Bizawit Merawi

MIT 220

White savior, White tears, and a Big nose

          He-man is a show about a white man with the power of a gray- skull in him who must protect a castle and its people. It is a show for boys made by a toy company to grab children’s interest in the toy line. In this episode of He-man, we can take race and gender to see how each and every character is represented in the show. From narrative, characterization, and character design.  As mentioned by Kearny (2020), intersectionality is now the dominant lens used to analyze identity within virtually all academic fields. When looking at the episode of he-man with a lens that examines both gender and race, we see two major things the first one being there is a clear favor towards what is considered masculine than feminine. The second one is that Eurocentric features and white skin are attributed to the hero while oriental (primarily Semitic) features and different skin colors are attributed to the villain.

         We can observe the clear favoring of masculinity when comparing Kia and Elina. Elina is portrayed to be weak and fragile whilst having feminine traits, while Tia is strong and brave while being characterized as masculine. Right from the beginning of the episode, we are introduced to Elina as this scared soft-spoken woman who can’t handle flying. She meets Tia a woman who is red-haired (a stark contrast to the blonde Elina) and appears more confident and assured. When they both hear of the possibility of escaping, Elina comes off frightened while Tia confidently brushes off the rumors and eggs on Elina to come along. They then encounter a geyser field that begins erupting and while Teela acts immediately and steps out of danger, Elina could not because she was simply too scared. Then Teela is knocked out from the steam and Elina is left alone and scared. Enter He-man and his sword to the rescue and the distressed Elina is rescued.

          Elina’s character and Teela’s character are introduced so that we understand that the feminine soft-spoken Elina is weak and always in need of help, she desires to be like the tomboy Teela and begins hating herself. This idea that feminine women cannot be brave and should strive to be like men is an attempt at dismissing and reducing femineity to nothing more than a burden and a weakness. Eliana is the perfect representation of what can be defined as feminine. She is blond with Aryan features and has a slim body. White women have historically always been painted out to be in need of protection and guarding at all times. One can argue that this is precisely why Elina was the character chosen by the writers to tackle the subject of drugs on this show. Having the feminine white woman be the one to be fooled into taking drugs would help the audience empathize and forgive her. Her whiteness also makes it far easier for the audience to digest and accept. If say for example Elina was a black woman who was tricked into taking drugs, it would not be hard to imagine what kind of response that would have elicited from parents. The character surely would not have been easily forgiven.

         This binary view of masculine and feminine women and the clear bias toward masculine women as the definition of strong independent women is a form of internalized misogyny as well. While girls at the time were being conditioned to be like Elina, shows like He-man are targeted towards boys with the idea that femineity should be looked down upon. 

While femineity is shamed on Eline, there is a sort of softness viewed on He-man as well, one that was slowly being accepted in the 1990s. In fact, at the time there seemed to have a clash due to men becoming softer and more feminine. This is one article that actually criticized He-man as being a sissy because He-man does not resort to violence and would do what he could to make sure that he did not use violence. The article reads 

 

He-Man is really a plot to turn young children into bleeding hearts… In fact — and this has to be seen to be believed — that hulk of muscles doesn’t hurt anybody. Except, maybe, in the way a spanking hurt. He’s forever tossing a bad guy into a convenient puddle or bringing some bad-tempered monster to the way of Truth and Goodness. He-Man has been heard to say, “It often takes more courage not to fight,” and his female companion, Teela, is a decidedly modern woman. She’s not only a soldier, she’s a leader of soldiers.

– Welch,1985

 

The other aspect of the show that is interesting is the contrast between the villain and the heroes of Gray skull. There is no sight of a person of color and nearly all of the characters have straight hair and Eurocentric features. They are slim and most importantly they are all white. Contrastingly all of the villains are these sub-humanoids who are clearly othered, for this episode’s villain his crooked nose and greed stood out as Anti-Semitic troupes that seem to plague the Hollywood screens. 

The crocked nose and the greed for gold and power have often been seen in a lot of movies and tv shows to characterize villains and portray them as the other. This othering not only conforms to white supremacist ideologies but also promotes white saviors and superiority.

In an article written in 1986, We can see a rise in the presence of white supremacists. The text can be seen below

White supremacy leaders gathered Friday for an Aryan Nations Congress to unite their efforts to establish a “whites only” homeland in the Northwest. The meeting is the white supremacists’ first gathering in the Northwest since an FBI investigation led to last December’s racketeering convictions of 10 members of The Order, a militant, right-wing group blamed for two murders, more than $4 million in robberies, counterfeiting, and other crimes.

Many Order members had met through the Aryan Nations and its leader, the Rev. Richard Butler. The Order was smashed when its founder, former Aryan Nations member Robert Mathews, died during a Dec. 8, 1984, standoff with FBI agents. Mathews was killed when a flare ignited his waterfront hideout on Whidbey Island, north of Seattle. 

  • Press, A. (1986, Jul 12). 

WHITE SUPREMACY ZEALOTS GATHER:

 

In Hendershot’s Park and recreation piece, he notes how the show is used a cultural forum where the ideals are put forth and viewers interpret the content. They either accept it or reject it. The ideals put out are a clear reflection of the present and the same can be said for He-man. Looking back to 1982-1986 there are multiple articles about white supremacy and anti-Semitic incidents in the US. White supremacists meeting to create their white nation, white supremacists spreading flyers that deny the holocaust, White supremacists making a tv show that ordains white people as God’s chosen people., The 30-minute “Race and Reason” featured claims by Richard Barrett, a Mississippi attorney, that the superiority of whites was ordained by God, and recognized by the framers of the US Constitution (Press, 1986). 

Looking at the time and the climate during the release of this show, it does not surprise anyone that these racist tropes can be found in one of the most popular media texts of the time. While critics and parents were more concerned about how obvious this show was simply made for advertisements, these harmful tropes were able to fly past them completely.

He-man is a show targeted toward middle-class young white boys with its action-packed scenes and a role model of chivalry as the main character. It uses the characters as a way to put forth a strong of what it means to be masculine, strong, powerful, assertive, and a leader; while it portrays femineity as weak, timid, and a burden. It shows little boys that fragile timid women need all the protection. It is also the very same feminine character that is used as a way to empathize with viewers on the subject of drugs and enable viewers to forgive the character for being tricked. It also Upholds white supremacist ideals by othering the villains and giving them oriental features. This particular episode had a character with blue skin and a not-so-small nose. He is greedy and yearns for power. These have been very popular tropes used on Jewish people for centuries and it bleeds into the American film scene, so much so that these caricatures have become so normalized even today. 

 

Reference

 

Celeste Kearney, M. (2020). 16. Orange Is the New Black : Intersectional Analysis. In E. Thompson & J. Mittell (Ed.), How to Watch Television, Second Edition (pp. 153-162). New York, USA: New York University Press. https://doi.org/10.18574/9781479837441-018 

 

Hendershot, H. (2020). 24. Parks and Recreation : The Cultural Forum. In E. Thompson & J. Mittell (Ed.), How to Watch Television, Second Edition (pp. 230-238). New York, USA: New York University Press. https://doi.org/10.18574/9781479837441-026

 

Polman, D. (1984, Jul 06). PUTTING MACHO BACK IN THE MAN. Philadelphia Inquirer Retrieved from http://turing.library.northwestern.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/newspapers/putting-macho-back-man/docview/1820028873/se-2?accountid=12861 

 

Press, A. (1986, Jul 12). WHITE SUPREMACY ZEALOTS GATHER: [3 STAR EDITION]. Orlando Sentinel Retrieved from http://turing.library.northwestern.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/newspapers/white-supremacy-zealots-gather/docview/276843421/se-2?accountid=12861 

 

Press, A. (1986, Sep 18). WHITE SUPREMACY TV SHOW ANGERS VIEWERS: [THIRD EDITION]. Boston Globe (Pre-1997 Fulltext) Retrieved from http://turing.library.northwestern.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/newspapers/white-supremacy-tv-show- 

angers-viewers/docview/294380324/se-2?accountid=1286 

 

Polman, D. (1984, Jul 06). PUTTING MACHO BACK IN THE MAN. Philadelphia Inquirer Retrieved from http://turing.library.northwestern.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/newspapers/putting-macho-back-man/docview/1820028873/se-2?accountid=12861

 

Welch, J. A. (1985, May 08). IN TERMS OF MACHO, ‘HE-MAN’ IS A SISSY: [3 STAR EDITION]. Orlando Sentinel Retrieved from http://turing.library.northwestern.edu/login?url=https://www-proquest-com.turing.library.northwestern.edu/newspapers/terms-macho-he-man-is-sissy/docview/276610388/se-2?accountid=12861
At this point, there’s much thunder and lightning and screams from young viewers. Then Prince Adam, now He-Man, roars, “I have the Power.” Grayskull is an ancient castle and source of He-Man’s strength.