Warning: Spoilers.
Walter White, the lead character of White American television’s “Breaking Bad” (2008-2013), is a high school chemistry teacher and family man who breaks bad, becoming an evil drug lord. It is more than just his last name that is “white”:
His race and ethnicity – not only the character, but the actor, the show’s creator and the main audience are all White Americans (here meaning white Anglo Americans).
His racially segregated social life – he lives in a city that is nearly half Latino, yet his social world – and therefore the main cast and the characters we are supposed to care about – are nearly all white. Whites are centre-stage, the white Whites are at the centre of centre stage. Latinos mostly appear as bad guys, co-workers or people in the background. We are meant to care about them only to the degree that a white character does. They have no value in their own right.
His respectability – what Gus Fring, a black Latino American, must painstakingly achieve and constantly fears losing, White takes for granted. Both Walter White and the show trade on the racist stereotype of suburban middle-class whites as being above crime, as being Basically Good.
His racism: When he does not feel like cleaning his own meth lab, he has Latina laundry women do it (pictured above). Because the lab is secret he puts them in danger of being killed for knowing too much. Instead they are instantly deported, put on a bus back to Honduras. He shows little concern about upending their lives.
His being a hero:
During the closing weeks of “Breaking Bad” I was reading about Columbus. The parallels were striking.
How Walter White is like Columbus:
- He is mad for wealth, way beyond any reasonable need.
- He is extremely violent – to the point of murder, even for slight things.
- He does not seem to care about right or wrong.
- He shows little concern for the suffering he causes others.
That is not the bad part. After all, there will always be bad apples, not all of them white. If you doubt that, just scroll down: I am sure the comments will be full of black crime statistics and accounts of brutal black psychopaths. Just like how this show trades on the idea that whites are Basically Good, so White American culture, flipside, assumes blacks do not break bad – they are Born Bad, born broken.
No, the bad part is the way many White Americans see Walter White and Columbus as heroes! The American government, as of 2013, still observes Columbus Day as a holiday, 77 years and counting. Vince Gilligan, the creator of “Breaking Bad”, made Walter White the hero and gave him a hero’s death, letting his crimes pay to the tune of $9 million (a half million crowns) – making his son richer than he has any right to be. American history in a nutshell. Filmed, in part, on Navajo land.
See also:
“That is not the bad part. After all, there will always be bad apples, not all of them white. If you doubt that, just scroll down: I am sure the comments will be full of black crime statistics and accounts of brutal black psychopaths. Just like how this show trades on the idea that whites are Basically Good, so White American culture, flipside, assumes blacks do not break bad – they are Born Bad, born broken.”
So true, but we can’t expect our oppressors to care about us? We need our own shows, and not those so called blacks shows with like one black writer if any and 8 white writers…how can u expect WP to show preference for WP…why would they chose,to take away their privilege when it makes even the white trash think they’re better than us…
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Exxxxxxxxxxaaaaaaaaactly! What amazes me is that it took three posts to peel the skin off the onion. Was that the plan all along?
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I agree that we need our own shows and cinema but Whites will always find a way around things and exploit and use us like they always do. I don’t trust those sneaky bastards one bit!
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[…] The whiteness of Walter White […]
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Brilliant, Aba. Brilliant.
Great way to start the day.
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Reblogged this on donatelloturtle.
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While watching this series I couldn’t help being reminded of this Walter White. http://myloc.gov/Exhibitions/naacp/newnegromovement/ExhibitObjects/WalterWhite.aspx?Enlarge=true&ImageId=6369c94f-71f9-4d10-b75b-3cd13e4ac4ec%3Aaf587318-8ba4-4085-ad4a-3df7b091a6f6%3A69&PersistentId=1%3A6369c94f-71f9-4d10-b75b-3cd13e4ac4ec%3A10&ReturnUrl=%2FExhibitions%2Fnaacp%2Fnewnegromovement%2FExhibitObjects%2FWalterWhite.aspx
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Reblogged this on [Modern Times].
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Abagond, did you watch the “American Tragedy” episode of Law & Order: SVU? I thought it was pretty clearly based on the Trayvon and Paula Deen scandals. In general, I think that show does a good job of portraying Black people fairly frequently and realistically (as people with real lives, who are not born criminals, and who are capable of doing wonderful, terrible, and perfectly ordinary things). It also shows how white people can be racist in less obvious ways, like in one episode when a white girl made up a story about being raped by a mysterious black man with a machine gun (her story was disproved). I would be interested in hearing your (and anyone else’s) opinions of the show and how it handles the issue of race.
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@Paige
I have watched it for so long I have not really put into thought on how well it actually does portray black people. I have yet to watch that episode but I will take a closer look at it.
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I knew this was going to be brought up here after reading the first post critical of the show. Why did I know this? Because it fits in with this blog’s story arc, of sorts.
I don’t know why I ever read anything here. I suppose to be infuriated. Let’s get this straight: you see connections where they do not exist, you ignore the 99% of something to focus on the 1% that fits your narrative, you walk around feelingly like John Nash from A Beautiful Mind and thinking you are seeing patterns but it is pareidolia and each new false pattern instill confidence i your ability to identify them.
If you look at Walt’s circle outside the meth trade it is composed of his family and Pinkman. They guy doesn’t have a lot of random friends.
I can imagine a scenario that would have stymied that though: baby Holly was adopted from a Latino family. Do you know what Abagond would’ve said then? That she was a token and trophy of some sort and related to “mighty whitey”.
You’ve called wolf so many times….and you have a group of followers that do it too.
I’m sure you have things in life to be angry about, but you are inventing reasons based upon past hurts and overly conspiratorial thinking.
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” Just like how this show trades on the idea that whites are Basically Good, so White American culture, flipside, assumes blacks do not break bad – they are Born Bad, born broken.”
No. It shows ONE WHITE DUDE that started out not in crime at all and then he became a criminal and bad.
Admit it. Anything that involves race AT ALL and does not somehow perfectly conform to your expectations of a social narrative will get this treatment.
This is how Popper said we can identify pseudo-science: the practitioner will then that A and not A both confirm their pet theory of B.
Perhaps Abagond doesn’t believe this stuff and is simply trying to generate page views by writing controversial things (incorrect or not) on popular topics.
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@gro jo,
Now THAT’s a hero!
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@ gro jo: Good looking out. That was excellent. He was a true hero. Need more like him today.
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I have yet to view this show. “Wow, Abagond, you got all of that from watching this. I know there are a lot of people who love this show. My boss gave me the dvd’s, she loves this show. I tried to watch it. it made my eyes glaze over, I will try again. I think it’s interesting you comparisons to him and Christopher Columbus. I will make a second attempt and Netflix this.
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Yep, when I first glimpsed the title I too thought it was a reference to the late, fair-skinned and blue-eyed leader of the NAACP.
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Never heard of Walter Francis White, but he is a hero, doing the work that he did for the NAACP. I guess he was the real Walter White as opposed to the fictional character on the show. Breaking Bad. Glad to learn about him. He could have just assimilated into white society, but instead chose to help fight white supremacy. He could have lived a comfortable life as a Caucasian.
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Abagond, you recently showed some pictures of black people that had been lynched.
Now, imagine going back to that era and explaining to them why it was a big deal to you that there was a famous TV show with a white guy and the show did not conform to your expectations.
You would perhaps explain to them your standard of living, that you went to college, that there were laws that protected you very explicitly from what they had experienced, and they would think that you were wasting your times as much as I am now by trying to convince you that MANY THINGS ARE RACIST BUT NOT EVERYTHING THAT BOTHERS YOU IS.
You are racist because you reflexively see race in everything. You are a caricature of yourself.
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@ Anne
This was the post I wanted to write from the start, as Qwerty kind of said. But in fairness I waited till the series was over to do it. The post on the finale I wrote just because I did not like it and wanted to vent.
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@ gro jo
Yes, a truly heroic Walter White!!
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@ Paige
I did not see that episode. “Law & Order” and Dick Wolf shows more generally seem to present blacks as real people, not stereotypes, at least in the many episodes I have seen. I used to like his “New York Undercover”.
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@ qwerty
I agree, lynching is worse than “Breaking Bad”.
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This blog is refreshing, as always! Some people are just not ready for or willing to let you have your point of view! Thanks Abagond for keeping it real!
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@ qwerty
1. I spent over 40 hours of my life watching this series.
2. I often blog about racism.
3. It made sense to me to blog about the racial aspects of this show while it was still fresh in my mind.
4. In American culture, racism is in everything. The country was built by racist white people for racist white people. Unfortunately, it is not something I and millions of others are “imagining”.
5. American television, as part of that culture, helps to strengthen racism more often than not.
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Ah Kiwi,
I admire your consistency.
POC marched for civil rights, but they did not conquer to get them. They convinced open minded whites – those in power – to acquiesce. they were supported in turn, by a multitude of whites – those with privilege – who also argued for full inclusion of Blacks and other POCs in our republic. They did this because they thought it was the right thing to do.
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So, without seeking a reward for doing the right thing – how about you acknowledge the fact that without white support, black and POC would still live under Mr. Crow’s directives.
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I’ve never watched “Breaking bad” before. It’s on netflix, and since everyone keeps raving about it, I think I may have to. I’ve stictly been a “Boardwalk empire,” “Mad men,” and “Game of thrones” fanatic over the past few years.
In regards to the “Whiteness” of many of these shows, I was thinking about this the other day. I’m a late 80’s baby, and for all those of my generation, I think we really took for granted the amount that we had growing up: “Sister sister,” “Moesha,” “Keenan and Kel,” “The Cosby show,” “My wife and kids,” “One on one,” even the character of Lisa in “Saved by the bell.” We also came up during the Spike Lee era, when we often saw movies with varied storylines played by African Americans and other minorities, even John Singleton and the Hughes brothers did a couple of good flicks. This era made it so that actors and actresses like Larenz Tate, Nia Long, Vivica Fox, Denzel Washington and Wesley Snipes, had platforms, and were in heavy demand. As that era came to a sharp close, the only one out of that list, who was able to consistently maintain a career, is Washington.
All of a sudden our music became a stereotypical mess, we went from Public Enemy and Mos def, to 50 cent and Solider boy, from Erykah Bady and Jill Scott, to Beyonce and K Michelle. And shows and cinema, with a decent representation of African Americans and other minorities, just vanished. I sometimes wonder why that happened, I think it actually managed to happen in the first place because the 80’s was one of the most conscious eras for us the Black community, and the 90’s was one of the most militant.
We wrongly assume that if we build up momentum and plant, things will continue, but it’s evident that the moment we drop the ball, things quickly regress. It seems we can’t afford to drop the ball, at any moment. Look at the “Soul food” series, it was immensely popular, but they cancelled it, just like they always do.
For now, I’ll have to buy old DVD’s of all the old shows, just so my future children have something to see of themselves that isn’t some negative depiction, but an image of dignity.
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@ Ebonymonroe
At times I’ve wondered wth happened. “Family Matters”, “The Steve Harvey Show”, “The Parent Hood”, “Malcom and Eddie, “Living Single”, “Martin”, “Fresh Prince”. And remember when black men were actually singing about their feelings? Lol no more room for the Brian McKnights of the world eh.
I do remember when Britney Spears came on the scene though, the Christina Aguileras and Jessica Simpsons and Willa Fords came marching in after that, even Shakira couldn’t dare show her face without blonde hair. American entertainment got a lot whiter again. And reality tv took over once producers realized they were not only dirt cheap to make but there were enough miserable people in the land who’d be entertained by such ugliness. Same thing on the film scene, if Tyler Perry(ugh!) isn’t doing it, we’re not getting anything through.
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@ Gen
ABSOLUTELY! I don’t know how this happened. It leaves me scratching my head. One minute we had TLC, Envogue, Boyz 2 men, Jodeci, A tribe called quest, and The roots.
We had groundbreaking movies like “Boomerang” with an entire African American cast, as well as the shows we both mentioned. And then, all of a sudden, it was all gone.
It’s interesting you should mention Shakira going platinum blonde just before she attempted to cross-over, as many people seem to be under the impression that “White washing,” or to be exact, the issue of White supremacy, only affects Blacks, which is completely untrue. Both Shakira and Jennifer Lopez went blonde to begin their music careers in the Western world. “Memoirs of a Geisha girl” had its lead actress struggling through the entire filming process because she was required to wear blue contact lenses. Asian cinema is hardly given any light over here, and when it is, it’s always involving stereotypes, like Martial arts, Geishas (romanticised child and adult female prostitues), and sometimes it even goes a step further and becomes a “White hope” story, like Tom Cruise in “The last Samurai.”
Skin bleaching among Bollywood actors and actresses is pervasive. It’s all across the board.
But going back to how we took 50 steps forward in the 90’s and 100 steps back by midway through the last decade, I don’t know how that happened???!!!
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Riverside_Rob
So, without seeking a reward for doing the right thing – how about you acknowledge the fact that without white support, black and POC would still live under Mr. Crow’s directives.
******
Rob, listen to what you’re saying. “Without white support, POC would still live under the white tyranny known as Jim Crow.”
The way you say, “Mr. Crow” it’s a way of distancing yourself and white people from the direct harm they caused then and are still causing now. There was just this system. It’s just the way things were. No one was really responsible. It was the times. It was Mr. Crow.
Many of the white people who were alive during segregation and Jim Crow are still alive today. It’s not like they’ve all died out. The much vaunted white Baby Boomer generation – the largest generation to date in America – IS the product and end result of generations of these racists. They are alive and well and their ideologies have changed only so much and definitely not enough.
You want to believe that Abagond overestimates how much racism has affected his life in particular or black people in general by comparing it to an era of deprivation, humiliation and terrorism that should never existed and then say, Yay! White people fixed it in the end.
The small amount of work white people have done this far is the very least they can do. They can and should do more. That black people expect this, galls white people to the nth degree. But we’ve carried the weight of white people on or backs for centuries. It’s long past time white people got their shit together and worked on ending racism and correcting their own dysfunctional communities.
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@Ebonymonroe
Interesting that you mentioned that as it is something that has plagued me as well. What Happened?! I just don’t get it.
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@Riverside_Rob
You’ll either have to prove that there was exceptionally greater quantity of nice white people at the civil right era or explain the several centuries long abysmal lack of apathy of white folks toward their black compatriots.
There is quite an american belief which held African american in contempt and assumed the rest of the World would follow suit. This is not quite true.
The truth is the Civil Right was never some domestic affairs but rather a foreign one. The sixties era offered a unique opportunity which was successfully exploited.
Once the civil right legitimacy were officially recognized by the american administration, foreign resistance and suspicion toward american administration jsut kind of vanished in a matter of days, the benefit of civil right era for the american economy were enormous and unprecedented.
So it’s not jsut a matter of white folks’s ‘once upon a blue moon kind of’ benevolence.
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I see how blacks today view history and it is a tragic consequence of the blending of English and german american into the category ‘white’ after world war 2, continuing from german aggression in the civil war, the vengeful southern sentiment after slavery is blended so successfully with Naziism. Blacks had a place and will have a place in their place, was a very different philosophy from the radical german-influenced hate groups.
The fact is the show strikes me as very german in philosophy and inspiration. The ‘race unity’ will hopefully come to a close with the world war 2 generations to where the real cultural differences between Anglo-Saxon and german ideology can be rediscovered.
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qwerty,
No. It shows ONE WHITE DUDE that started out not in crime at all and then he became a criminal and bad.”
No “Breaking Bad” showed ONE WHITE DUDE that chose to become a criminal from THE FIRST EPISODE on. .He faced a crisis and chose an illegal option rather than a legal one. He consciously chose “Bad” over “Good” from the very first moments of the show and as such didn’t become, or break, Bad. The metamorphosis angle is nonsense. It’s more Jekyll and Hyde than anything. .
You make and miss Abagond’s point. I mean after all where was there any evidence shown that White was ever “Good”? All the show did was present a archetype that they knew the audience would pick up on as a default “Good”.
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@ Ebonymonroe: Well said, I am still scratching my head wondering what happened as well. How did we end up here?
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@ThatDeborahgirl: Brava!
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@ Gen: You brought good points to the discourse as well.
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Family Guy basically summed it up here:
http://freedomandfiction.tumblr.com/post/19442682608/chris-i-thought-if-you-do-something-wrong-youre
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@ Yamada
Excellent summary. Thanks.
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@ qwerty
Ks has it right. The show plays on the stereotype of white, middle-class suburban men as being above crime. Walter White is “presumed” to be good because he has all the markers of respectability. A respectability that Gus Fring has to painstakingly maintain because of his race and ethnicity. Walter White does not need a chain of fried chicken restaurants, the Fun Run, super-erect posture, dialled anger and precise dialect. He can just be himself. Despite his PhD in chemistry and the purity of his meth, he is the last person anyone suspects. Why is that?
Another way to think about it is to ask yourself how well this show would have worked with a black cast.
Denzel Washington was able to pull off a seemingly-good-but-truly-evil black character in “Training Day”. But notice the differences:
1. He was able to pull it off because we are so used to seeing him play good guys.
2. We cheer for his destruction, his come-uppance, which the film provides.
“Breaking Bad” is the “Training Day” where Denzel Washington keeps his millions for his estranged son and goes out in a blaze of glory killing his enemies (while saving a now-corrupt-but-still-conflicted Ethan Hawke). Who in the world would want that kind of ending – AND WHY?
Even when Walter White dies, it is not his crimes catching up with him but his settling of scores before he dies of cancer. Oh wow.
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Abagond:
Not necessarily. Gus Fring also needed the chicken business and public respectability to justify an industrial-grade production and distribution infrastructure, as well as a scholarship/mentoring program that he used to develop and recruit talented chemists.
Abagond:
Nobody would have suspected Bill Cosby’s “Cliff Huxtable” either. Why not? They’re both portrayed as milquetoasty, hapless / harmless nerd-dads.
Abagond:
There’s a narrative that the main anti-hero characters generally got what they deserved according to their deeds. Walter White may have been “bad”, but the others were arguably “worse” and so received punishment as such.
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Randy,
“Nobody would have suspected Bill Cosby’s “Cliff Huxtable” either. Why not? They’re both portrayed as milquetoasty, hapless / harmless nerd-dads.”
Ha! You think so given the general suspicion black males are usually treated with? All milquetoasty, hapless/harmless nerd-dads are not created equal. When was the “Cosby Show” again? The mid 80s to the early 90s? He would’ve been very lucky to catch a cab going to Brooklyn back then and if it was today, Theo, and the outrageously named Cockroach!, would’ve been Stopped and Frisked a few times over. .
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Just finished watching the finale. I loved it. I definitely agree with Abagond, though.
I read this article on salon that talked about how this show fits the mighty whitey trope. I didn’t really think about it but I guess I can see it. I don’t really see manufacturing meth as the domain of POC but within the constraints of the show I guess it is.
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Interesting piece had to finish up the series b4 I could read it. I suppose I do see that Basically Good trope – but I don’t see Walter as a hero. Altho that may be my Black perspective I think **SPOILER ALERT** He had quite a fall from grace definitely by the 2nd half of the 5th season. All was lost, his greed was obviously overwhelming. His willingness to murder- once he killed Mike and considered killing Jesse- I for one lost all sympathy for him. And in the end he admits that he did it for himself, because he liked it- not for family. Then he dies. It reads to me more like a tragedy than a hero story.
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“Ks has it right. The show plays on the stereotype of white, middle-class suburban men as being above crime. Walter White is “presumed” to be good because he has all the markers of respectability. A respectability that Gus Fring has to painstakingly maintain because of his race and ethnicity. Walter White does not need a chain of fried chicken restaurants, the Fun Run, super-erect posture, dialled anger and precise dialect. He can just be himself. Despite his PhD in chemistry and the purity of his meth, he is the last person anyone suspects. Why is that?”
And if this happened in real life, would this not be the case?
Wouldn’t a white guy like him fly under the radar for longer?
Yes.
So, perhaps what you are decrying is actually a purposefully statement meant to hold a mirror up to reveal what you would like to express. However, it does it in less of a ham handed way than you’d like (i.e. it doesn’t beat you over the head with one particular message).
You’re going down the rabbit hole on this one and just reading tea leaves.
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“You make and miss Abagond’s point. I mean after all where was there any evidence shown that White was ever “Good”? All the show did was present a archetype that they knew the audience would pick up on as a default “Good”.”
This is what happens when someone tries to critique relatively complex art based upon their ideology.
How about this? The writers did this on purpose in order to reveal to the white viewers their own racism and assumptions, but did it on a meta-level and didn’t beat everyone over the head with it.
Fixed the show for you. You’re welcome.
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@qwerty
I can not render a verdict on the show or what Abagond has said in the post because I do not and have not watched it, but up to a certain point. However I will take what you said as food for thought.
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Now that I’ve watched up the series up to the end of Season 4, it seemed that W White started out like this down-trodden little man but for some reason, I became more and more bored and by his character, and more interested and sympathetic to Jesse Pinkman’s instead.
We see White for what he is.
Pinkman is not a better man than White: he has no innocence, he is no less selfish.
Both of them are murdering drug dealers.
But Jesse struggles with what he does, he suffers for what he loses/destroys..
He is filled not only with grief, but with self-loathing for it.
The paradox is that he started out as this no-hoper who becomes a competent and ‘successful’ man by being his depraved self, by committing ghastly crimes.
He has his guilt to show for it.
These are 2 different kinds of the same whiteness.
I think I found off W White so dull because he is strong and paternal, whereas Jesse Pinkman is not, and let’s himself be led.
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@ Riverside_Rob
“So, without seeking a reward for doing the right thing – how about you acknowledge the fact that without white support, black and POC would still live under Mr. Crow’s directives.”
Such an astounding illustration of compartmentalization on your part and so, so many other white people!
This what I usually term: the burning down of my house; providing me with a hovel, (due to the dastardly act(s) of the conflagration by the perpetrator), OR the gauging out of my eyes, providing me with a white cane and expects that I should show magnanimity (to the perpetrator) for the “gifts” he has bestowed.
It also applies to those who argue that black people should show gratitude to the estimated six hundred thousand white men who fought and died in the American Civil War.
What hubris!!
Dare I say, “Mr. Crow” and Slavery were such bad hurricanes!
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@qwerty,
“This is what happens when someone tries to critique relatively complex art based upon their ideology.
How about this? The writers did this on purpose in order to reveal to the white viewers their own racism and assumptions, but did it on a meta-level and didn’t beat everyone over the head with it.
Fixed the show for you. You’re welcome.”
How about this? Wrong. None of my criticism about BB was based on any ideology. This is what happen when someone can’t handle, or answer, valid criticism of their pet show and in order to continue to whine about others opinions has to hide behind, again, stale platitudes and, in the case above, snarky absurdities in order to try and mask that fact.
Btw, I do find it amusing that barely a month after the show was over, the overheated nonsense about it being “the greatest show in the tv history!!” has rapidly faded and seems to be just embarrassingly laughable hyperbole.
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Reblogged this on oogenhand and commented:
Breaking Bad is indeed controversial.
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