October 26, 2023 • 44 mins
In today’s episode, Yves has beef with jokes about Black people running away from danger in horror movies. But the best stories have dramatic reversals, and even the most stubborn minds can be changed. Katie and Yves get into the complexity of the well-intentioned jokes and speak with Dr. Robin R. Means Coleman, a horror expert who isn’t afraid to look in the mirror and say “Candyman” five times.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and fair Weather
Friends Media.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
I'm Katie and I'm Eves. Today on the podcast, we
go toward the Danger.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Okay, Katie, So I have a little pop quiz for you.
Are you ready for it?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (00:38):
So it's only one question, So it's a pretty short
pop quiz. If you were an archetypal character in a
horror movie, which one do you think that you would be?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Absolutely? No question. I'm the black person against killed first.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
And you know what, I was fully expecting you to
say that, because I feel like in conversations that we've
had about danger before, you have said that you would
die quickly. And I've tried to get you out of
saying that because I want.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
That to be ad. Yeah, I would be Not only
would I die first, I would like actively try to
die first.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Well, I love horror, and I don't think that I
would be the person who would die first, at least
not hopefully.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Yeah, I think you would survive. You think I would survive? Yeah,
that's you.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I'm glad you think that highly of me. Anyway, there
is this running joke that black folks would act way
differently than white people do in horror movies that a
black person would like never pull out a flashlight or
go into a pitch black cave looking for answers, like,
there is no way in the world we would go
(01:49):
looking for smoke with anyone who had just gone on
a killing spree or something similar.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
There's this perception that black folks aren't going to do
anything that puts us in more danger, Like why would
we choose to do that when we could choose to
survive or at least do what's ever in our power
to escape exactly.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
And it's such a known joke that black folks be
screaming at the screen saying that we would never do something.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
And I mean, the joke makes sense because generally people
be doing some wild stuff in horror movies, making the
wrong decision at literally every turn.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And you know we do that in real life too,
So obviously there's room for that, and that makes sense
to depict it that way. That's necessary also to build
tension and for entertainment value, so we can actually enjoy
things as we're watching them, even if they're horror. But
there is a lot more at play when you throw
race into the equation. There is not an overwhelming amount
(02:57):
of research on it, but there have been studies on
links between race and risk aversion or tolerance as it
relates to different fields like healthcare, for instance. So we
may tend to be more risk averse in certain situations.
But on the other hand, black people can be perceived
to be more reckless in their risk taking, and that
(03:19):
was the case in a twenty twenty one study out
of Northwestern University. In it, the authors found that the
mostly white participants imagined reckless risk takers as black by
appearance and by stereotypical traits, and they recognize responsible risk
takers as white.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
So while some of us Black folks.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
May swear that we are experts, experts and knowing how
to slide out of tricky situations, racism would have some
belief that we take all of the unnecessary risks.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, and it's interesting that these, you know, studies contradict
the way we're seen in some instances, but affirms the
way we're seeing to some people, because you know, black
people love to say what black people love to say.
Black people aren't a monolith. It's true though, It's so true.
(04:10):
So like, of course, there are going to be some
reckless folks, and there are going to be some very
you know, timid folks who aren't going to take any risk.
You know, we all have different lives. Our risk assessments
depend on what we've been through, you know, lived experience,
how we handle things, and the conditions of our environment.
There are a million and one reasons we may assume
(04:31):
that we don't want to confront danger. We face enough
terror in everyday live child, and we know that we
are more likely to be harm in certain circumstances. What
may happen to me doing something risky than a white woman,
same age, same everything else could be totally different And
(04:51):
guess who's gonna get blamed for it? My black ass.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
So when black people joke about leaving a dangerous situation
with no hesitation, it can be funny, and it can
be true, and it's a legitimate observation and deduction that
we would be more risk averse, especially in life or
death situations.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
But see, I felt a butt coming.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
But at the.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
Risk of being that sad, sad soul who takes a
joke far too seriously. I want to make the case
for why this joke about black people running away from
the danger always being too prepared and too ready to
leave a situation or not even enter it for why
(05:40):
that joke could be revised or maybe even could be
put to rest.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Okay, you know I'm ready to hear this case. I'll
be the judge, Judy, excuse me, the judge, Joe Brown,
the judge maybe Lean period. But there there are a
lot of reasons that the joke is a vouid thing
to say, though. You know, I know that this joke
has become a thing because of the actions that people
take and a lot of horror doesn't resonate with some
(06:09):
of us. Otherwise we wouldn't be saying the joke. But
you know, our fears can be different, and the way
we respond to them and write about that can be
different from a lot of those tropes we see written
by non black creators.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Yeah, black folks have a shared sense of what we
would and what we wouldn't do in these dire situations
that is based on personal experience and observation and standards
of safety, et cetera, et cetera. I know that we
know as entertainment as well, the drama is there on
(06:43):
purpose and the point is not always representing real life
as accurately as possible. So I had to sit there
and ask myself, why is this joke bothering me so bad?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Like, girl, the.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Joke is based on facts, and obviously it's made in
good fun. Why am I taking something that is so
understandable so personally? And I have a theory, but you'll
have to hear it after the break got me.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
So we want to know, why should this joke about
black people always avoiding danger in horror movies go the
way of extra taties.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
I'm going to start with the low hanging fruit.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
So I know that this is personal, but it just
didn't feel like it applied to me. I know it's
a joke, and I know it's a generalization. So I
had this kind of strong reaction to it, like I
want to believe that I'm going to protect my home
and my people and that I'm not going to give
up that easily, and the fact that it's just a
(07:58):
default joke was really getting me in my feels a
lot more about it.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Okay, So here's my thing though. So you're in the
apocalypse right the world and then there's no modern comforts,
like y'all really just out here and you fight, you fight,
and defend your home, defend your people. Okay, say you win.
Now what, I don't want to live in this world.
(08:25):
I don't like this, you know what I'm saying. Yeah,
that would be like, what are these people fighting so
hard for? Like life as you know it is done?
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Yeah, But I guess the thing is there are some
people who still care to live even within that new paradigm.
Versus there are people who are just like I don't
even want to experience it.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I'm cool with what I know.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
So I guess that also depends on your tolerance for
a change and a change that is unpredictable to you.
It's a spectrum of experiences and thoughts on that for
different people.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah, I'm on the low end of that spect.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
So point number two. In so many of the works
that we create, we involve ourselves in business that we
shouldn't be involved in. We do things like we follow
the noise, we open the door, we investigate things, we
try to see what's going on. We might be a
little bit nervous, a little bit fearful, but we might
(09:25):
still do the thing we do all of the things
that put us in the path of danger. So take
for example, Jordan Peels Us, in which the father warns
the Doppelganger family that they don't want any smoke with them.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
So if y'all want to get crazy, we can get crazy.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
Of course, getting into trouble is a function of storytelling.
People have to be involved in things, they have to
take action, get wrapped up in some sort of problem.
But saying that black people wouldn't look into a creepy
sound to see what's up, or run right into the
stalker because they took a wrong turn, that's just not
fair to the black creators who make works with us
(10:07):
falling for these kinds of traps and doing the things
that just simply make us human.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
That's very true. And you know, I think we all
like to think that we're like smarter than the people
that we see making these choices. You know what the
thing is, the characters in horror movies do not know
they are in horror movies. And there's this really good
zz Packer quote that was in her collection of short
stories called Drinking Coffee Elsewhere. She says, when she'd watched
(10:36):
horror movies, it seemed easy enough to know when the
victims should leave, run hide. They're always shrieking violins and
threatening sawing cellos to alert you to danger, but here
there were none. And I really think about that because
I've definitely been in situations that if there was an
audience watching me, they'd be screaming at me to not
(10:57):
do the thing that I inevitably do because I just
don't know any better. I don't have perfect information. I'm
not watching from the comforts of my living room as
I make these bad decisions or make the wrong turn,
and so without that perfect information, people and characters in
movies behave imperfectly. And it's easy to say that if
(11:18):
it were you in that situation, you would do different,
but come on, be for real, Like if you look
at your life as a movie, there's definitely some horror
horror movie decisions you.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
Made, plenty of them, plenty of horror movie decisions. And
there's also this sorry history of portrayals in white created
media of black folks being these scared, meek or subservient negroes.
And I don't think it does us any favors to
pile onto the idea that we aren't capable of facing
(11:50):
our fears.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
And this point leads.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Me to number three, which is that we have a solid,
non fictional history of choosing the path of most resistance
when necessary. I think this one is the reason why
my knee jerk reaction to the joke is so dramatic.
It just makes me feel like we believe we are cowardly.
(12:13):
Of course, our fears aren't all the same, so I
don't like the idea of confining black folks to a
single experience of fear response and risk tolerance. It makes
it seem like we always end up choosing safety and
comfort over courage and defense of a just cause, and
the optics of that just makes me feel really icky.
(12:36):
The history of black folks on this earth is exactly
the opposite of that, So we stay putting ourselves at
risk to fight for and to protect our own in others. So,
without even getting into value judgments on that, I am
uncomfortable with perpetuating this idea that we are always too
(12:57):
spooked to face a thing that scares ay.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
When you think about it, sometimes the horror movies we see,
it's kind of like this one group of friends are
in a cabin in the woods and there's this one
killer on the loose, right, But I mean having dogs
sticked on you as you walk asking for your right
to vote. That's horror, that's you know, that's like some
(13:24):
scary shit. And people did it, you know, day in
and day out, knowing that that danger was not even
just possible, but probable, you know what I'm saying. It
wasn't like, oh, they were shocked that these dogs came out,
maybe the first time, but you know, after a while,
you're like, you know, the dogs are coming out, you
know the fire holes are coming out. You know you're
(13:45):
gonna get beat with the baton, and yet those people
still face that danger. So you know what, now I'm
thinking that this trope is around so black people don't
rise up in revolution. Think about it, like Harriet Tubman,
you got the dogs on your tail. You know that
(14:05):
if you get caught, you are going to get beaten,
probably die. You're using the stars in the moon to
find your way, and you aren't just doing it for yourself,
but you're doing it for all these other you know,
enslaved people who are running to Like that's a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
There is so much about the real world where we
do the thing that is the hardest thing to do.
We do the thing that's the scariest thing. To do,
and you know, these situations in which we're having dogs
sticked on us, in which we're in darkness and having
to try to find our ways to places we know,
(14:48):
we are running from situations that meant death and torture
for us and running into situations that are unknown, which
is another fear in itself, is like, you know, just
because we were leaving one place that was full of
danger and we were going toward another, doesn't mean that
it was going to be a one hundred percent safe
(15:09):
place for us, and it likely wasn't going to be
because we live in a world where so many different
places are dangerous to black people, and it is just
so much more realistic to think about how we do
so frequently choose these paths that involve danger out of necessity,
(15:32):
out of courage and out of a willingness to survive,
and out of optimism and hope, because I do think
that it takes a certain amount of optimism and hope
to be able to think that you're going to overcome
a situation that you know is already dangerous and that
you will be a person who's integral into changing that
(15:55):
situation into one that has a positive outcome.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
All right, let's go to this ad break, but don't
go too far. We will be waiting for you on
the other side. Okay, we're back, and we didn't scare
(16:19):
them enough to keep them away, so clearly that people
want to hear the rest of this list what you
got next?
Speaker 1 (16:24):
So number four, this one is kind of a counterpoint
to the last point. That assumption that we avoid fear
like the plague can imply that we're cowardly, but on
the opposite end of the spectrum, it can also play
into the idea that we are above making mistakes. But
are we smarter than getting ourselves caught up? Do we
(16:48):
know better than to go risking our lives when we
can just walk away and we know damn well that
our parents raised us better than that. Saying that we
would never make an unwise or a logical decision that
puts us in danger, it really takes away from our
ability to be fallible. We are not superhuman. We don't
(17:09):
always make the correct choices. We mess up a lot.
We are flawed, and I want stories about us to
really reflect that. I don't want to pretend that we're perfect.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
There's this Maya Angelou quote about like pretending that we're
perfect and we never mess up. So in a nineteen
ninety five article, she talked about her past, and in
this interview, she said, I wrote about my experiences because
I thought too many people tell young folks I never
did anything wrong. Who why never? I I have no
(17:42):
skeletons in my closet. In fact, I have no closet.
They lie like that, and then young people find themselves
in situations and they think, damn, I must be a
pretty bad guy. You know, my mom and dad never
did anything wrong, so I'm pretty bad and they can't
forgive themselves. And I felt that like, if everyone's hiding
everything that they've ever done that they're not the proudest of,
(18:04):
then there's nothing to learn from from younger generations coming
up behind you, whether it's your direct lineage or justlike
people who who know your story right, they're like getting
half of the story. So I think, like with tying
that back to horror movies, like, yeah, these people are
making like to us, obviously wrong decisions, but maybe they're
(18:27):
kind of like, hey, this is what I did and
this is what happened from it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, I think we have a lot to learn from
seeing black people do things wrong in horror movies for
the reasons that you just said. It's actually very edifying
to see people mess up, and to see people like
us mess up in ways, especially in where we control
those narratives. It's hard to make good decisions because how
can you even determine what is a good decision or
(18:54):
not before crystal ball?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
And that's it.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
You gotta be magic.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
So we reach your fifth and final point, bring it
all home.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
This one. I just want it to be pretty simple,
and that's that fear does not save us. That sounds
so serious, but it feels like the idea that our
fear will keep us out of danger is the message
that's kind of hovering in the background of this joke.
But the reality is running away from a threat or
(19:26):
avoiding a single threat does not guarantee our safety or
our survival. So avoiding confrontation can absolutely be healthy, but
choosing not to engage is not always the only good option.
So look, what I Am always going to do is
hold us to a high standard. I'm a firm believer
(19:49):
in the power of words, so I just want us
to think about the things that we say. There is
nothing more to that, Nothing less. I know it's not
that deep. I know there is a big culture of
making things deeper than they need to be, although I
(20:10):
don't always think that's necessarily a bad thing. I think
it's kind of beautiful that we are so analytical, that
we have so much access to information, and that we're
able to share our thoughts and think critically around things
in ways that can be super impactful and super meaningful.
So I acknowledge that it's not that deep. My point
(20:34):
is that it's all in the spirit of love. I
just want to make room for curiosity and care. That's it,
that's real. And this is where doctor Robin R. Means
Coleman comes in.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So my name is Robin, middle initial R, last name
is means Coleman.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Unlike me, she's a certified expert on the topic of
black people and horror.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
I am a professor at Northwestern University. One of my
claim to fames is that I'm the co author of
The Black Eyed Dies First and also the author of
Horror Noir, which was also turned into a documentary. And
perhaps the other thing that people know about me is
(21:20):
that I am not afraid to say Candyman five times in.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
A mirror well, you are better than me because I
have held onto that I don't do the candyman thing.
I don't do the bloody Mary thing. None of that
is within my wheelhouse. And I consider myself a person
who's pretty tolerant to horror, and I draw my limits somewhere.
So I guess all of that means that you're also
(21:45):
a horror fan yourself, right.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
I am to write the books that I've written or
co authored with my fabulous co author Mark Harris, required
us to watch not just hundreds, but thousands of horror films,
and that's been a terrific crazy ride.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
See a consummate professional, a woman dedicated to the enjoyment
and study of the craft. Okay, anyway, Katie, The thing is,
I wanted to talk to doctor Means Coleman because all
of this has been about me trying to figure out
why I had the emotional response I did. Even after
digging pretty deep into why the joke rubbed me the
(22:26):
wrong way, all of these conflicting thoughts were having one
big ass boss battle in my brain. I still couldn't
reconcile all of the capital t truths buried in the jest.
Like sure, I feel this way about it. But it's
a well known joke for a reason.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
I think doctor Means Coleman is the perfect person to
have this conversation with. So I'm excited to see what
she has to say, and I hope y'all can get
down to the capital t truths of the matter.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Okay, back to our conversation. So it really stood out
to me when I read the first edition of your book,
Hohor and war So in the beginning, there's this forward
by Steven Toreano Barry, and he talks about in that forward,
how there's this joke that goes around that has been
around for quite a while now that if somebody tells
black people to leave.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
We're going to leave.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
In a horror movie, somebody says get out, We're going
to get out.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
We won't be in the movie.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
You won't see us. The movie wouldn't even exist if
it were based around us, you know, investigating the problem,
and he says in that forward he uses the phrase
that that joke was quote an off handed justification to
help explain that absence of black people in horror in
the time before the nineteen seventies. It is such a
(23:42):
well known sentiment it's so prevalent that it that it
starts this whole journey through your book. So that says
something alone. So before we even begin getting into that context,
could you tell me about the first time that you
remember hearing that joke.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
I love this question, and I would say that it's
a trope in popular culture, and where I think we
have a shared experience is that it isn't just that
we were introduced to that in popular culture, but sort
of real life black lived experience. They're that joke, that
(24:21):
trope that we now it's sort of gallows humor or
represent and I guess we'll talk about the ways it's
represented in movies, but that often what we see in
media comes out of real life experience, and that is
a necessary mode of survival for black people. You'll see
(24:43):
people sort of joke about it on the comedy stage,
but that's real. So on the comedy stage, outside of
the genre of horror, you'll see comedians say that, you know,
black people will be gathered somewhere in an auditorium or
at a party and somebody will are running, and that
black people are like, wait, wait are we running? Are running?
(25:04):
Everybody's running, everybody's got everybody runs right, no question. So
that comes out of a real moment of a necessity
around survival. Running to drama or trauma is never going
to be good for black people. So a real life
example is where you have a black person. There was
(25:27):
a shooting in a mall, uh, just a couple of
years ago, where a black male assumed a really heroic
position and sort of thwarted this mass shooting, and in
return for that, when police came in, they shot and
killed him right thinking he was the perpetrator. So there's
(25:49):
a necessity two for preservation, for real survival, to stay
away from these kinds of moments, right, these crisis moments,
because we are often not looked at as hero or victim,
but as perpetrator, as.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Monstrous whenever we do go towards any situation, even if
that situation doesn't outwardly seem harmful in the first place,
and we still end up being the people who violence
is enacted against in the end. And yet and still
there is this inner conflict in me. I felt this
reaction to it, and where I was like, there are
(26:33):
so many moments in which we are the ones who
stand up, in which we do run to danger so
I was relating it to some of the things that
you talk about in your books about being this sacrificial
negro or being this fool, this cowardly fool who always
runs away from the danger. And so I think there's
this other end of the spectrum of that joke where
(26:56):
it has this implication that we are too fearful or
too cowardly.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
So I think context matters. What I do in talking
about the horror genre is I make a clear distinction,
and it may be a little bit too on the nose, clear,
but a clear distinction between black horror and Blacks in horror.
And so I don't want to conflate the two in
this reaction. In Blacks in Horror, that's where you see
(27:25):
the sort of scared, shivering negro, right, the scared negro
trope that comes up that does the feats don't fail me. Now,
that's the kind of thing that bothers you. I think
that doesn't serve black people. That never cast us as smart,
as heroic, as problem solving that occurs in Blacks in Horror.
(27:46):
The other thing that you may see in Blacks in
Horror are these kinds of this white boogeyman in the basement,
and a black person isn't going to go down there
and investigate the white boogeyman in the basement. An important
sort of way that I'm talking about that there's the
specter of whiteness that we are contending with in that joke, right,
(28:11):
And so if there's whiteness also or non blackness in
a range of ways showing up, right, And you don't
have to be white to be invested in white supremacy.
So if there's sort of white supremacy showing up, that's
a danger. It isn't just going as you know, sort
of descending down the basement steps. The danger is that
(28:33):
blackness may be treated as monstrous, as other as dangerous,
and that can lead to the end of our lives.
Black horror, to correct it, black horror. That's not the
same sort of response or reaction. It's in black horror
you see people be heroic. It's in black horror that
(28:55):
you see the discernment, the reasoning. The For example, Nia
Dacosta's Candy Man twenty twenty one, this sort of the
ending the spoiler alert where Brianna, she looks in the mirror,
she summons candy Man, and up until that point, that
person who looks in the mirror and summons Candy man,
(29:17):
they're going to be the victim. But she's bravely entering
into that space to do some real uncivil, critical problem solving.
I like using Brianna. That character is a contrast because
this is also the character who, when she's trying to
figure out what's going on, has a moment where she's
(29:38):
literally looking down into a basement down a darkened stairway
and she says nope, and she you know, it's a
funny scene. She closes the door and walks away. That's
because she does not yet know what the monster is, right,
she doesn't know what's going on, and until she does
(30:01):
writes some amazing critical thinking on her part. Until she
does this investigation, understands the context, then she proceeds. There's
a real difference between the way black people are treated
and blacks in horror, right, which is this sort of
these odd objects or they cannot show up as heroic
(30:21):
because in black's in horror, it's the white character, often
the white male character, who is cast as hero. So
there's no way you can write a black character charging
in and saving the day, because it's the white character. Again,
often the white male character who is the hero black
(30:42):
horror does something very different when we think about what
heroism and problem solving looks like. I do think an
example of where you see, you know, sort of an
infamous example, right, this sacrificial Negro trope where you see
these characters who who are like, I'm going to run
into danger and by any means necessary, I'm going to
(31:04):
help out and save the day. Is you know, sort
of the infamous scene where Scotman Cruthers, the famed actor
Scotman Cruthers in the Shining. You know, he is on vacation,
like in Florida. He gets an sos psychically from you know, Danny,
(31:25):
this white kid, and he leaves his beachside vacation. He
puts on a coat, he books a ticket across country.
He does connecting flights. He does this in a snowstorm.
He goes as far as he can in his car,
and then he abandons the car, and then he rents
(31:46):
a snow cat. Like who's paying for all of this?
Then the brother gets in a snow cat and he
drives up the mountain and then he abandons the snow
cat and he gets out and he's trudging through and
the feats of snow chloral feats to walk through the
door to save this white family. And as soon as
(32:10):
he walks in the door, he gets an axe to
the chest. Now Black audiences are sitting in the theater
looking like, I'm skeptical here because in some ways you're saying,
homeboy couldn't see that axe coming. What is he thinking
running across country to do this. That's the sacrificial negro.
(32:31):
That's not his business. He has a family, right, This
is we're supposed to believe that he centered. This family
is his priority at the expense of an invisible black family, relatives, children, grandchildren,
right right. That's what running into that kind of danger
(32:52):
really means. When I say it's about black survival, it
means that we no longer have him. His family, who
doesn't even make this scre green, no longer has him
of you know, a girlfriend, a partner, friends, All of
that is denied by him running through the door.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
It also devalues and portrays black people, in this specific case,
a black man as a person who devalues his connections
to his own family.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
So the only correction there is that we think about
that in his relationship to blackness, because we're bringing that
meana making of a black lens. But remember that's a
blacks in horror film, which means that the writers they
weren't thinking, where is this brother's you know, sisters and
aunties and you know the siblings and all of that.
(33:44):
Where are his people? So they're not thinking that he's
absented himself. Right, this character didn't do it, But the
way to make him seem or appear heroic is to
be so sacrificing, so selfless in support of whiteness that
he would give up all of blackness to do it.
(34:07):
That's not that character that comes out of the imagination
of those who operate outside of a whole in full blackness.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
How can we portray these black characters as hero is
going forward and keeping them in these nuanced portrayals?
Speaker 3 (34:26):
So there are two things I think. The first is
the example I gave of like Brianna and Niadcosta's candy Man,
which is a contrast to Bernard Rose's candy Man of
nineteen ninety two, where in that candy Man, the black
folks were really disempowered and they were like, oh my gosh,
there's a monster here. And then the entire kind of
housing project. Cabrini Green turned to Helen, the white savior,
(34:51):
to come and solve the problem. Right, that's the difference
between blackhr where Brianna saves the day verse Black's in horror,
where there's Helen, who's the white protagonist who sort of
saves the day. What I think is a solution first
is that we need much more black horror, and that
(35:13):
is having that part of the genre, which I call
horror noir, more robustly represented. But it also requires a
much more diverse writer's room and people who are there
creating and imagining stories and talking about the ways that
black people show up, how black people show up in
(35:34):
black horror. You see all kinds of heroism. But I
also don't want to discount what that sort of we're
smart enough not to go their means. That doesn't mean
that we're the scared negro in a horror movie, whether
it's Black horror or Black's in horror. There is something
(35:55):
that is very smart and discerning about This isn't running
into a fire and saving baby kittens. This is in horror.
This is about charging in staring a monster in the eye,
to be slaughtered because horror is about the monster. That's
what horror films are about. And there's something that doctor
(36:18):
Barry is getting at when he says, we're like, Nope,
we're not doing that, which also means we're not gonna
be sacrificial Negro number two in a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (36:30):
Today, you unlocked something for me, because I feel like
that became something that is very empowering. There is an
inherent pause in what you said. Instead of it being
something like us continually running to this joke because we
don't believe in ourselves to be able to face a thing,
It's more like we understand the power in our pause
(36:52):
and our ability to in a single moment, have this
risk assessment and have this moment where we can say,
I know the fears and dangers that I face that
are very real, and they're my choice is what path
do I take? So it's also a moment of I
guess a lot of self awareness and ability to assess
(37:12):
a moment and choose what to do in the next
rather than running quickly into something that could be life ending.
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Survival for black people is the greatest gift, it's the
greatest contribution. That's what we want is the survival of blackness.
So yes, the pause is a powerful one.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
So do you think that we should continue telling this joke?
Speaker 3 (37:39):
So I'm reminded of a quote, and it's paraphrasing because
I don't think I have it perfectly right, But George
Bernard Shaw says, when a thing is funny, search for
a hidden truth. And this sort of humorous approach is
pointing to a truth. And I think that that is
(38:02):
one of many invaluable tools to remind us, both in
the real and in the imagined, what black people still
navigating in the US. I think people should love the
humor behind it. I think that there's something that's interesting
and reflexive about it, and it doesn't diminish black folks
(38:24):
or their sort of stature in society, or their discernment
or their heroism, but that it is really not so
much a reflection on blackness, but it is a reflection
on the dangers of whiteness and horror. And so shifting
that understanding to saying, Okay, what are we stepping back from?
(38:47):
Oh that danger right there, which we know we have
experienced centuries of danger right there. That's the importance of
what he's writing about.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
Could you talk about any other examples of black people
not high tailing it out of there in a recent
movie that you've seen that you love.
Speaker 3 (39:07):
Oh, there's a whole there's a whole genre of those movies,
and those are the black horror movies.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
You know.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
I have favorites. Jay Dillard's Sweetheart is you know where
you have a black woman who is the heroic person
who stares down the monster. Spoiler alert, right, I like
attack the block. John Boyega's character also one who is
(39:34):
you know, discerning. Sometimes he's not going headlong into the
monster and other times he's doing battle, right, But that's
what we expect of complex situations, and he ultimately stares
down the monster figures out a way another spoiler work
to do some annihilation of some bad stuff. So that
that is what black horror does, is that it treats
(39:59):
black intervention in a very different way, and we don't
always have to win, but it is a very different
treatment of the ways in which we show up.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
Katie, I have to tell you, after speaking with Doctor
Means Coleman, I changed my mind. I went into this
already like wanting to retire this joke.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
But I'm cool with it all.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Now, I hold all of these truths together, and it's complicated,
as our most things, but I'm at peace with that.
Be free y'all to resort to this joke a million
more times, because you know we will. And actually, thanks
to doctor Means Coleman, I feel free to not even
think of it as this stale joke that I've heard
(40:46):
so many times before. But instead I get to think
of it as this kind of wise adage born of
our breath of experience, concern for our own and others
well being, and our beautiful propensity for survival and extreme circumstances.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Oh my gosh, the gross I did not think I
would see the day. And I'm glad that you got
to talk to doctor Means Coleman because she really broke
it down. Oh and y'all don't forget to support doctor
Means Coleman.
Speaker 3 (41:15):
You can follow me on Twitter at Means Coleman. Grab
a copy of The Black Eyed Dice, first co authored
with Mark Harris, and if you want a still deeper,
scholarly dive, grab a copy of Horror and a War,
the second edition. Both books came out this year twenty
(41:37):
twenty three.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Eaves It's My favorite part of the show roll credits,
where we give credit to a person, place, thing, idea
that we've encountered during the week that you know, we
just want to give them some props, give them a
little shout out. So this week, I would like to
(42:03):
give credit to the Shrine of the Black Madonna in Atlanta, Georgia,
the West End. It's known for being one of the
first churches that showed Mary Jesus' mom is a black woman.
They've been so helpful for me while I'm writing my
book about black bookstores. They're the nicest people and it's
(42:25):
just really nice to have, you know, older black folks
like looking out for you, helping you on your path
whatever you're doing, and being like excited for you. So
shout out to all the folks at the Shrine of
the Black Madonna. They also have a bookstore connected to
the church, So if you're ever in Atlanta, hit them up.
Who do you want to give credit to? Who are what?
Speaker 3 (42:47):
So?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I would like to give credit to black people who
write horror, black people who make horror films, black people
who are invested in horror content and thinking about horror content.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
We'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (43:01):
And In the meantime, we are going to watch some
horror and try our best not to yell at the
screen the whole time.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
Now you know that's impossible, you Right.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
This episode was written by Eves, Jeffco and Katie Mitchell.
It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us
on Instagram at on Theme Show. You can also send
us an email at hello at on Theme dot show.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(43:42):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Do you think you would recognized someone that looks just
like you know, I thought that's what you guys stopped cowering.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Well, some people just freeze, you know.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, I would probably the same thing. I would probably
just die.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Oh my god, No, you wouldn't
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Have I said this before.
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and fair Weather
Friends Media.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
I'm Katie and I'm Eves. Today on the podcast, we
go toward the Danger.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
Okay, Katie, So I have a little pop quiz for you.
Are you ready for it?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (00:38):
So it's only one question, So it's a pretty short
pop quiz. If you were an archetypal character in a
horror movie, which one do you think that you would be?
Speaker 2 (00:48):
Absolutely? No question. I'm the black person against killed first.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
And you know what, I was fully expecting you to
say that, because I feel like in conversations that we've
had about danger before, you have said that you would
die quickly. And I've tried to get you out of
saying that because I want.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
That to be ad. Yeah, I would be Not only
would I die first, I would like actively try to
die first.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
Well, I love horror, and I don't think that I
would be the person who would die first, at least
not hopefully.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
Yeah, I think you would survive. You think I would survive? Yeah,
that's you.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
I'm glad you think that highly of me. Anyway, there
is this running joke that black folks would act way
differently than white people do in horror movies that a
black person would like never pull out a flashlight or
go into a pitch black cave looking for answers, like,
there is no way in the world we would go
(01:49):
looking for smoke with anyone who had just gone on
a killing spree or something similar.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
There's this perception that black folks aren't going to do
anything that puts us in more danger, Like why would
we choose to do that when we could choose to
survive or at least do what's ever in our power
to escape exactly.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
And it's such a known joke that black folks be
screaming at the screen saying that we would never do something.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
And I mean, the joke makes sense because generally people
be doing some wild stuff in horror movies, making the
wrong decision at literally every turn.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
And you know we do that in real life too,
So obviously there's room for that, and that makes sense
to depict it that way. That's necessary also to build
tension and for entertainment value, so we can actually enjoy
things as we're watching them, even if they're horror. But
there is a lot more at play when you throw
race into the equation. There is not an overwhelming amount
(02:57):
of research on it, but there have been studies on
links between race and risk aversion or tolerance as it
relates to different fields like healthcare, for instance. So we
may tend to be more risk averse in certain situations.
But on the other hand, black people can be perceived
to be more reckless in their risk taking, and that
(03:19):
was the case in a twenty twenty one study out
of Northwestern University. In it, the authors found that the
mostly white participants imagined reckless risk takers as black by
appearance and by stereotypical traits, and they recognize responsible risk
takers as white.
Speaker 3 (03:37):
So while some of us Black folks.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
May swear that we are experts, experts and knowing how
to slide out of tricky situations, racism would have some
belief that we take all of the unnecessary risks.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
Yeah, and it's interesting that these, you know, studies contradict
the way we're seen in some instances, but affirms the
way we're seeing to some people, because you know, black
people love to say what black people love to say.
Black people aren't a monolith. It's true though, It's so true.
(04:10):
So like, of course, there are going to be some
reckless folks, and there are going to be some very
you know, timid folks who aren't going to take any risk.
You know, we all have different lives. Our risk assessments
depend on what we've been through, you know, lived experience,
how we handle things, and the conditions of our environment.
There are a million and one reasons we may assume
(04:31):
that we don't want to confront danger. We face enough
terror in everyday live child, and we know that we
are more likely to be harm in certain circumstances. What
may happen to me doing something risky than a white woman,
same age, same everything else could be totally different And
(04:51):
guess who's gonna get blamed for it? My black ass.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
So when black people joke about leaving a dangerous situation
with no hesitation, it can be funny, and it can
be true, and it's a legitimate observation and deduction that
we would be more risk averse, especially in life or
death situations.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
But see, I felt a butt coming.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
But at the.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
Risk of being that sad, sad soul who takes a
joke far too seriously. I want to make the case
for why this joke about black people running away from
the danger always being too prepared and too ready to
leave a situation or not even enter it for why
(05:40):
that joke could be revised or maybe even could be
put to rest.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Okay, you know I'm ready to hear this case. I'll
be the judge, Judy, excuse me, the judge, Joe Brown,
the judge maybe Lean period. But there there are a
lot of reasons that the joke is a vouid thing
to say, though. You know, I know that this joke
has become a thing because of the actions that people
take and a lot of horror doesn't resonate with some
(06:09):
of us. Otherwise we wouldn't be saying the joke. But
you know, our fears can be different, and the way
we respond to them and write about that can be
different from a lot of those tropes we see written
by non black creators.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Yeah, black folks have a shared sense of what we
would and what we wouldn't do in these dire situations
that is based on personal experience and observation and standards
of safety, et cetera, et cetera. I know that we
know as entertainment as well, the drama is there on
(06:43):
purpose and the point is not always representing real life
as accurately as possible. So I had to sit there
and ask myself, why is this joke bothering me so bad?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Like, girl, the.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
Joke is based on facts, and obviously it's made in
good fun. Why am I taking something that is so
understandable so personally? And I have a theory, but you'll
have to hear it after the break got me.
Speaker 2 (07:22):
So we want to know, why should this joke about
black people always avoiding danger in horror movies go the
way of extra taties.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
I'm going to start with the low hanging fruit.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (07:35):
So I know that this is personal, but it just
didn't feel like it applied to me. I know it's
a joke, and I know it's a generalization. So I
had this kind of strong reaction to it, like I
want to believe that I'm going to protect my home
and my people and that I'm not going to give
up that easily, and the fact that it's just a
(07:58):
default joke was really getting me in my feels a
lot more about it.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Okay, So here's my thing though. So you're in the
apocalypse right the world and then there's no modern comforts,
like y'all really just out here and you fight, you fight,
and defend your home, defend your people. Okay, say you win.
Now what, I don't want to live in this world.
(08:25):
I don't like this, you know what I'm saying. Yeah,
that would be like, what are these people fighting so
hard for? Like life as you know it is done?
Speaker 1 (08:35):
Yeah, But I guess the thing is there are some
people who still care to live even within that new paradigm.
Versus there are people who are just like I don't
even want to experience it.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
I'm cool with what I know.
Speaker 1 (08:47):
So I guess that also depends on your tolerance for
a change and a change that is unpredictable to you.
It's a spectrum of experiences and thoughts on that for
different people.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah, I'm on the low end of that spect.
Speaker 1 (09:04):
So point number two. In so many of the works
that we create, we involve ourselves in business that we
shouldn't be involved in. We do things like we follow
the noise, we open the door, we investigate things, we
try to see what's going on. We might be a
little bit nervous, a little bit fearful, but we might
(09:25):
still do the thing we do all of the things
that put us in the path of danger. So take
for example, Jordan Peels Us, in which the father warns
the Doppelganger family that they don't want any smoke with them.
Speaker 3 (09:40):
So if y'all want to get crazy, we can get crazy.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
Of course, getting into trouble is a function of storytelling.
People have to be involved in things, they have to
take action, get wrapped up in some sort of problem.
But saying that black people wouldn't look into a creepy
sound to see what's up, or run right into the
stalker because they took a wrong turn, that's just not
fair to the black creators who make works with us
(10:07):
falling for these kinds of traps and doing the things
that just simply make us human.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
That's very true. And you know, I think we all
like to think that we're like smarter than the people
that we see making these choices. You know what the
thing is, the characters in horror movies do not know
they are in horror movies. And there's this really good
zz Packer quote that was in her collection of short
stories called Drinking Coffee Elsewhere. She says, when she'd watched
(10:36):
horror movies, it seemed easy enough to know when the
victims should leave, run hide. They're always shrieking violins and
threatening sawing cellos to alert you to danger, but here
there were none. And I really think about that because
I've definitely been in situations that if there was an
audience watching me, they'd be screaming at me to not
(10:57):
do the thing that I inevitably do because I just
don't know any better. I don't have perfect information. I'm
not watching from the comforts of my living room as
I make these bad decisions or make the wrong turn,
and so without that perfect information, people and characters in
movies behave imperfectly. And it's easy to say that if
(11:18):
it were you in that situation, you would do different,
but come on, be for real, Like if you look
at your life as a movie, there's definitely some horror
horror movie decisions you.
Speaker 1 (11:27):
Made, plenty of them, plenty of horror movie decisions. And
there's also this sorry history of portrayals in white created
media of black folks being these scared, meek or subservient negroes.
And I don't think it does us any favors to
pile onto the idea that we aren't capable of facing
(11:50):
our fears.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
And this point leads.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Me to number three, which is that we have a solid,
non fictional history of choosing the path of most resistance
when necessary. I think this one is the reason why
my knee jerk reaction to the joke is so dramatic.
It just makes me feel like we believe we are cowardly.
(12:13):
Of course, our fears aren't all the same, so I
don't like the idea of confining black folks to a
single experience of fear response and risk tolerance. It makes
it seem like we always end up choosing safety and
comfort over courage and defense of a just cause, and
the optics of that just makes me feel really icky.
(12:36):
The history of black folks on this earth is exactly
the opposite of that, So we stay putting ourselves at
risk to fight for and to protect our own in others. So,
without even getting into value judgments on that, I am
uncomfortable with perpetuating this idea that we are always too
(12:57):
spooked to face a thing that scares ay.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
When you think about it, sometimes the horror movies we see,
it's kind of like this one group of friends are
in a cabin in the woods and there's this one
killer on the loose, right, But I mean having dogs
sticked on you as you walk asking for your right
to vote. That's horror, that's you know, that's like some
(13:24):
scary shit. And people did it, you know, day in
and day out, knowing that that danger was not even
just possible, but probable, you know what I'm saying. It
wasn't like, oh, they were shocked that these dogs came out,
maybe the first time, but you know, after a while,
you're like, you know, the dogs are coming out, you
know the fire holes are coming out. You know you're
(13:45):
gonna get beat with the baton, and yet those people
still face that danger. So you know what, now I'm
thinking that this trope is around so black people don't
rise up in revolution. Think about it, like Harriet Tubman,
you got the dogs on your tail. You know that
(14:05):
if you get caught, you are going to get beaten,
probably die. You're using the stars in the moon to
find your way, and you aren't just doing it for yourself,
but you're doing it for all these other you know,
enslaved people who are running to Like that's a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
There is so much about the real world where we
do the thing that is the hardest thing to do.
We do the thing that's the scariest thing. To do,
and you know, these situations in which we're having dogs
sticked on us, in which we're in darkness and having
to try to find our ways to places we know,
(14:48):
we are running from situations that meant death and torture
for us and running into situations that are unknown, which
is another fear in itself, is like, you know, just
because we were leaving one place that was full of
danger and we were going toward another, doesn't mean that
it was going to be a one hundred percent safe
(15:09):
place for us, and it likely wasn't going to be
because we live in a world where so many different
places are dangerous to black people, and it is just
so much more realistic to think about how we do
so frequently choose these paths that involve danger out of necessity,
(15:32):
out of courage and out of a willingness to survive,
and out of optimism and hope, because I do think
that it takes a certain amount of optimism and hope
to be able to think that you're going to overcome
a situation that you know is already dangerous and that
you will be a person who's integral into changing that
(15:55):
situation into one that has a positive outcome.
Speaker 2 (15:58):
All right, let's go to this ad break, but don't
go too far. We will be waiting for you on
the other side. Okay, we're back, and we didn't scare
(16:19):
them enough to keep them away, so clearly that people
want to hear the rest of this list what you
got next?
Speaker 1 (16:24):
So number four, this one is kind of a counterpoint
to the last point. That assumption that we avoid fear
like the plague can imply that we're cowardly, but on
the opposite end of the spectrum, it can also play
into the idea that we are above making mistakes. But
are we smarter than getting ourselves caught up? Do we
(16:48):
know better than to go risking our lives when we
can just walk away and we know damn well that
our parents raised us better than that. Saying that we
would never make an unwise or a logical decision that
puts us in danger, it really takes away from our
ability to be fallible. We are not superhuman. We don't
(17:09):
always make the correct choices. We mess up a lot.
We are flawed, and I want stories about us to
really reflect that. I don't want to pretend that we're perfect.
Speaker 2 (17:19):
There's this Maya Angelou quote about like pretending that we're
perfect and we never mess up. So in a nineteen
ninety five article, she talked about her past, and in
this interview, she said, I wrote about my experiences because
I thought too many people tell young folks I never
did anything wrong. Who why never? I I have no
(17:42):
skeletons in my closet. In fact, I have no closet.
They lie like that, and then young people find themselves
in situations and they think, damn, I must be a
pretty bad guy. You know, my mom and dad never
did anything wrong, so I'm pretty bad and they can't
forgive themselves. And I felt that like, if everyone's hiding
everything that they've ever done that they're not the proudest of,
(18:04):
then there's nothing to learn from from younger generations coming
up behind you, whether it's your direct lineage or justlike
people who who know your story right, they're like getting
half of the story. So I think, like with tying
that back to horror movies, like, yeah, these people are
making like to us, obviously wrong decisions, but maybe they're
(18:27):
kind of like, hey, this is what I did and
this is what happened from it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, I think we have a lot to learn from
seeing black people do things wrong in horror movies for
the reasons that you just said. It's actually very edifying
to see people mess up, and to see people like
us mess up in ways, especially in where we control
those narratives. It's hard to make good decisions because how
can you even determine what is a good decision or
(18:54):
not before crystal ball?
Speaker 2 (18:56):
And that's it.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
You gotta be magic.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
So we reach your fifth and final point, bring it
all home.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
This one. I just want it to be pretty simple,
and that's that fear does not save us. That sounds
so serious, but it feels like the idea that our
fear will keep us out of danger is the message
that's kind of hovering in the background of this joke.
But the reality is running away from a threat or
(19:26):
avoiding a single threat does not guarantee our safety or
our survival. So avoiding confrontation can absolutely be healthy, but
choosing not to engage is not always the only good option.
So look, what I Am always going to do is
hold us to a high standard. I'm a firm believer
(19:49):
in the power of words, so I just want us
to think about the things that we say. There is
nothing more to that, Nothing less. I know it's not
that deep. I know there is a big culture of
making things deeper than they need to be, although I
(20:10):
don't always think that's necessarily a bad thing. I think
it's kind of beautiful that we are so analytical, that
we have so much access to information, and that we're
able to share our thoughts and think critically around things
in ways that can be super impactful and super meaningful.
So I acknowledge that it's not that deep. My point
(20:34):
is that it's all in the spirit of love. I
just want to make room for curiosity and care. That's it,
that's real. And this is where doctor Robin R. Means
Coleman comes in.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So my name is Robin, middle initial R, last name
is means Coleman.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Unlike me, she's a certified expert on the topic of
black people and horror.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
I am a professor at Northwestern University. One of my
claim to fames is that I'm the co author of
The Black Eyed Dies First and also the author of
Horror Noir, which was also turned into a documentary. And
perhaps the other thing that people know about me is
(21:20):
that I am not afraid to say Candyman five times in.
Speaker 1 (21:24):
A mirror well, you are better than me because I
have held onto that I don't do the candyman thing.
I don't do the bloody Mary thing. None of that
is within my wheelhouse. And I consider myself a person
who's pretty tolerant to horror, and I draw my limits somewhere.
So I guess all of that means that you're also
(21:45):
a horror fan yourself, right.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
I am to write the books that I've written or
co authored with my fabulous co author Mark Harris, required
us to watch not just hundreds, but thousands of horror films,
and that's been a terrific crazy ride.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
See a consummate professional, a woman dedicated to the enjoyment
and study of the craft. Okay, anyway, Katie, The thing is,
I wanted to talk to doctor Means Coleman because all
of this has been about me trying to figure out
why I had the emotional response I did. Even after
digging pretty deep into why the joke rubbed me the
(22:26):
wrong way, all of these conflicting thoughts were having one
big ass boss battle in my brain. I still couldn't
reconcile all of the capital t truths buried in the jest.
Like sure, I feel this way about it. But it's
a well known joke for a reason.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
I think doctor Means Coleman is the perfect person to
have this conversation with. So I'm excited to see what
she has to say, and I hope y'all can get
down to the capital t truths of the matter.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
Okay, back to our conversation. So it really stood out
to me when I read the first edition of your book,
Hohor and war So in the beginning, there's this forward
by Steven Toreano Barry, and he talks about in that forward,
how there's this joke that goes around that has been
around for quite a while now that if somebody tells
black people to leave.
Speaker 2 (23:15):
We're going to leave.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
In a horror movie, somebody says get out, We're going
to get out.
Speaker 3 (23:19):
We won't be in the movie.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
You won't see us. The movie wouldn't even exist if
it were based around us, you know, investigating the problem,
and he says in that forward he uses the phrase
that that joke was quote an off handed justification to
help explain that absence of black people in horror in
the time before the nineteen seventies. It is such a
(23:42):
well known sentiment it's so prevalent that it that it
starts this whole journey through your book. So that says
something alone. So before we even begin getting into that context,
could you tell me about the first time that you
remember hearing that joke.
Speaker 3 (23:56):
I love this question, and I would say that it's
a trope in popular culture, and where I think we
have a shared experience is that it isn't just that
we were introduced to that in popular culture, but sort
of real life black lived experience. They're that joke, that
(24:21):
trope that we now it's sort of gallows humor or
represent and I guess we'll talk about the ways it's
represented in movies, but that often what we see in
media comes out of real life experience, and that is
a necessary mode of survival for black people. You'll see
(24:43):
people sort of joke about it on the comedy stage,
but that's real. So on the comedy stage, outside of
the genre of horror, you'll see comedians say that, you know,
black people will be gathered somewhere in an auditorium or
at a party and somebody will are running, and that
black people are like, wait, wait are we running? Are running?
(25:04):
Everybody's running, everybody's got everybody runs right, no question. So
that comes out of a real moment of a necessity
around survival. Running to drama or trauma is never going
to be good for black people. So a real life
example is where you have a black person. There was
(25:27):
a shooting in a mall, uh, just a couple of
years ago, where a black male assumed a really heroic
position and sort of thwarted this mass shooting, and in
return for that, when police came in, they shot and
killed him right thinking he was the perpetrator. So there's
(25:49):
a necessity two for preservation, for real survival, to stay
away from these kinds of moments, right, these crisis moments,
because we are often not looked at as hero or victim,
but as perpetrator, as.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Monstrous whenever we do go towards any situation, even if
that situation doesn't outwardly seem harmful in the first place,
and we still end up being the people who violence
is enacted against in the end. And yet and still
there is this inner conflict in me. I felt this
reaction to it, and where I was like, there are
(26:33):
so many moments in which we are the ones who
stand up, in which we do run to danger so
I was relating it to some of the things that
you talk about in your books about being this sacrificial
negro or being this fool, this cowardly fool who always
runs away from the danger. And so I think there's
this other end of the spectrum of that joke where
(26:56):
it has this implication that we are too fearful or
too cowardly.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
So I think context matters. What I do in talking
about the horror genre is I make a clear distinction,
and it may be a little bit too on the nose, clear,
but a clear distinction between black horror and Blacks in horror.
And so I don't want to conflate the two in
this reaction. In Blacks in Horror, that's where you see
(27:25):
the sort of scared, shivering negro, right, the scared negro
trope that comes up that does the feats don't fail me. Now,
that's the kind of thing that bothers you. I think
that doesn't serve black people. That never cast us as smart,
as heroic, as problem solving that occurs in Blacks in Horror.
(27:46):
The other thing that you may see in Blacks in
Horror are these kinds of this white boogeyman in the basement,
and a black person isn't going to go down there
and investigate the white boogeyman in the basement. An important
sort of way that I'm talking about that there's the
specter of whiteness that we are contending with in that joke, right,
(28:11):
And so if there's whiteness also or non blackness in
a range of ways showing up, right, And you don't
have to be white to be invested in white supremacy.
So if there's sort of white supremacy showing up, that's
a danger. It isn't just going as you know, sort
of descending down the basement steps. The danger is that
(28:33):
blackness may be treated as monstrous, as other as dangerous,
and that can lead to the end of our lives.
Black horror, to correct it, black horror. That's not the
same sort of response or reaction. It's in black horror
you see people be heroic. It's in black horror that
(28:55):
you see the discernment, the reasoning. The For example, Nia
Dacosta's Candy Man twenty twenty one, this sort of the
ending the spoiler alert where Brianna, she looks in the mirror,
she summons candy Man, and up until that point, that
person who looks in the mirror and summons Candy man,
(29:17):
they're going to be the victim. But she's bravely entering
into that space to do some real uncivil, critical problem solving.
I like using Brianna. That character is a contrast because
this is also the character who, when she's trying to
figure out what's going on, has a moment where she's
(29:38):
literally looking down into a basement down a darkened stairway
and she says nope, and she you know, it's a
funny scene. She closes the door and walks away. That's
because she does not yet know what the monster is, right,
she doesn't know what's going on, and until she does
(30:01):
writes some amazing critical thinking on her part. Until she
does this investigation, understands the context, then she proceeds. There's
a real difference between the way black people are treated
and blacks in horror, right, which is this sort of
these odd objects or they cannot show up as heroic
(30:21):
because in black's in horror, it's the white character, often
the white male character, who is cast as hero. So
there's no way you can write a black character charging
in and saving the day, because it's the white character. Again,
often the white male character who is the hero black
(30:42):
horror does something very different when we think about what
heroism and problem solving looks like. I do think an
example of where you see, you know, sort of an
infamous example, right, this sacrificial Negro trope where you see
these characters who who are like, I'm going to run
into danger and by any means necessary, I'm going to
(31:04):
help out and save the day. Is you know, sort
of the infamous scene where Scotman Cruthers, the famed actor
Scotman Cruthers in the Shining. You know, he is on vacation,
like in Florida. He gets an sos psychically from you know, Danny,
(31:25):
this white kid, and he leaves his beachside vacation. He
puts on a coat, he books a ticket across country.
He does connecting flights. He does this in a snowstorm.
He goes as far as he can in his car,
and then he abandons the car, and then he rents
(31:46):
a snow cat. Like who's paying for all of this?
Then the brother gets in a snow cat and he
drives up the mountain and then he abandons the snow
cat and he gets out and he's trudging through and
the feats of snow chloral feats to walk through the
door to save this white family. And as soon as
(32:10):
he walks in the door, he gets an axe to
the chest. Now Black audiences are sitting in the theater
looking like, I'm skeptical here because in some ways you're saying,
homeboy couldn't see that axe coming. What is he thinking
running across country to do this. That's the sacrificial negro.
(32:31):
That's not his business. He has a family, right, This
is we're supposed to believe that he centered. This family
is his priority at the expense of an invisible black family, relatives, children, grandchildren,
right right. That's what running into that kind of danger
(32:52):
really means. When I say it's about black survival, it
means that we no longer have him. His family, who
doesn't even make this scre green, no longer has him
of you know, a girlfriend, a partner, friends, All of
that is denied by him running through the door.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
It also devalues and portrays black people, in this specific case,
a black man as a person who devalues his connections
to his own family.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
So the only correction there is that we think about
that in his relationship to blackness, because we're bringing that
meana making of a black lens. But remember that's a
blacks in horror film, which means that the writers they
weren't thinking, where is this brother's you know, sisters and
aunties and you know the siblings and all of that.
(33:44):
Where are his people? So they're not thinking that he's
absented himself. Right, this character didn't do it, But the
way to make him seem or appear heroic is to
be so sacrificing, so selfless in support of whiteness that
he would give up all of blackness to do it.
(34:07):
That's not that character that comes out of the imagination
of those who operate outside of a whole in full blackness.
Speaker 1 (34:17):
How can we portray these black characters as hero is
going forward and keeping them in these nuanced portrayals?
Speaker 3 (34:26):
So there are two things I think. The first is
the example I gave of like Brianna and Niadcosta's candy Man,
which is a contrast to Bernard Rose's candy Man of
nineteen ninety two, where in that candy Man, the black
folks were really disempowered and they were like, oh my gosh,
there's a monster here. And then the entire kind of
housing project. Cabrini Green turned to Helen, the white savior,
(34:51):
to come and solve the problem. Right, that's the difference
between blackhr where Brianna saves the day verse Black's in horror,
where there's Helen, who's the white protagonist who sort of
saves the day. What I think is a solution first
is that we need much more black horror, and that
(35:13):
is having that part of the genre, which I call
horror noir, more robustly represented. But it also requires a
much more diverse writer's room and people who are there
creating and imagining stories and talking about the ways that
black people show up, how black people show up in
(35:34):
black horror. You see all kinds of heroism. But I
also don't want to discount what that sort of we're
smart enough not to go their means. That doesn't mean
that we're the scared negro in a horror movie, whether
it's Black horror or Black's in horror. There is something
(35:55):
that is very smart and discerning about This isn't running
into a fire and saving baby kittens. This is in horror.
This is about charging in staring a monster in the eye,
to be slaughtered because horror is about the monster. That's
what horror films are about. And there's something that doctor
(36:18):
Barry is getting at when he says, we're like, Nope,
we're not doing that, which also means we're not gonna
be sacrificial Negro number two in a horror movie.
Speaker 1 (36:30):
Today, you unlocked something for me, because I feel like
that became something that is very empowering. There is an
inherent pause in what you said. Instead of it being
something like us continually running to this joke because we
don't believe in ourselves to be able to face a thing,
It's more like we understand the power in our pause
(36:52):
and our ability to in a single moment, have this
risk assessment and have this moment where we can say,
I know the fears and dangers that I face that
are very real, and they're my choice is what path
do I take? So it's also a moment of I
guess a lot of self awareness and ability to assess
(37:12):
a moment and choose what to do in the next
rather than running quickly into something that could be life ending.
Speaker 3 (37:21):
Survival for black people is the greatest gift, it's the
greatest contribution. That's what we want is the survival of blackness.
So yes, the pause is a powerful one.
Speaker 1 (37:33):
So do you think that we should continue telling this joke?
Speaker 3 (37:39):
So I'm reminded of a quote, and it's paraphrasing because
I don't think I have it perfectly right, But George
Bernard Shaw says, when a thing is funny, search for
a hidden truth. And this sort of humorous approach is
pointing to a truth. And I think that that is
(38:02):
one of many invaluable tools to remind us, both in
the real and in the imagined, what black people still
navigating in the US. I think people should love the
humor behind it. I think that there's something that's interesting
and reflexive about it, and it doesn't diminish black folks
(38:24):
or their sort of stature in society, or their discernment
or their heroism, but that it is really not so
much a reflection on blackness, but it is a reflection
on the dangers of whiteness and horror. And so shifting
that understanding to saying, Okay, what are we stepping back from?
(38:47):
Oh that danger right there, which we know we have
experienced centuries of danger right there. That's the importance of
what he's writing about.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
Could you talk about any other examples of black people
not high tailing it out of there in a recent
movie that you've seen that you love.
Speaker 3 (39:07):
Oh, there's a whole there's a whole genre of those movies,
and those are the black horror movies.
Speaker 1 (39:13):
You know.
Speaker 3 (39:13):
I have favorites. Jay Dillard's Sweetheart is you know where
you have a black woman who is the heroic person
who stares down the monster. Spoiler alert, right, I like
attack the block. John Boyega's character also one who is
(39:34):
you know, discerning. Sometimes he's not going headlong into the
monster and other times he's doing battle, right, But that's
what we expect of complex situations, and he ultimately stares
down the monster figures out a way another spoiler work
to do some annihilation of some bad stuff. So that
that is what black horror does, is that it treats
(39:59):
black intervention in a very different way, and we don't
always have to win, but it is a very different
treatment of the ways in which we show up.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
Katie, I have to tell you, after speaking with Doctor
Means Coleman, I changed my mind. I went into this
already like wanting to retire this joke.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
But I'm cool with it all.
Speaker 1 (40:26):
Now, I hold all of these truths together, and it's complicated,
as our most things, but I'm at peace with that.
Be free y'all to resort to this joke a million
more times, because you know we will. And actually, thanks
to doctor Means Coleman, I feel free to not even
think of it as this stale joke that I've heard
(40:46):
so many times before. But instead I get to think
of it as this kind of wise adage born of
our breath of experience, concern for our own and others
well being, and our beautiful propensity for survival and extreme circumstances.
Speaker 2 (41:01):
Oh my gosh, the gross I did not think I
would see the day. And I'm glad that you got
to talk to doctor Means Coleman because she really broke
it down. Oh and y'all don't forget to support doctor
Means Coleman.
Speaker 3 (41:15):
You can follow me on Twitter at Means Coleman. Grab
a copy of The Black Eyed Dice, first co authored
with Mark Harris, and if you want a still deeper,
scholarly dive, grab a copy of Horror and a War,
the second edition. Both books came out this year twenty
(41:37):
twenty three.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Eaves It's My favorite part of the show roll credits,
where we give credit to a person, place, thing, idea
that we've encountered during the week that you know, we
just want to give them some props, give them a
little shout out. So this week, I would like to
(42:03):
give credit to the Shrine of the Black Madonna in Atlanta, Georgia,
the West End. It's known for being one of the
first churches that showed Mary Jesus' mom is a black woman.
They've been so helpful for me while I'm writing my
book about black bookstores. They're the nicest people and it's
(42:25):
just really nice to have, you know, older black folks
like looking out for you, helping you on your path
whatever you're doing, and being like excited for you. So
shout out to all the folks at the Shrine of
the Black Madonna. They also have a bookstore connected to
the church, So if you're ever in Atlanta, hit them up.
Who do you want to give credit to? Who are what?
Speaker 3 (42:47):
So?
Speaker 1 (42:47):
I would like to give credit to black people who
write horror, black people who make horror films, black people
who are invested in horror content and thinking about horror content.
Speaker 2 (43:00):
We'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (43:01):
And In the meantime, we are going to watch some
horror and try our best not to yell at the
screen the whole time.
Speaker 2 (43:09):
Now you know that's impossible, you Right.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
On Theme is a production of iHeartRadio and Fairweather Friends Media.
This episode was written by Eves, Jeffco and Katie Mitchell.
It was edited and produced by Tari Harrison. Follow us
on Instagram at on Theme Show. You can also send
us an email at hello at on Theme dot show.
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
(43:42):
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Speaker 2 (43:51):
Do you think you would recognized someone that looks just
like you know, I thought that's what you guys stopped cowering.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
Well, some people just freeze, you know.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, I would probably the same thing. I would probably
just die.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
Oh my god, No, you wouldn't
Speaker 2 (44:10):
Have I said this before.
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