Why would I do that you ask?
Well, that's a good question.
Particularly once you know that I despise the BBC for its bias and even more for the supercilious way it delivers its bias.
Yet I've decided to make them happy.
I'm going to take the bait and say I'm annoyed that they cast a black man to play the archetype Western warrior Achilles in their new sword and sex epic: Troy: Fall of a City. I'm rising to their bait even though I'm pretty sure that one of their reasons for casting David Gyasi in the first place was to smoke out racists like me.
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| David Gyasi as Achilles |
In fact I'm not a racist (yeah, yeah, they all say that).
But I am irritated to see Gyasi in the role for a couple of reasons.
The first is the obvious reason that it's not historically accurate. Yeah, I know that there isn't actually much history here to be accurate about. This is because almost the whole source for the battle of Troy is an epic poem likely written centuries after the events it describes. But we do know that the people of that time and place were white and more importantly the author, Homer, describes all the Greeks and Trojans as white with even the odd ginger in evidence.
But the most important reason I care about this trivial casting choice is that the BBC are applying a gross double standard, and an overtly racist double standard at that. They need to be challenged on this racism.
How many decades is it since white actors could play black roles without howls of protest from BBC talking heads? I think the practice finally fizzled out in the dark ages better known as the Seventies. Perhaps the last bastion to fall was the BBC's own Black and White Minstel Show which was finally pulled in 1978.
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| A staple at the good old BBC till 1978 |
It has to be said that casting Anglos as other races wasn't always an unalloyed success. Charlton Heston just about carried off playing a Mexican in Touch of Evil. And I don't think Lawrence Olivier chewing the carpet as the Mahdi in Khartoum could have been bettered. But God help us, John Wayne in a pointy hat as Genghis Khan with Maureen O'Sullivan as his flame-haired love interest in Conqueror! That was probably going a couple of steps beyond the plausible. So perhaps it's just as well that that sort of buffonery is confined to the past along with Golliwogs and, of course, the BBC's Black and White Minstrel Show.
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| My personal favourite Genghis Khan |
But now it seems that the bad old days are back with a vengeance.
Not only do we get a black Achilles but also a black Zeus in the same production.
Then there's Sophie Okonedo as Queen Margaret in Hollow Crown.
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| Sophia Okonedo in excellent The Hollow Crown series |
And for the kids a whole series of BBC cartoons depicting our history in a much more colourful light than historical record would suggest.
There's this 'typical Roman family' (in Britain).
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| Possible, yes. Typical, no |
This typical Celt going into battle.
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| New Irish not as new as we thought? |
And this blacksmith.
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| Hmm. |
So what's going on? Why would it be irredeemably racist to cast a white actor to play Nelson Mandela, but uber anti-racist to have a black man play Admiral Nelson?
It all comes down to the BBC's view of racism.
Most of us tend to assume that not being racist means treating everybody the same regardless of their race, but to the cultural Marxists at the BBC that sort of thinking is naive at best and a right-wing tactic to keep blacks down at worst.
These days progressive anti-racism actually involves being racist against certain groups. The theory goes that because the white race has institutional power and privilege it's necessary to balance that by favouring 'disadvantaged' races so that the outcomes for each racial indentity can be equalised. Hence being racist against whites counts as anti-racist in BBC circles!
The racist evil of this can be very easily seen when you realize that in this way of seeing the world a homeless white guy is privileged and the wealthy son of two black doctors is in need of a leg up.
The kids' history animated series which featured the 'typical Roman family' illustrates it best. Bonkers as it sounds the BBC does actually seem to think that they can persuade us (or more likely our kids) that we have always been a multi-racial society. And the more black actors they cast in iconic British historical figures the closer we will be to that noble aim.
So to all of you out there who miss racism on the BBC, the good news is that racism is fine and dandy again!
The BBC is racist.
But it's all in the cause of fighting racism you understand!
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The BBC can't help themselves. All their historical dramas have to feature black people in situations and positions they would never have been. I have no problem with black actors or those of any ethnicity provided they are good actors and their inclusion is relevant to the situation and most importantly, historically a possibility. Peaky Blinders is set in the 1920's yet the BBC have included the odious, arrogant, aggressive, racist Benjamin Zephinia as would you believe a Vicar. This despite the fact that Rastafarianism was not formed until the 1930s in Jamaca and dreadlocks were not worn until the 1940s.
ReplyDeleteI see the BBC has also cast a black fellow in the role of Inspector Javert for its forthcoming 'back to its roots' Les Miserables. I'm prepared to be proved wrong, but I can't imagine there were many black senior policemen in northern France in the early 19th century.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-42623067
The BBC are also fond of calling anybody who is against racial preference or mass immigration 'far-right' or in other words 'Nazi'. And this is the same organization that airs an extreme racist rant from trans model Monroe Bergdorf saying among other things:
ReplyDeleteWe “need to understand that racism is not learned, it’s inherited, and either consciously or unconsciously passed down through privilege”
Or in other words all whites are racist monsters and it's genetic.
The BBC seem to really believe that black people because of their 'disadvantage' cannot be racist. This is neo-Marxism and of course utter rubbish too.
Old white people have to die because "they're racist". This is a quote from Oprah Winfrey.
ReplyDeleteHow is Harvey Weinstein's biggest pal these days? The most influential and richest woman in Hollywood said and did nothing about abuse for 20 years, yet she's now a the heroine of the hour after one emoting speech. Hollywood is truly rotten to the core.
DeleteFrom DP111
ReplyDeleteBy their fruits you shall know them.
The BBC is full of marxists, whose main aim is to destroy capitalism and install global socialism. One cam destroy capitalism by loading its wealth production with tens of millions of immigrants from Africa and Muslim countries. These people will not be wealth creators but wealth consumers. Bit by bit, the system will fail, and capitalism will get the blame. One can see its fruits in the NHS.
One part of this policy is to make Blacks and Muslims appear as if they have always been a part of the West, and its success.
My argument is that the BBC are not racists, but actually marxists, who are using "race" (Islam too is a race in this policy mix), to destroy capitalism - in the West anyway.
Capitalism will not be destroyed though- it will simply be adapted by the likes China, India, and Asia.
They come from our elite universities yet they don't seem to understand that the final victory of their beloved Marxism will destroy their lives and the lives of their kids too.
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