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"The thing is, if you just do stuff, and nothing happens, what's it all mean?"

Friday, August 16, 2013

The Will to White Power: Racial Politics and Geopolitical Poetics

Murky waters (I'm white, so some may say I have no idea what I'm talking about...but am far from "whitey."



Sources: 
http://ideas.time.com/2012/07/20/breaking-bad-and-the-downfall-of-the-white-anyman/
http://www.salon.com/2012/09/12/breaking_bad_white_supremacist_fable/
Many blogs and articles that responded to Malcom Harris' article, making even more narrow interpretations of the show.

Fear of globalization.



Is the scene near the end of 5X09, where Jesse treats the black homeless man like as a dog, racist? Clearly, the purpose of this scene is to bring back the "Problem Dog" symbolism (it also cleverly calls back the Dog House eatery than Jesse used to frequent, having the background wagging tail appear as if it's coming out of the vagrant); but there was something burlesque about the transient, and in a show with few unintended icons, perhaps "Blood Money" is drawing attention the the inherent racialized contradictions in the Pinkman character (...shit, his last name isn't as white as "White"'s, but it does denote honkiness...then again, aren't we all pink(-hu)man(s), on the inside?). 

Recall that Jesse started out in season one as a complex yet caricatured "wigger" archetype (5x09's juxtaposition of Jesse's background stoicism and his former running-crew's [Badger and Skinny Pete...off the meth but still on the pipe] foreground shenanigans--echoing the start of the meth-fueled bro-out blast-that-went-on-seemingly-in-perpetuity which started in "Thirty Eight-Snub" (4x02)--show how far Jesse has unraveled from his previous "personaes." Like Walter, the characters and the audience no longer see someone rooted in "being" (confined identity which embodies cultural archetypes and performative expectations) We don't no who, or where, they are. So...is it better to sustain an identity that, while . ; or to go in flux with the abyssal tides of nothingness?

Then again, maybe I'm giving the show too much progressive credit. If it's meaning is inextricable with the "meaning of life," than I guess it is racist. Keep in mind that Gilligan is known by some (at least one) as the "Red State Auteur".

German Conglomerate.

Gus being the ultimate Other (a Chilean emigrant to Mexico, who then emigrated to the U.S.), dark skinned and likely homosexual. However, he is the most efficient and humane . Lydia, who is a quintessential

Racialist tropes from Western film (guy with clear Native American descent being the foil for the "White guys" caper.

Ricky Hitler.

Purity.

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