An Open Letter to Black People in Horror Movies

For my poetry reading I chose a slam poem entitled "Open Letter to Black People in Horror Movies". What initially drew me to this poem was the performance given by Omar Holmon and Anthony Ragler. The way they perform the beginning of the poem is hilarious (and I think the audience thought so too). As the poem continues, they keep the same strong tone, but the stanzas quickly go from being funny to being very serious, and I found myself being surprised at the transition. When I first watched their performance, I had to occasionally pause the video to let the words sink in. 

In class, we discussed most of the points I wanted to get to. But I'm still thinking about one thing that came up in discussion: black actors in Hollywood and how they are represented. Before class, I searched up the poem on Youtube so I could transcribe it, I came across a comedian talking about why black people aren't portrayed in horror movies. I've honestly always thought that black people either aren't in horror movies because they're more logical or die first, and that's it. However, after I found this poem, it gave that idea more reasoning. For one thing, the poem talks mostly about the horrors of everyday life. So maybe the reason people say black people are more logical than white people in horror movies is because the everyday struggle of surviving forces them to be cautious or else there are consequences. This is shown in the lines "Son, the fuck I look like being scared of some goddamn movie monsters? I'm from Brooklyn..." We wouldn't usually compare just living in a city as scary or threatening, but there's so much more to the situation. Another poem we looked at this semester said that the ghetto is scarier than every monster, so I thought of that as well (let's be honest, Freddy Kreuger probably wouldn't be able to make it). 

In some horror movies (or so I've been told) the black characters always die first. Something Tim mentioned in class interested me as well, and it related to the line "Don't go check on the white guy, he'll be fine, his privilege will protect him." White people are likely the ones writing these horror movies, so white privilege does in a way come into play in these situations. It's the white writers that are killing of these characters, so they're not safe anywhere. Hollywood's representations of black characters shows more than I expected. (I think this also relates to the line "so we aren't even safe in fantasies.")

You should definitely watch their performance and think about the content, I think there's a lot to be said about black people in horror movies.

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Dearly

Beloved is very complicated and confusing and I'm enjoying it very much. I like how as Sethe's story unfolds, we also begin to learn Paul D's, and Denver's, and Beloved's stories. There's so much I could talk about in this post since so many things have happened so far, but one thing I kept thinking about was how Sethe feels "flattered by Beloved's open, quiet devotion" but if Denver showed the same adoration, she would feel annoyed because she doesn't want to have a dependent child.

This strikes me as odd because we've accepted that Beloved is the ghost of the baby. But at the same time, Sethe doesn't even realize that Beloved is the baby, so why does her relationship with Beloved seem closer than her relationship with Denver? Maybe something that involves the death of the baby has to do with Sethe's disgust at having a dependent child. It seems to me that the pain of losing her children was a lot of Sethe to handle, and maybe Denver being more independent will lessen the blow should Sethe ever lose her. Of course, that's just one idea I have, and I hope that we find out more about Sethe's experiences with the baby soon, maybe it will explain this dynamic. Also, it would be great to hear anyone else's ideas in the comments!

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Art

Style Wars definitely opened my eyes.

I've never really thought much of graffiti. I always thought that all graffiti looked the same and I was always confused about how it got where it was, but that was about it. The movie definitely gave me a different perspective on this art form. The community that came from this one idea makes me wish I could be a graffiti writer too, and be able to carry out my name in such a unique way.

Whenever criticism of graffiti came up in the movie, especially from the mayor, we all laughed, which I think is an appropriate response. During discussion, Jack pointed out the ironic situation that the authorities were in. Graffiti supposedly supports violence, but the measures they took to prevent graffiti weren't better. Not to mention the dogs they also used to deter graffiti writers. Whoever was talking about this plan also seemed so enthusiastic about someone getting trapped in the razor structures on the top of the fences.

I consider graffiti to be an art, and I know the mayor and other critics would disagree, but it's definitely a skill and it brings beauty and color. Isn't that something art should do? Bring life and creativity and be inspirational? They're only seeing graffiti as vandalism, but I think it's more than that. 

Also, I personally think that the trains with graffiti looked better than the clean ones.

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