¨White power¨or why we´re so racist?

In my opinion, racism is a really important subject thats why I chose a movie which can represent the failure of it. Take your time and enjoy...

In the beginning movie “American history x” seems like a really threatening and scary movie about abominable reality. It is a movie about racism, about discrimination and about ethnic groups being oppressed by others. In the first seconds on this movie I realized that it is going to be about nationalists, on other words: skinheads. 

In the first episode Derek gets up from the bed and viewers are able to see swastika tattoo on his heart, so it can say more than thousands of words. It means he believes in “white power”, or one nation being better than others.

Later one, viewers are able to realize other one fact: older brother (Derek) is like a hero for his younger brother, because of that he is trying to behave like Derek, think like he does, act like Derek does and so on. He is only teenager right now, so he is really confused which way in his life he should choose and what should he do, older or stronger minded people are able to manipulate him and try to “help” to find a way for him. But is it right and is it a really good way for him? These questions are important to his teacher as well because of that he wants to help him not to choose a bad way or a way which Derek chose and after that regret about it (but viewers are going to find it out later on).Later people are able to see teacher and Danny conversation about his essay (Daniel wrote it in a racist way) and teacher are able to see his confusion,

indecisiveness in life, because of that he told Daniel to write a different essay “American history x” and then, in my opinion, the movie actually started.

In reality this movie has got two sides: dark side and a bright side, despite the violence and all swearing or unpleasant behavior, this movie also can be a lesson, an example for others. On my view, it is really good when people do understand that they were doing mistakes and after that they are able to change they lifestyle and habits and also try to help others to change it too, it is great when people regret about the mistakes they done and they want to fix it somehow. I think we can call it resurrection – it is like born again, isn´t? Yes! Viewers are able to see this in the movie as well: Derek came back from the jail and he is totally different (he has got his long hair; he seems more mature, more responsible, and more individual! (Derek tells his friend to leave their house, really strange because he would never do this before).

Therefore, jail is a really important thing, place, fact in this movie (we can find a lot of names for it, but for Derek it was life experience). When I hear the name – jail, I am always thinking about bad people who deserved to be there: they are wild, unstoppable; you never know what they can do, always should keep away from them and things like this. I never think about their feelings, never. I am just always trying to imagine things they done.                                             

On the one hand, I am might be right, but on the other hand, who am I to judge them? Maybe after being in jail they are going to be better people? Maybe one day one of them would help me somewhere, somehow? Maybe I would fall in love with one of them? Maybe my lovely neighbor or shop assistant was in jail too? Etc. We would never know. Actually I strongly believe that jail is not the best option. Jail would not change anything or make people better, I think it as place where people can loose themselves even more, our modern society should find other ways to stop the crimes but it is a different topic.

 Anyway,  there is a life in jail as well; people have got rules, laws, even “government” and feelings, they also missing their families or regretting about things they done, thinking about life “what if” (of course maybe  not all of them). So movie character - Derek faced it (very much so).

Derek showed swastika to his mother’s boyfriend and told him to leave the house, it means that his ideas about nationalism is more important to him than his mother’s happiness, more important than everything; he is blaming other nations about his father’s death, about all the problems in the country, about everything. And he does not care that he is frightening his family members and making them suffer.

We can hear Derek’s girlfriend saying: “everything is fine, I am proud of you, darling”. So she is proud because he is “such a big leader”, “such a brave hero”, he don’t even care about his family members’ feelings, because he is “the only one right one”. And his girlfriend thinks like him (she is also nationalist), they are like a team, like a big group of people who trying to stop the “injustice” in America.

Moreover, there is very important conversation between Derek’s mother and her boyfriend. He is trying to open her eyes that her children are living really dangerous life style, but her eyes are still closed and she thinks that the reason is living without father. Unfortunately, she is not right.

later people are able to see argument between two brothers: Derek and Daniel. Daniel is screaming and punching his older brother Derek because he is different, he is not behaving like hero anymore and Daniel feels disappointed because of Derek’s behavior. He is even more confused than before; he feels like his is losing ground under his feet, he is losing support. He needs answers.

Finally viewers are able to see what’s happened in the jail. Derek was disappointed by his “white power friends” by his team, actually by all his ideas, by everything, other nationalists raped him and only blacks helped him out after that. Derek realized that life is really easy when you have the power to construct it, when you are the hero and it is totally different when you see other reality, where you are not the hero anymore. He had a lesson about discrimination, about racism, even about himself. And because of that he wanted to change everything. Finally he understood.

So two brothers became a team again, but in a different way. They are not in a racists’ group anymore, they do not believe in it anymore, they are two individuals, who believes in harmony and people as individuals. We can be black, white, yellow, but we all have good and bad people, it is not about color it is about minds!

In the end of the movie - such a sad moment, because Daniel are killed by black boy and Derek was crying near his youngest brother’s dead body. But all he was saying: “what did I done?” he did not started to swear on blacks again or blame them; he blamed himself because he showed this way to his brother.

In conclusion I want to say that sometimes we need an electro shock to realize who we really are, what we really need. Also we need to remember that all human are same, just different color, but we all have feelings, memories, life experiences which we can share with others, and we all can cry, smile and love! Just love each other and life will be more beautiful than we can imagine. According to Daniel, hate is a heavy burden, there is no point to live like this, and life is too short for hating others!