del Valle, American History X

The movie American History X attracts groups of insecure young individuals, who feel alone, and have personally experienced the loss of someone by a minor, to Facism/Nazism. Like in the White Supremacy article, it attracts those who start to relate to the movie, and believe all the stereotypes they see. In this movie, Derek’s father was murdered by an African American, and afterwards, Derek felt upset and angry, and didn’t know what to do with that anger, so put it towards being racist. It wasn’t until he met Cameron, that he focused this anger, and began racist hate crimes. In the scene from the picture, it is tightly framed, bringing you closer and more personal with Derek, so you can see how he’s feeling. It shows you that he is almost happy and proud of what he did, but then, at some point, realizes that it might not have been worth the consequences.

Rivera: American History X

American History X is a film which presents to the audience a very disturbing view of the effect hate groups in America. The film is about a man who forms a white supremacy group in his neighborhood, and his younger brother who follows in his footsteps. Ultimately the older brother, Derek learns the error of his ways, and tries to help his younger brother, Danny, see the same light. Throughout the film the audience is exposed to intense scenes of racist acts including dialogue, violence, imagery, and propaganda. There is one scene in the film, I believe, that encompasses every intent the film is meant to portray.
The film is not shown in chronological order, segmented with black and white flashbacks told through Derek's perspective. It is interesting to note that Derek is associated with a white-supremacy group who hate blacks, and all of his flashbacks are in black and white. This use of color shows two things: the first of which is that the division between the two colors was in his past, that is why this color scheme is only used in flashbacks. The second intent is to how Derek viewed the world at that time in his life; We often refer to this color scheme as "black and white" but in reality, there are varying hues of gray, which is the predominant color. This represents that although Derek believes the world to be as simple as a separation of black and white, he is ignorant to the gray areas of the world. The scene I am speaking about involves Derek as well as a group of other racists attacking a Korean-owned convenience store and assaulting the employees. The individuals attack the black cashier and lay her on the counter covering her in food while stating overly-racial and disgusting remarks. This scene to me encompasses everything the film is trying to portray.For the most part of the scene, the camera is at a very intimate level, making the assault very uncomfortable for the audience, but adding to the feeling of dominance the audience expects the white supremacist to be feeling. It is in black and white, and there is a group of white men encircling a black woman, whom they are assaulting. The men are certainly the dominant in the frame, leaving the black woman as the contrast. The arrangement of the men symbolically represents a state of power and superiority over the woman, who lays there defenseless.
This film does a great job of delivering to the audience a message about the importance of recognizing the issues and difficulties hate-related crimes can bring. The sense of comradeship the white-supremacist feel is an enticing and dangerous aspect of the film. However, I feel as though the film is quite exaggerated, and therefore, quite unrealistic. For starters, the article we read states that most hate groups rarely commit any major crimes against other races, and even went as far as to say that a majority of members do nothing more than read the literature. In doing so, I feel as though it unintentionally feeds into the same stereotypes the film tries to portray as dangerous. As the article states, the black and white characters in the film are text-book cut-outs of their stereotypical basis. Not all white-supremacists are rednecks, and not all blacks speak in slang, are always aggressive, and are uneducated. The film seems to feel that in order to show the affect hate can have on a group, it must first represent the "ideal" characters to fit the stereotypes to place in the film.

Oria, American History X

In the movie it was clear that the white supremacies groups attracted the young and impressionable teens of the lower, working class. These are kids that are often very underprivileged and live in very poor neighborhoods. The scene in which Derick goes to the party to talk to the leader of the group shows that the majority of the members that were apart of it were very young. Most of them must have been in their early to mid teens. I got the feeling that it was very chaotic and there was a lot of disorder in the scene of the party. There was a lot of anger and confusion. Everyone was all clustered together mosh pitting and jumping around. I got the sense that that is how the teens were feeling. They had a lot of pent up anger and hate inside of them. They are insecure and looking for something to be apart of. The skinheads give these kids an opportunity to be apart of something bigger then themselves. They accept all of those who feel alone or forgotten in the world and fill them with hate and anger. This is similar to why some kids join gangs or why they join sports teams, to feel like they have worth or like they are apart of something. Those kids that joined are not bad, but they often feel like the victim. Some of the articles talked about how they feel like they are entitled to certain advantages and ways of life because they are white. So when they are living in bad neighborhoods or their parents do not have a job, they blame look for someone to blame. This group focused their blame and anger on people of different races. This is how the young, insecure teens who long to be accepted get sucked into these kinds of groups and hatred.

Whitlock American History X

Facism/Nazism is attractive to lower middle class white Americans. They need someone to blame for being in their socio-economic class, and in American History X, this group of people chose to blame it on every single race other than white people. This sort of ideology is described in the article as "Racism as an Individual Problem," not to say that hate crimes are only committed by people in hate groups, but the group of white supremacists in American History X believe that blacks have had enough time in this country to "get their act together."

A scene that illustrates the idea that Facism/Nazism is attractive to lower middle class white Americans is when Derek goes to visit Cameron during the celebration party that Cameron is throwing because Derek was released from jail. He tells him that he wants to be out of this group and then an argument ensues. Derek tells Cameron that he preys on these young kids and feeds ideas into their heads. They are corrupted because of him. He says that Cameron just uses them for his "cause." Derek feels that Cameron is just using these people as his puppets and is able to tell them to do anything that he wants because of the hatred that Cameron feels. In this scene, when they are fighting, the camera proximities move back-and-forth from social to intimate. When the camera does pan out to show their stance, the camera always shows Cameron's back and Derek's face, this shows that Derek is the good guy because you are able to see him and see his real-ness. The lighting is pretty low-key and the second thing that you look at in every scene are the multiple pictures of swastikas and Hitler hanging on the walls. The confined space is just an explosion of propaganda.

Lighter - American History X

American History X is an emotional and sometimes disturbing film filled with racism and hatred. The scene when the 3 black thugs are trying to steal Derek’s car is one particular scene that illustrates racism and hatred. The black and white scene starts with the thugs pulling up to Derek’s family’s house and the dark ominous music begins. The black and white scene demonstrates an emotional feeling for the viewer that makes the scene more dramatic. After the car pulls away the scene changes to slow motion and becomes even more dramatic than before. The family screaming also adds to the tension in the scene, it shows them disoriented quick cuts to them and then back to Derek. This scene is a shocking opening scene that grabs the viewer’s attention. Later in the film, this scene shows up again and shows Derek curb stomping one of the thugs, a scene that one cannot forget.

Leary American History X

In the movie, American History X, the scene that stood out to me the most was the scene where Derek is getting put in handcuffs. This particular scene really seems to send a white supremacy message to the lower-class racist young people, especially white males, in the world. The reason lower-class racist white males would pay attention to this scene would be because it shows a white racist male being very powerful and showing his racist thoughts towards blacks. This audience would probably take pride in this scene and rather enjoy it. The reason this scene illustrates the idea of Nazism attracting this specific group of young people is because Derek seems to be someone to look up to for this class of people. He has a huge Nazi sign across his heart showing that being racist towards Nazis is what is in his heart and what is most important to him. He is also smiling in this scene when he is being put into cuffs, showing that he is proud of what he has done which would make this audience also feel what Derek is feeling.

This scene starts of with Derek running outside and shooting the two men breaking into his car. Immediately, the audience realizes the scene is in black and white meaning that it is a flashback. This black and white filming makes the audience truly realize the segregation going on in these flashbacks. This symbolizes that there are no grey areas, just black and white meaning that the African Americans and Caucasian whites do not mix well together. This already makes the audience feel the sense of tension between the two races.

Even though this scene is pretty long, the main part that I thought was an example of white supremacy that sent a message to a group of young people was right when the police came. After Derek killed one man by shooting him and killed the other by stomping on his head then spitting on him, the cops showed up. There is a lot of soft music in this scene and not a lot of voices which shows that what is happening in the scene is very important. This makes it so that the audience only focuses on the characters in the scene. The music playing almost calming. I think they chose this music because it sort of calms the audience down since what just happened what very disturbing. This music might of also been chosen to represent that what Derek did was not something horrifying in his eyes. You see Danny’s face in a close up, staring at Derek in disbelief. The close up makes the audience feel close with Danny and feel what Danny is feeling. Close ups tend to make the audience relate to the character on a better level.

Next you see the cops yell at Derek to put his hands on his head. Derek looks very powerful in this stance because his Nazi sign is very bold and dark over his chest. This sign is standing out because he has just killed two men and by seeing him smile while seeing this sign seems like he is very proud of being racist. Derek also looks very powerful by the way the camera is slightly tilted upward, which makes it seem like we are looking up to him. You can see Derek’s muscles in this scene, which adds to how powerful Derek looks. When Derek puts his hands on his head, he faces Danny and has a strange smirk on his face. He is smiling as if he is proud of killing two men that didn’t deserve to actually die. It was a bit strange at first to see him smiling while being taken away to jail for murder but then you realize why he is actually smiling. This also seems to show white supremacy since Derek looks like he is a powerful white males that is superior to the black men he has just killed.

In the article we read, it talked about how this movie was a racist movie where whites are superior to other races. Even though I don’t think that the movie as a whole is a racist movie, but many scenes individually are very racist. This scene in particular is one of the most racist scenes in the movie, which agrees to what the article was saying about white supremacy. It also states in the article that blacks are stereotyped as violent thugs, which is supported by this scene since the blacks were breaking into a car. It also says how white characters are shown as the heroes, which is also supported by this scene because Derek is acting as a hero that stopped blacks from committing a crime.

Lanaux American History X

The scene that illustrates the attractiveness of Nazism/Facism to a group of young people is the scene right before the vandalism of the Korean owned store. We see Derek rallying a group of young skinheads while Danny explains the reason for the increasing following Derek garners. Danny says the new skinheads are young men who have been harassed and beaten by black thugs. In the words of Danny, 'Don't just be some punk, be part of something." They manifest their fear and frustration into extreme prejudice for the sake of power and revenge.

Later in the scene we see Derek preaching to the eager new members his neo-nazi propaganda. The camera focuses on him through most of his speech but we get brief shots of various members watching him. The shots of them are in close up, and we see that they are fully attentive and absorbing the material. The camera focuses on Derek longer though so we the audience can pay attention to everything he is saying. The shot looks as if we're a part of the crowd. The article on white supremacy talks about the issue of voice and how the choice of giving Derek various opportunities to preach makes a difference in the message to viewers take from the film. The article states the white supremacist is the brightest and most articulate and the other side are to meek and ignorant to argue. While I disagree that the opposing side of Derek's views are not as smart, I agree that having Derek be the most articulate character is an important aspect of the film. It makes his personal transformation much more meaningful.

McGowan American History X

One of the scenes that really stood out to me in American History X is the scene on the basketball court. I thought this scene did a great job illustrating the definition of white supremacy. It involves Derek challenging a few black guys to a game of basketball. This game is a battle to gain the basketball court territory. Derek is extremely confident with this game and comes through in the end. Throughout the scene, I noticed that it very much portrayed the black guys in a negative way. This scene definitely supports the article on white supremacy. The article often stated that black people are often portrayed in a negative way on screen. In this case, the white guys seemed to really be on their game while the black guys were running around like a bunch of ignorant monkeys. One of the black guys elbowed Derek in the face which is a sure portrayal of bad conduct. I think the fact that it was not the other way around is an important detail. In fact, the same black guys in the scene are the ones that try to steal Derek's car and get killed as a result.

I think that the type of people who are attracted to the white supremacy movement are ignorant. A huge problem in this subculture seems to be the fact that they are extremist for the sake of being extremist. Many of them have probably been offended by one or two minorities in their life time. However, the fact that someone could hate an entire race because of a couple of people is absolutely far fetched and ridiculous. It also seems to be the type of people who like being pissed off because they think it is badass.

One of the things that I noticed specifically about this scene is that at certain moments the camera would flash other stills from throughout the scene in fast motion. It seems to be coming from Derek's mind, in my opinion. These flashbacks from the scene seem to illustrate Derek's adrenaline rush. It makes me feel as if Derek is having a good time battling for the courts. I also noticed that there were quite a few close ups on the black leader's face. Every time, he had a horribly mean look on his face. Another important shot was at the end of the scene as the other whites are lifting Derek in victory. The camera is far below him and seems to look up at him in awe. He seems to smirk at the world in his blind victory and hatred.