Witnessing Ruby Bridges

 Today my family watched Disney's Ruby Bridges, a 1998 episode of "Wonderful World of Disney" that tells the story of Ruby Bridges, a 6-year-old girl in New Orleans who, in 1960, was the sole black student in a school resisting desegregation.

Though the movie has all the characteristics of a Disney family-friendly live film--a comical musical score, pedantic and moralistic lines, and characters that border on stereotypical--it packs quite a wallop for a family with young children. (IMDB advises not showing it to children under 10; our family has an 8-year-old.) Although it avoids the curse-words that would earn it an "R" rating, it does employ "nigger" in an honest historical way, as well as other racial slurs. And given the happy-go-lucky vibe of most Disney films, the emotional strength with which segregationist sentiment appears struck me deeply.

What struck me even more powerfully was the way in which the film portrays the complexity of blacks' struggles in the fight for desegregation. Though a 90-minute Disney film can only get so nuanced, as an adult I saw clearly the themes of blacks' desire to avoid additional suffering, the cracking of relationships with mutually oppressed groups (like Jews), and the divides between working class blacks and those more financially secure. I was left with the clear image of a richly layered history and society represented by, but also standing behind, Ruby Bridges.

All of these features in one film made it an excellent choice for watching with my family. My children could ask questions about what the characters said and why; I could add commentary on what we saw in order to clarify or emphasize what I thought was important. And the focus on schoolchildren seemed to hold the interest of my kids better than an all-adult cast would do.

Kudos to Disney for producing such an honest, enlightening, and accessible depiction of the desegregation crisis of 1960. Kudos for encouraging Americans to watch it on this day, November 14th 2020, the 60th anniversary of Ruby Bridges' (and her mother's, and the black community's) bold grasp of the promise of desegregation. I hope that by watching it we may gain new resolve to change America into a better place, especially for children of color.

~ emrys

The Shoe on the Other Foot: Noughts + Crosses

I spend as little time as possible in front of a screen. And I have become adept at ignoring adverts that appear as I scroll through the few things I do look at. So it seems providential that I should have paid attention to an advert on my phone for an original tv series on Peacock entitled Noughts + Crosses.

This first-season series imagines a London which, for the last 700 years, has been colonized by an African empire. Sephy, a young woman from the privileged African class ("Crosses"), and Callum, a young man from the oppressed British Isles class ("Noughts"), begin a romantic relationship that is against the law because of their skin colors. Meanwhile city-wide racial tensions continue to rise around them.

At first the narrative trick seems too simple: Invite European and American viewers, so accustomed to seeing (or not seeing) racism in a certain way, to imagine a world in which that power relation is inverted. But the trick works. Simple inversion brings the facts of our world into haunting relief. All the trends of systemic racism, from interactions with police to sexual stereotypes to economic disparities, leap out at the viewer--especially this privileged white viewer--and take hold of the gut in a way that all the books on antiracism do not.

The inversion works because the script and direction present complex characters who could be any of us. Their stories, full of struggles normal and poignant, pull us along so that the offenses of racism stand out with stabbing cruelty. In the spacious homes of the privileged Crosses smiles are easy and comfortable, if often false. In the dilapidated flats of the Noughts faces are tense and conversations fraught, even if familial bonds are tighter. It all leaves this viewer feeling oppressed by a persistent segregation of prosperity, of attitude, of possibility. Of course, I will admit that this effect may be much more intense for me, who have been able to stand aloof from the tension of racism for most of my life. But I suspect that this effect is precisely the intended one.

Noughts + Crosses works so beautifully also because it does more than simply invert the skin colors of 21st-century Londoners. Centuries of domination by African cultures mean that the architecture, fashions, and political structures of the world have a distinctly African theme. London's skyline bows beneath an African woman holding aloft a globe--this world's answer to the pale Statue of Liberty in ours. Speech is sometimes punctuated by phrases from African dialects (think of the Mandarin phrases that popped up in the series Firefly.) The Nought culture includes Celtic symbolism, and as they struggle for political power one hears the echoes of the Irish under British rule. The result of these details is a rich, subtle, and utterly captivating setting for Sephy and Callum to find each other.

Because for all of its power at presenting the realities of racism and racial tensions, Noughts + Crosses is a love story. Here are Romeo and Juliet for the present day. Whether they will make it together moves the plot with irresistible gravity, and makes the dark shadows of their world all the more personal and threatening. When Sephy asks Callum, "What can we do? We're only two people," the threat of despair vibrates through the screen into our world. What can any of us do? We are just individuals.

Noughts + Crosses shows clearly that what Sephy and Callum see in each other must be greater than the hatred and violence of their world. They ache for an ending of happiness and freedom. They echo the hope that we, faced in 2020 with this new surge of resistance to racism, want to have for our own world. So I will keep watching, and maybe from it gain more courage and inspiration for solving the hatred and violence of our world. I want an ending here, too, in which we can all be happy and free.

~ emrys