of how deeply Borat already exists in their mind as an inferior, Old World exotic. When he unstoppers their anti-semitism and other hatreds, just look at their joy: they'll take this from him and even bond their own with it because they feel superior to him, they feel safe. That's the genius of the guise. He's a pollster of bile--why feel bad if the rodeo has been canvassed?
While you look to Lenny Bruce, I think we've met the new Groucho. Like the great American comic, Cohen's impulses are socially anarchical, acutely cruel, maybe not a little misanthropic, and terribly funny.
lester wrote:
"I mean, Borat is bad because it insults anti semites or something? what kind of bizarro world political correctness is this."
Which is a complete strawman misrepresentation of what Weiss was saying. Cohen intentionally lied to and misrepresented his subjects. He edited together several hundred hours of footage in a
highly selective way to make it conform to idiot, red neck stereotypes.
Fine. I'm sure rich, socially enlightened types will enjoy seeing this priveleged, Cambridge boy outsmart the dumb rednecks. Just let's not pretend that this film is a hard hitting, seering indictment of racism and anti-semitism in America.
It's a good Pollock joke but nothing more.
Borat must be asked:
Are we more decent after Borat than before?
The main event of Borat was the Rodeo.
What was the aftershock on the local people?
It would be nice to find it out.
His impact on the large public which has seen the movie is probably negligible.
If the Passion has not made any difference, then Borat will be forgotten soon, too.
I am trying to find more reactions to the movie on my trip to Europe.
nate- he is assuming rednecks can't tak a joke. are you offended by the "dave chapelle show"? they get it. they get "throw the jew down the well" it's politically incorrect fun
What disgusts me is that Liberals and Leftists are using the politeness of people as evidence of the most ugly intentions. Nearly everyone, especially in a large group, will respond to a situation like Borat by "smile and nod" rather than an immediate denunciation.
When the President of Iran says that he wants to destroy Israel, he doesn't really mean it, but when Americans are polite to some strange dude with a video camera, it's obviously proof of the imminent destruction of Jews in America and the underlying anti-semitism of the American public. Funny that.
Rather than proving what the Left claims, it has demonstrated once again that they are suffering from cranial-anal impaction.
Jews like Cohen are obsessed with "exposing" anti-semitism because they know that we "goyim" have plenty of wholly valid reasons to hate them.