Cliches in The Hurt Locker
Maryam Ismail (AT HOME) / 30 March 2010
The film The Hurt Locker is an infomercial for the war on terror, reiterating the one-sided portrayal of US soldiers as self-sacrificing and hardworking. Iraqis in the film however are corrupt, sneaky, and cowardly. Conversely, this film made by a woman, had only one woman in it whose lines don’t amount to a single paragraph.
Maryam Ismail (AT HOME) / 30 March 2010
The film The Hurt Locker is an infomercial for the war on terror, reiterating the one-sided portrayal of US soldiers as self-sacrificing and hardworking. Iraqis in the film however are corrupt, sneaky, and cowardly. Conversely, this film made by a woman, had only one woman in it whose lines don’t amount to a single paragraph.
The
voices of the women, especially those affected by the war are hard to find. It’s
time to create an oral history of victims of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan,
Palestine, Lebanon. In this project there can be no wailing, chest pounding,
grovelling, moaning or bizarre conspiracy theories. Just voices of women, girls, and
mothers-whose voices have been locked up in the sort of media ventriloquism of
aid workers, documentary makers, UN officials, and powerless
peace
activists.
The
traditional media outlets of AP, UPI, Reuters, as well as other global players
have split the discourse into two sides colouring one hero and the other
terrorist and for the most part, both are male. To spice up this black and white
canvas, there are stories of Iraqi women and girls being forced into
prostitution or unwanted refugees who’ve been rejected as asylum seekers. But
what about those who remain behind? How do they cope with the battalions of
missionaries, social reformers, and cultural opportunists coming to ‘save
them’?
I
found a warm fuzzy story about happy refugees who’ve made peace with their
predicament and the suffering on the web site, Teacherstv. This video about
Iraqi refugee children in Syria, was reminiscent of the 18th century
polemics of the happy slave, when no one is happy. But it’s human nature to take
the worst situation and do the best you can with it. In my search for videos
about Iraqi moms, I found a horrendous video from Parents TV promoting a
children organisation called Campfire USA. Armed with a scheme called ‘Operation
Iraqi children’, Campfire USA organised a school supplies drive for Iraqi
children. readmore
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