Bruno's Prejudice
Sacha Baron Cohen is at his best when he's at his most political. Taken together, his three characters from Da Ali G Show constitute a body of work more like the work of a muckraking journalist than that of a comedian, work that reminds audiences of the vital place of comedy in our culture.
Baron Cohen has positioned himself as a man unafraid of speaking truth to power with his balls out, quite literally. Borat's cultural awkwardness brings out our geographical ignorance and prejudice towards those who are "not like us." Ali G's interviews with politicians and dignitaries serve as shocking testaments to how humorless, clueless, and out-of-touch our policy makers and elected officials are.
When we first met Bruno on Da Ali G Show, he seemed to be a combination of the two: his outrageous couture and unabashedly "out" behavior take Borat's act to a more threatening place where people express entrenched homophobic views, while his interviews do for vacuous celebrities and fashionistas what Ali G does for politicians.
This quality endows Bruno with the potential to be Baron Cohen's most provocative statement; unfortunately, however, Bruno limits its target to American homophobia, and while the events of the film do indeed expose prejudice toward homosexuals, they also reveal a fallacy at the heart of Baron Cohen's work: Baron Cohen has some prejudices of his own.
Baron Cohen and director Larry Charles believe that every white person in the South (or perhaps America at large) is a gay-hating redneck Jesus freak. The film serves mainly as an attempt to confirm their preconceived notions. Of course they find what they're looking for, just as anyone who goes looking in reality for evidence of stereotypes will if s/he looks hard enough ... Or if his/her prejudices are strong enough. We don't see anyone in the film contradict this stereotype or surprise Baron Cohen and Charles with his/her tolerance because Baron Cohen and Charles aren't interested in having their assumptions tested. That would complicate their simplistic worldview. Besides, they might add, that kind of stuff is not funny.
But actually, such an incident makes for perhaps the most hilarious moment of Borat. When Borat disrupts a southern woman's dinner party by bringing his feces to her in a plastic bag because he doesn't understand how to use a toilet, we laugh at the uncomfortable breach of etiquette, but we also are amazed by how hard the woman works to maintain her composure. What's funny is not that she's a small-minded bigot, but that she's a big-hearted woman bending over backwards to help make a guest feel welcome in her home. We leave that scene thinking more of that woman than we did at the start, and we still laugh our asses off.
For a film that claims to fight against prejudice, Bruno fights it with a prejudice of its own. Is this revelatory? Is this progressive? Or is it simply trading one kind of blind disdain for another, albeit a kind more politically correct and culturally hip?
Baron Cohen and Charles are, to paraphrase Woody Allen, "bigots for the left," and their comedy serves to reassure people who already agree with them that their dislike for the South, Christianity, and Conservatism are well-founded and not the stuff of prejudice or bigotry but rather fact. One could speculate that Baron Cohen and Charles may think it's impossible to be both liberal and prejudiced, or, to put it more bluntly, liberal and incorrect. Part of their invincibility on-screen comes from their outright fearlessness, but part of it also comes from a supreme sense of superiority.
Both Borat and Bruno reveal Larry Charles' and Sacha Baron Cohen's comedy to be deeply rooted in a cynical contempt for people. No one is above reproach for them; everyone is a total idiot, a total hypocrite, a total bigot, or all of the above. Everyone, that is, except for Baron Cohen and Charles. And while we might find their particular kind of contempt amusing, even hilarious, their intent and methods only differ from Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh with regards to politics, and that's not funny at all.
Follow Mike Miley on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Don't Tweet
William Bradley: Why the Big Fade for Bruno?
Why the big fade? It's actually not much of a mystery. Once you see the movie, the only mystery is why it wasn't predicted in the first place.
Sean L. McCarthy: "Bruno" And The Irony Of Satire
What happens when you're lampooning someone, or some segment of society, but in exposing their ridiculous notions, they only think you're promoting their cause?
Loading comments…
Want to reply to a comment? Hint: Click "Reply" at the bottom of the comment; after being approved your comment will appear directly underneath the comment you replied to
"Baron Cohen has positioned himself as a man unafraid of speaking truth to power"
I see it otherwise. He is a coward, as seen in Borat. His comedy rises from insecurities about his own country. It is easy to get Americans to act strange, with little coaxing, in front of a camera. Most of his vignettes are made to placate himself, a psychological displacement, to impose that which he sees in his own country upon Americans. He is not the first Briton to do it.
Britain is more racist, more anti-semitic, than America. It has its hicks and rubes and prudes too. The one insecurity he plays out I don't understand is his attacks on American "high class" etiquette types. Britain certainly has its share, and its snobs undoubtedly exceed America's. Perhaps he feels he cannot attack British of this type because it would lose him entree to friends and society.
If he did his routine among the British public, that would be brave.
You may not be aware that Baron Cohen was famous in the UK for doing exactly the same sort of routines for a LONG time before America was even aware of his existence. He took his work to America because that's where the showbiz money (and largest market) is -- and because he was so well known in the UK that his schtick didn't work any more.
I have no idea where you get the idea that Britain is "more racist, more anti-semitic" than America. Having grown up over there and lived in a number of different countries since then before moving to North America, I see no real evidence to back that statement up.
well i will say that I was born and raised in Boston. Living in Boston I had seen old racist Irish and Italians, and the Southie neighborhood in Boston still has a pretty big problem with racism...so I knew there were POCKETS of it, but I figured it was pretty much a dead issue in mainstream society.
When I went down South I was floored. I had heard the "n" word said disparagingly by a white person maybe a handful of times in my life...suddenly I was hearing it in casual conversation on an almost daily basis. I saw police officers stopping black people and harassing them for the crime of walking outside at night. There a few cases of minorities getting beat up, and MANY cases of establishments for minorities being vandalized or defaced.
But on the other hand..,there were plenty of tolerant people too. I never hurt for friends, and the multi cultural organizations never hurt for members. There WERE KKK and Neo Nazi rallies in nearby areas...but the crowds PROTESTING these groups were ten times larger than the crowds attending, and there were plenty of white people there.
Also, in later years I went to the midwest and northwest, to places like Montata and South Dakota it was WAY worse than it had been in the South. People forget that the most prominant racist and militant right wing groups are in the Northwest, not in the South.
One might say that Cohen's film works and does what it is supposed to do just by looking at this comment board. He wants to start a discussion. He wants to make us - ALL of us- uncomfortable and put issues like bigotry and hate and racism in our faces so we feel like we HAVE to talk about it. If this is an example, then he is succeeding.
I read a lot of these comments and there seems to be an attitude that all prejudice is all equal. Some Southerners here feel attacked and point out that when they leave the South, people make fun of their accents, etc. Yes, that's annoying, to be sure, and unfortunate. But to equate that with the kind of bigotry where gays and people of color fear for their physical safety is an imbalanced comparison.
I've yet to hear any stories of gangs of liberals lynching anyone, or beating anyone to death and leaving them on a fence as a warning for all to see, or pulling someone for miles on dirt roads chained from the bumper of a pickup truck.
In my 41+ years, from what I've seen, there is a violent line that gets crossed more often by bigots on the Right than by bigots on the Left.
Yes....all the stories of gangs of liberals lynching anyone, etc. etc. that you've never heard of and that have never happened...that would be reverse racism. So until that stuff starts happening (which it never will because Liberals tend to show emotions like compassion and empathy rather than hate and bigotry) until that stuff happens, Rush Limbaugh and Pat Buchanan can shut up with their "reverse racism".
I certainly don't equate being discriminated against b/c of my accent with getting beat b/c of being gay or an ethnic minority. But it IS discrimination and it IS widespread and it's more extensive than having people "make fun of my accent," so please don't minimize that fact. All prejudice is not equal, but all prejudice is prejudice and we should speak out against all prejudice when we see/hear/read it.
I do agree, though, that the conservative Right crosses the line of violence far, far more than progressive Liberals, and that violence is usually astounding in its ferocity. My intent was never to minimize that sort of violence.
exactly.
I am a yankee who went to college in the south.
While I was at college, the Muslim mosque, Jewish Temple, and Catholic Church were all defaced with anti Muslim/Semetic/Catholic rhetoric. There were often southern baptists who would stand outside these three buildings as well as the Harry Krishna house yelling VERY offensively and aggresively at people as they went to services.
When a latina ran for class president, the latnio-American house on campus was VERY badly vandalized, and the vandals left anti hispanic slogans painted on the wall.
The science building where evolution classes were taught was defaced with anti evolution rhetoric.
Several Muslim and gay kids got beat up while I was at school for no other reason than being Muslim or gay.
The LBGT association received death threats while I was there.
I was constantly told jokes about killing yankees when people found out I was one. Also I have a Jewish name and am very Jewish looking (though I am not actually Jewish) and I received my fair share of anti semetic comments.
Yet there was not a single instance of a Baptist Church being vandalized. Never a case of a Republican or conservative association being attacked or defaced. Never a white southerner who got beat up by a minority for being a white southerner.
Is making fun of someone's accent stupid and petty? Of course. Now excuse me while I play the world's smallest violin.
I should also point out that none of things (blatant attacks against whites, or conservative establishments) happened at my Northern friends' schools either, even at schools like UMass Amherst which is considered one of the most liberal schools in the country. People may have protested ACTIONS by conservative groups, or written school paper articles about them, but that's just expressing your opinion, and I had no problem with people who did these things in the South against liberal groups either.
"Bruno" isn't very good and it's not as good as when the character was on Cohen's show, because Cohen is getting more desperate to get a reaction.
I'm pretty sure if you go to the South, you'll find most of the people who voted for Bush twice. You'll find most of the people that make up that dumb Alaskan hockey mom's base. You'll find the half of the country that believes it's ok for the U.S. to TORTURE people SUSPECTED of terrorism. You'll find the half of the country that hi-jacked Jesus and painted him white but would call the Feds if the real dark, long haired, Palestinean, Jewish Jesus ever stepped on their front lawn or sat next to them on a plane. Thats If they ever even fly anywhere because they believe they're in the "real" America and everything outside is Socialist Communist secret Muslim America.. I know everyone in the South is NOT a gay hating, redneck, Jesus Freak. But most gay hating, redneck, Jesus Freaks are from the South. Just like I know not all Republican's and Conservatives are racist, but most racists are Republican or Conservative.
Well said .
I
The author is assuming Cohen's left bigotry without any proof. The only proof provided is that Cohen has isolated a part of the Southern Christian society as being bigoted. Which we all know is true, whether it is 25 percent or 75 percent of the population. Perhaps, the author should work to change the uneducated bigotry in the South rather than criticize Cohen for shining light on this bigotry.
HalfBakedSushi, Can I get a witness?! As a very well educated Southerner, feminist and liberal (who, in fact has been largely disowned by her family for her ideals) I despise traveling anywhere outside of the South for the very reason you describe. Instead of recognizing that Southerners are no more homogenous than any other regional group, I tend to be stereotyped instantly. If I am not immediately suspected of having a white sheet wardrobe, then I am patronized regarding my "cute" accent. I am convinced that the South is indeed the scapegoat for the entire country, to make it feel supeior and deny the need for ALL of us to take a long hard look in the mirror!
Indeed so, Orleansbebe. I have met some of the most interesting people while traveling from one coast to the other, but have also been witness to some of the most widespread stereotyping and dismissal, as well as some minor verbal abuse and once a situation that could have turned incredibly ugly but for situational serendipity - all originating b/c I am Southern.
Sadly, it's also quite difficult sometimes to be a well educated liberal and feminist living IN the South - as you seem to have experienced within your own family. All the best to you.
I saw bits of Borat , and I can't imagine bothering to watch Bruno, even for free. Your take is spot on. I saw the baggie scene, and the horror that his date was "a black prostitute." Cohen didn't have a point to make; he was just tossing feces. If the woman had been an educationed, attractive black with the ability to move effortlessly in that group, then the reaction would be racist. His date was not welcome there for the same reason a white English professor would not be welcome at a black pajama party.
Calling the woman was a racist because she didn't want that particular woman at her dinner party is exactly the sort of liberal prejudice you are talking about. The hostess opens her home to him, he brings in a person who is totally out of place there, and her being dismayed is "prejudice"? If I invite you to my house and you show up with a couple of large, unruly dogs, does my dismay mean I hate dogs?
The things Bruno does to people as a homosexual would be just as unacceptable if he weren't. If I refuse to let a man I just met give me a big, wet kiss, buI don't let strange women do that either. If somebody presents himself as a stereotype homosexual, and I don't like him, it might be because I don't like people who pretend to be gay.
But is it fair to speak out against something you admit you haven't seen?
Granted, 'Borat' and 'Bruno' aren't for everyone but at least watch them before commenting so strongly.
Oh dear Lord. You did not say "Educationed", did you???
Oh poor christians and southerners! How awful that a movie made fun of them by showing them being all bigotted! In real settings, where they act just like they feel like, and are then recorded. How unfair!
If you think the southern bible belt is so "tolerant" and deserving, why don't you test that theory and go there yourself, and act like Bruno. Once you get insulted, taunted, and beaten, maybe you will be less aghast at the "unfairness" of showing the southern christian haters for what they are.
How many places are these christian southerners afraid to go and be themselves? Fearing that mobs of gays will beat them up? Uhhh, like no place!
Actually, I dislike traveling much in the Northeast or Western Pacific states of the United States b/c of attitudes like yours. Once I open my mouth and people hear my Southern accent, I'm often immediately dismissed and stereotyped as stupid, backward, homophobic, and racist.
And, yes, btw, there is a growing population here in the South that is, in fact, tolerant and deserving of attitudes far more understanding than yours. And, frankly, it surprises me that you live in a Southern state if you hate Southerners so much.
Certainly, there are bigots and racists in the South, but there are bigots and racists everywhere. Also, there are wonderful, giving Christians in the South who don't push their beliefs on everyone with whom they come in contact. It's true that stereotypes are borne out of reality, but I would hope that many people (especially those who "try to be flexible") would be more open to the fact that not all Southerners are stupid, backward, homophobic, and racist. Many of us fight every day to change perceptions like those as well as attitudes that lead to those perceptions.
I agree with your comment. There are bigots and racist everywhere in this nation, not only the South. You, along with the this author, have so eloquently put it in to perspective.
Stereotypes don't come out of nowhere, trooper. You can blame the stupid, backward, homophobic, racist Southerners for acting stupid, backwards, homophobic and racist and getting you branded as such simply by association.
Why make a comedy if you're going to give equal screen time to the people who aren't funny? That would be more like a documentary, which is not what he was trying to do.
Also, the same woman who was so big-hearted about the poop-in-a-bag lost her heart when confronted with Borat's dinner date--a black prostitute. Quelle horreur!
BTW, do you believe the fashionistas Bruno started the film with were southern Christians? This film skewered pretty much everybody.
I almost totally concurred with the blogger until i read your comment.Well said.
I think most people realize that not all Christians, conservatives or Southerners are anti-gay bigots. But most of them are. It would've been nice to show an example or two of non-bigotry, but the movie is still hilarious without it.
You would be surprised at the permeating prejudice against the South in the United States.
Where are your stats proving the most of the Southern population are bigots. And why is Christianity being associated with racism and bigotry. Everyone has a bigot and prejudice view of people, your post proves that.
Their voting patterns speak for themselves.
Have you seen who they vote for?
You must be logged in to comment. Log in or connect with
