The White Messiah Complex

Who would have thought that it would take the block buster film Avatar to get David Brooks, condescending spokesman for the establishment, and Slavoy Zizek, the hyper caffeinated Marxist, to agree on something.  First, here is David Brooks apparently offended by the cliche of simple primitives unable to make their own destiny:

"It rests on the stereotype that white people are rationalist and technocratic while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic. It rests on the assumption that nonwhites need the White Messiah to lead their crusades. It rests on the assumption that illiteracy is the path to grace. It also creates a sort of two-edged cultural imperialism. Natives can either have their history shaped by cruel imperialists or benevolent ones, but either way, they are going to be supporting actors in our journey to self-admiration."

No to be out done, Monsieur Zizek sees the film, despite its sympathies with the aboriginy Na'vi, as the clear expression of neoimperialist racism:

"Avatar's fidelity to the old formula of creating a couple, its full trust in fantasy, and its story of a white man marrying the aboriginal princess and becoming king, make it ideologically a rather conservative, old-fashioned film. Its technical brilliance serves to cover up this basic conservatism. It is easy to discover, beneath the politically correct themes (an honest white guy siding with ecologically sound aborigines against the "military-industrial complex" of the imperialist invaders), an array of brutal racist motifs: a paraplegic outcast from earth is good enough to get the hand of abeautiful local princess, and to help the natives win the decisive battle. The film teaches us that the only choice the aborigines have is to be saved by the human beings or to be destroyed by them. In other words, they can choose either to be the victim of imperialist reality, or to play their allotted role in the white man's fantasy."

No doubt Zizek would be amused by this dialectical unity of opposites.  Both the defender of the status quo and the radical critic agree that the portrayal is racist and simplistic.  But that is as far as I think they can agree - for example Brooks has to slip in the fact that "The plotline gives global audiences a chance to see American troops get killed."  When I saw the film the first thing I thought of this was "Blackwater vs. Indians" but I suppose that isn't much of a difference. 

As usual Zizek uses the film as an opportunity to make his larger ideological critique. Just in case we forget, there are always real life wars of resistance whose the plot lines are not as easy for us to digest; he refers to Arundhati Roy's recent account of the Dongria Kondh people's uprising that is currently taking place in India.  The Hills that they inhabit in the state of Orissa "were sold to mining companies that plan to exploit their immense reserves of bauxite (the deposits are considered to be worth at least $4trn). In reaction to this project, a Maoist (Naxalite) armed rebellion exploded:"

"The Indian prime minister characterised this rebellion as the "single largest internal security threat"; the big media, which present it as extremist resistance to progress, are full of stories about "red terrorism", replacing stories about "Islamist terrorism". No wonder the Indian state is responding with a big military operation against "Maoist strongholds" in the jungles of central India. And it is true that both sides are resorting to great violence in this brutal war, that the "people's justice" of the Maoists is harsh. However, no matter how unpalatable this violence is to our liberal taste, we have no right to condemn it. Why? Because their situation is precisely that of Hegel's rabble: the Naxalite rebels in India are starving tribal people, to whom the minimum of a dignified life is denied.

So where is Cameron's film here? Nowhere: in Orissa, there are no noble princesses waiting for white heroes to seduce them and help their people, just the Maoists organising the starving farmers. The film enables us to practise a typical ideological division: sympathising with the idealised aborigines while rejecting their actual struggle. The same people who enjoy the film and admire its aboriginal rebels would in all probability turn away in horror from the Naxalites, dismissing them as murderous terrorists. The true avatar is thus Avatar itself - the film substituting for reality."

While I appreciate the larger point Zizek is making, I have to say I really enjoyed the film.  Besides it being visually stunning, I also liked the mercenaries getting their asses kicked.  I suppose that means I am merely reinscribing the current neoliberal ideological coordinates - but it's still just a movie, right?

Comments

[5150]

insofar that the US imperialist army, at least infantry sort, consists of multicultural soldiers, Zizek and brooks are full of dookie--as are yoo (and Cameron, for that matter, for misrepresentation). But wait, they were forced to enlist by whitey capitalists!

after Steele, colin powell, rice the old lefto-liberal race card means little or nada

[Alain]

5150, I have no idea what you are talking about. The so called race of Michael Steele or Condi Rice has nothing to do with what they are saying. My point is simply both Brooks and Zizek make a reasonable point but use it in describing a fictional group of "Natives." I think it is a fair point without it being all that important because Avatar is just a movie. That's it. No big deal.

[fruit_loopz]

Are we supposed to read this 'That's it. No big deal.' ironically?

[Benoît]

Severely off-topic, but I was wondering if you’d be interested in a project I’m aiming at a number of the blog authors in the continental philosophy blogosphere. Specifically, I’m interested in developing a mailing list that would act as a “back channel” for discussion across a range of minds, the virtue of which is on-going, long-form discussion that bridges the gap between blog comments sections and email. If this interests you, let me know at what[dot]is[dot]ground[at]gmail[dot]com.

[Tom Matrullo]

An interesting and more complex film with a similar narrative arc (native woman, in this case Italian, falls in love with foreign man who is a scientist but also a sort of Indiana Jones type) might be Fritz Lang's Cloak and Dagger. That was back when people who made films felt some responsibility to present vaguely recognizable human types.

[Matze]

Hi! Well, Zizek is an interesting philosopher.

Yesterday I wanted to comment on an older topic on your Long Sunday Blog (from 2006), but the system wouldn't le me.

The blog entry in question was "Superego and the other":
http://www.long-sunday.net/long_sunday/2006/06/superego_ego_an.html

I am taking the liberty to post my comment here, so please note it is related to "Superego and the other".

"""
SOMETHING in the previous comment stared at me - you wrote: "So, in a way, there are 3 things--the other, superego, and enjoyment."

Isn't the missing link what is excluded there: what about "phantasized ideal Ego"(Ideal-Ich) and "Symbolic Ego Ideal"(Ich-Ideal) - and "desire" (as suggested by Lacan/Zizek) ?

Isn't it so that postmodern capitalism likes to dissolve former authentic "ideal ego", "I", and those old-fashioned traditional desires? .... In order to sell its own "better" versions of all three of it?

There you have it: the very functioning mode of capitalism is to create a synthetic "Ich-Ideal", synthetic multiple identities ("I"'s) to choose from and consumable, sellable desires (for "products").

It's just seems so blatantly evident to me in this moment, I have to think of a comment of Zizek's where he wrote: every successfull ideology wears a symbol of it's "evil" side-effect as a proud badge on its sleeve but nobody would recognize it (the original comment was about an uncanny-obvious symbolic sculpture on top of a building from the communist era which was interpreted by Zizek to point to both the ideological advantagous side as well as to its disawoved excess - if read correctly .. )

SO, the very self-proclaimed *advantages* of late capitalism (advertised ideal-ego's, choosable identity, ever new desirable products) supersed what have formely been the authentic ego-ideal, authentic I-Identidy and authentic desire.

But what's been "authentic" then? If you follow Zizek, Freud and Lacan, the Oediapal structure of a strong authoritian society (strong symbolic authority) provided this. But what you see there is not so much the loss of a "true" identity but its mere *changing* under socio-historical developments. Or to read it another way, the former real symbolic "I" has been castrated to the infamous empty void (the lost object ..) which now can be filled-up with changing contents.

I think this is an important point since Lacan's whole work gyrates around the lost object "petit a" (which seems not so "petit" in this case). We can now bring on the whole bunch of things Lacan and Zizek claim about "lost object small a" and the whole masculine addiction to it - the performative power of capitalism seems to overlap here with what men might have been seeking in woman. And it is universalized: not only men now chase the lost object, but also woman are on the hunt now (think of ever new woman products), which points to a new sexual non-difference. This equalness among sexes, races, nations seems to be a pacifying factor (to say *something* good of capitalism) - provided you have the money.

And last-but-not-least to the question of "enjoyment".

The only constant factor appears to me that - except for the superego - that the ideal-ego, the "I" and one's own desires naturally all want to be *enjoyed*.

I might ask wether Capitalism's (and its liberal democratic supplement ..) "injunction to enjoy" - really to enjoy its synthetic / manufactured products, even political products - does not this ever unsatisfied injunction receive its power from the destabilized / weak mode of enjoyment that those manufactured products only superficially provide? In a way in capitalism they have to be superficial because otherwise there would be no room for new products ("the new IT").

The whole problem might be, todays very psychic condition is itself SYNTHETIC and MANUFACTURED and exchangable, identity, "I", and phantasma are all castrated, i.e. individuals are forever staying synthetic and manufactured and they are obliged to enjoy this condition through the hegemonic ideological super-egoic injunction to enjoy the produced products.

However I think the symbolic castration as not at all sucessfull since everbody in this right mind knows that products only bring us so far but not "home".

One alternative is that one can become a part of capitalism (as a real capitlist) to regain a strong symbolic auhtority (the neoliberal stance) which however has the stain of not being "authentic".

Has today the notion of authenticity been lost? Capitalism of course advertises its prodcuts to build up your new "authentic" mode of being - but regarding that was said above it's clear it can only be fake. The question is what is an authentic capialist (or anti-capitalist). Following Zizek it has to be grounded in a traumatic Real of having "no money", or differently, in a truth event - for either stance to sprout. I guess Zizek would say the authentic capitalist can be one of three types: the perverse, the neurotic/obsessional subject, or the hysterial - in answer to a disposition of having "no money". The usual modes of sujectivation just applid to capitalism.

[GARRETTSandy]

I will recommend not to hold back until you earn enough amount of cash to buy all you need! You should just take the loans or just college loan and feel free

[Motorhead]

Not with a bang, but with a whimper, like a good zionist byatch: the lingering death of Long Slumday. Helped into its grave by "leftist Clintonite" Jodi D., the weblog phony pieces of mierda, Matt C, the radical green, dewd, the mysterious NY marxist-bondage-queen Alphonse, the cowards, Swifty, et al

[Vato]

Has today the notion of authenticity been lost?

By means no. Check out Joody Dean and I cite for some authentic liberal politics, and cutting-edge thinkers such as Paul Krugman. Nothin' but authentic

[Rootsandrights.wordpress.com]

These are my thoughts of the film on this theme:

http://rootsandrights.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/bewitched-bothered-and-bewildered/

[Socioproctology.blogspot.com]

"in Orissa, there are no noble princesses waiting for white heroes to seduce them and help their people, just the Maoists organising the starving farmers."
Ignorance truly is bliss. Sadly the evil mining corporations aren't ignorant. They financed the Naxals for one simple reason- the Naxals sell out at a cheaper price and kill off, or otherwise intimidate, the liberal N.G.O types who would otherwise go in for costly Public Interest Litigation such that the Corporation faces a large contingent liability on its Balance Sheet, thus making it more costly to access global capital markets.

The real story here is that
1) tribal people have judicially enforceable rights and entitlements
2) some tribal 'leaders' (descendants of chieftans or politically connected operators) use control of the local administration in order to grab title in mineral and other resources for themselves. They also divert money coming in under the rubric of people's entitlements for drought relief, setting up of co-operatives, education etc) to themselves.
3) the Naxals come from outside the area. They have no interest in the tribal people. They are interested in gaining money to buy guns and a secure base for training their cadres within forested regions. They initially gain some success by mobilizing tribal have-nots to demand better wages and conditions and to protest exploitation by the Forest Service functionaries and so on. They then levy a tax on economic activity. They forcibly recruit tribal kids for 'the armed struggle' and spend a lot of time hacking some little girl to death coz wearing a ribbon is bourgeois behavior and like totally reactionary and something to do with the Globalisation of Commodified Sex and other important stuff like that.
Mining companies love the Naxals coz they charge less than the Govt. Also, once paid off, they stay paid off- more than can be said for the mainstream politicians and judiciary. For their part, every budding Naxal Stalin-wannabe is looking for his Armand Hammer- i.e. the Capitalist fat cat who will be loyal to him coz Marx said something about it to Engels or something.

Naxals like killing tribal people, Why? Lack of exposure to slasher movies means that tribal folk are impressionable. A simple machete attack on a young girl has the sort of impact a full blown chain-saw massacre had on us back in the Seventies. Since then our standards have risen.

The Indian State wasn't very good at grabbing land from tribals and really fucking them over big time. This is because those fuckers fight back- always have always will, which is why they are called tribals and the rest of us are called 'caste' Hindus (i.e. we've internalized slavery).
Naxal violence is just one brand of caste/tribe/communal violence on offer. However, it has the greatest potential to cancel all entitlements not just for tribal people but the poor everywhere- hence, it is Corporate friendly.
Back when India was set on becoming a Communist country- i.e. when people like our present 'liberal' P.M was a fellow traveler- it was hoped that Collectivization could be pushed through. The State would get everything. But, there was a disconnect between the pointy headed intellectuals and the administration in the districts. It was the latter who'd end up butchered in their beds if they implemented the high minded 'reforms' handed down to them. Parts of India simply descended into anarchy. Naxalism along with every other ism, too, had its militia to protect its timber monopoly and right to levy a tax on school teachers and so on within its pockets of influence.
At present, Delhi hopes that the Naxals will finish off the declining Communist administration in West Bengal. For this to happen, the Naxals need to kill a lot of policemen. Why? Killing policemen is generally regarded as a GOOD THING. So this boosts their support. While continuing to hack random kids to death- important for the shock and awe factor- they get to put forward the argument that they are fighting Globalised Capitalism in its finally Final phase ushering a new dawn where all the tribals can be more rigorously fucked over than ever before.

[Ordinarypleasures.wordpress.com]

i think what's been overlooked when discussing avatar is the way it desublimates desires--our desire to escape capitalist society, our desire for meaningful community, our desire to fight back against imperialist forces on behalf of oppressed nonwestern peoples, and so on. I liked the visuals and watching the mercenaries get their asses kicked, too, but i think that enjoyment in itself is repressive--the film invites us to imagine freedom and life outside our atomized capitalist reality, but ultimately channels the audience's desublimated desire-to-escape into the mere act of consuming a product (in this case, the million-dollar 3-D visuals of the film itself). wrote a bit about it here, check it out if you're so inclined: http://ordinarypleasures.wordpress.com/2011/04/07/why-i-didnt-like-avatar-even-though-it-was-awesome/