Viva Forever

Watched Avatar a few days ago and enjoyed the film very much. One of the reasons I wanted to watch it, besides the hype from almost everyone I know who’ve seen it and who’ve gushed about it, is that lately I’ve seen many articles posted on the internet about Avatar that opine about the various -isms that the movie apparently did or did not handle well. For example, people have issues with the movie’s apparent racism, ableism, “liberal white guilt” and a bunch of other -isms.

I, for one, didn’t find any of the above criticisms particularly persuasive, especially the assertion that Avatar is white guilt fantasy. I think this article said it best in how it points out that the protagonist at the start of the movie is a lonely ex-marine who’ve lost the ability to walk and have no money to get his legs back. He is very far from the trope of the dashing white guy who brazenly saunters into a land occupied by indigenous people to teach them the ways of the white, ala John Smith.

But what got me was the comment on the article from a guy who asserts that the article and the movie is ableist (see previous link to article about ableism in Avatar). The comment postulates that people with disabilities shouldn’t be made to feel incomplete just because of their disabilities. The comment and the article implies that the movie is ableist in having the protagonist seem preoccupied and unhappy about being disabled and that he wants to be “fixed”.

I have a lot of issues with that sentiment because of how slippery-slope it is. I agree that there should be more media that portrays people with disabilities as being capable, independent people, and I’d be more than happy if there would be more movies made about people with disabilities who are absolutely comfortable with it. However, I have issue with it being a blanket statement that all people with disabilities should simply accept their disabilities and try to be happy with alternative means of living. Because that means silencing all those people who are unhappy with being disabled because they don’t want to be and telling them they should feel guilty about wanting to be different. Should the protagonist in Avatar be silenced for wanting to walk again, just so that he isn’t ableist?

I think a wider problem is our society’s preoccupation with the notion of “be yourself” and that incongruity what the ideal “yourself” (as molded by societal and media values) is. At face value, it seems like such a nice sentiment, to “be yourself”, in contrast to the evidently bad sentiment of “be what society say you should be”. However, both sentiments impose a command, an order. To compel someone who has a disability who wants to be different from that, so that they can “be themselves” does not seem any better than to compel someone who is comfortable with their disability to want to be “fixed”.

The conflict between the two societal “commands” manifest in more common ways and further hypocrisies become evident. It seems that the following are socially acceptable; dying hair, using coloured contacts, using makeup, dressing in particular ways (e.g. push-up bras), using perfumes and colognes etc. However, plastic surgery such as breast implants and face lifts are not socially acceptable. Outside the arguments that surgery is obviously more intrusive and dangerous, people are quick to jump to the accusations that the latter is “unnatural”, that it’s deceitful i.e. bad (some people in fact get very offended by plastic surgery, see some of the comments to this article). But isn’t cosmetic surgery just part of the self-enhancement spectrum that makeup and hair dying is on? They’re all about making yourself look a certain way, to be more appealing in a way that you want. Why is some of that okay but others not?

IMO, there is nothing wrong with putting on makeup, or getting plastic surgery or wanting to walk again if you’ve lost your legs, if that would truly make one happier, after having eliminated the possibility of peer pressure or any other incidental reason (psychological or otherwise) for such desire. One shouldn’t be guilted into not doing something out of fear of condemnation or shaming because their wants do not fit the “be yourself” mantra. Because “yourself” does not necessarily mean it’s statically who you are currently, but it also encompasses who you want to be. And if “being yourself” means wanting change, then why not?

In a hypothetical perfect world where getting cosmetic surgery have zero surgical risk, is 100% reliable, cheap, painless and quick, would you condemn someone who’ve got a boob job or a face lift? And if you do, do you feel the same way about them having dyed their hair, wears cleverly flattering clothing and makeup?

Watched Oliver! a few days ago and have been a bit obsessed with the soundtrack for a few days now. Oliver! was the first musical I’ve ever seen I think, back when I was in year 4 and we had to watch it to learn the song “Consider Yourself”. Even though looking back, it’s certainly not the best musical ever with only about half the songs being any good, it nonetheless kick started my enthusiasm and love for musicals in general (some exceptions of course, one of them being the movie, Rent).

Watching Oliver! again reminded me how terrifying a villian Bill Sikes is. You know how you can tell he’s a horrible person? He doesn’t sing. Everyone else in the movie sings, even the horrible governor in the beginning who sells Oliver to a creepy and white trashy undertaker people, whom at one point, throws Oliver into a coffin then sits on it to stop him coming out. There’s of course those extras who don’t get singing lines but at least they dance! Sikes doesn’t dance either.

Oh and there’s the other stuff he does. Spoilers ahead (are spoiler warnings necessary for a movie that’s 40 years old based on a novel that’s 169 years old?).

Did I mention Sikes is incredibly violent? In one of the songs that Nancy, his girlfriend, sings, she says

“Though you sometimes do come by
The occasional black eye
You can always cover one
‘Til he blacks the other one
But you don’t dare cry. “

I totally missed that verse when I was a kid, but it horrifies me now how nonchalant and joyous she was singing about serious domestic violence.

Oh and the other thing. He kills Nancy at the end of the movie by clubbing her to death. I don’t mean the dancing-at-a-bar kind of clubbing either. To be fair, we don’t see it directly, but when it’s happening we watch Oliver watching it, we hear the sounds of her screaming and him killing her and we see Oliver squirming and being traumatised. Did I mention this movie was rated G and is considered a family movie?

People complain nowadays of kids watching violence on TV and what not, and how that never used to happen but I don’t think such acts would ever get a “G” rating these days.

In other news, I’ve finished my last University class last week. As in… no more Uni classes ever. After my next two assessments (one that I’m supposed to be doing right now) University should be officially over!

I’m sick. AGAIN. Literally about three days after recovering from my previous cold, I’ve been invaded by more viruses (or something). While the previous one was a sore throat -> losing my voice -> non-stop coughing type, this new one seems to be scratchy throat + clogged/runny nose + sneezing + constant tiredness. Blargh. I feel pretty crummy about this new cold too, not only from the frustration of being sick and tired again, which does affect my study, but for the past few days I’ve been behaving and feeling really short-tempered and irritable at the people around me, which is just general crappy behaviour.

Other than that, I’ve been a relatively good student! I’ve been doing most of my readings, participating in class and what not. My Cyberspace Law research plan assignment thing is due soonish, and I’ve got to come up with a topic for what I want to write about. There are so many interesting internet issues out there! I’m thinking about writing about net neutrality, or maybe the proposed ISP-level filtering. Or maybe something entirely more fun, such as the interaction between internet law and MMORPGs and other online games. Or maybe online privacy and freedom of speech in relation to blogs. Must… decide soon. o_o

I watched Glitter yesterday due to feeling too ill to do my readings and wow… THAT’S A HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE MOVIE. It was just so… trite, contrived, bland and juvenile. It was about as meaningful as those really dramatic Korean music videos (for example) except that Glitter took over 100 minutes to express itself. The worse part though was hearing the awful “ballads” and pop songs in the movie, all of which were horrible dragged out and pedestrian. I am comfortable with admitting that I like Mariah Carey’s old music and her voice, but ugh, the songs in this movie were lyrically and melodically weak. It was a definitely poor choice on my part to be watching this movie in the hope that it would make me feel better.

Also, watched 10,000 BC the other day, that movie was also not very good. It was mostly nonsensical in terms of history, and the storyline was rather mundane for a Hollywood flick.

Watched Cloverfield tonight. Before I spoil my fresh impression of the movie by absorbing internet opinions, reviews and criticisms, let me just say first off that I really enjoyed the movie. I think the thing I liked most is that for a survival/horror/monster movie, it actually didn’t use stupid, pedestrian directing techniques to generate cheap scares. You know the type, where the booming background soundtrack would cease, the camera zooms close over near/over the protagonist’s shoulder, all you could hear is his/her heavy breathing in a dark environment, then moments later (length of such “suspenseful” moments proportional to how much of a douchebag the director is), BOOM, some creature launches it/his/herself at the protagonist, the background music floods in and the audience is startled. It’s amazing how much I hate that.

Cloverfield doesn’t have such bullshit because it doesn’t have background music as its completely filmed in first person. Speaking of first person perspective, I was a little iffy about the whole shaky handheld camera style, having seen the dizzying lameness that was The Blair Witch Project. However, Cloverfield isn’t much hindered by it, though sometimes, I guess for realism sakes, the camera does swing to an alarming degree.

I guess the only minor gripe I have about the movie is that I do want to know more about the… thing that caused so much havoc and the movie doesn’t really provide for it. Of course the point of the movie ISN’T about the thing but about the people who are trying to survive but still, a tad unfulfilling in that respect. Other than that, the movie was enjoyably suspenseful and scary throughout.

Yay Minchin. This clip is only 1 minute and 52 seconds long, so I highly recommend watching it. Pure lolage.

I haven’t been blogging much, been a bit out of it online-wise lately. I’ve joined a second awesome D&D campaign where I’m a halfling ranger. I’m also more than halfway through Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and I’m baffled by the amount of teen drama exploding throughout much of the middle of the book. The imagery of Ron spending chapter after chapter basically just sucking face with a girl non-stop is a little nauseating. Hopefully the plot would pick up soon. I loled when one of the “random” passwords into the Gryffindor room was “abstinence”. Real subtle, Rowling. Also, I’ve started a new crafting project, fingers crossed that it’ll turn out to be a success.