Pulls me up short every time!
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Film and Television Discussion
catlady1412 — 15 years ago(December 03, 2010 01:19 AM)
I know this movie is a product of its time and the time is 1932, but there are two places where Walter Huston says lines so breathtakingly racist that it startles me every time I see this movie! However, I am glad that TCM has not censored it. Listen for the lines and they should be glaringly obvious which ones I am referring to.
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nateba — 15 years ago(December 07, 2010 01:46 PM)
I know this movie is a product of its time and the time is 1932, but there are two places where Walter Huston says lines so breathtakingly racist that it startles me every time I see this movie!
I caught that one 'white man' line. What's the other one?
cinefreak -
gribfritz2 — 15 years ago(April 01, 2011 09:22 PM)
Huston says, "That's mighty white of you," to the two detectives who offer to help his brother on his assignment. The debate rages (or at least would rage if the phrase were more commonplace) over whether that phrase has racist roots, but most believe it does. The opposition claim that, typically, the color white is good, pure, etc So saying it's white of you just means it's good of you.
For a line not spoken by Huston, "Fitz is nothing but a tough, uncouth Irishman." "Irishman" is used instead of "mick" or some other derogatory term, but the context of the line implies that Fitzpatrick is not fit to be Chief of Police because he is Irish. Notice how everyone misses this one because it isn't racist against blacks. It's just as racist as the others since the ethnicity is mentioned. Imagine if it were "Fitz can't be Chief of Police. He's just a violent, uncultured black guy." Sadly, in today's culture, changing "Irishman" to "black man" makes it easier for most to identify the racism. -
Eightythreeyearoldguy — 14 years ago(June 21, 2011 01:13 PM)
"That's mighty white of you" is undoubtedly racist, but there were so many racist phrases when I was growing up that it was only in adult years that I suddenly realized it was racist.
I haven't watched this film yet, but the Irishman line might be excusable if it only expressed the attitude of the character speaking it. Like, for comparison, there's the line in THE UNTOUCHABLES in which Sean Connery speaks a flagrantly racist line to the Italian, but that is done deliberately in order to recruit him.
Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies -
Devans00 — 14 years ago(November 18, 2011 05:52 PM)
gribfritz2 and Seventyeightyearoldguy, I don't know of any use of expressions like "That's mighty white of you," in Europe or any place without a significant Black population. In fact, it's one of the catch phrases of the Klu Klux Klan which flourished in the 1920s and 1930s. Back then, it was kinda like joining the Tea Party in the 2000s.
No two persons ever watch the same movie. -
gribfritz2 — 14 years ago(November 28, 2011 10:26 PM)
So because the phrase isn't said in Europe and because the KKK used it then the origin of the term must be racist? It IS possible that it is simply an American saying (I can think of hundreds of "American" idioms no one in Europe uses). It is also possible that the KKK altered the original meaning to suit their agenda.
There is a saying "to call a spade a spade." Since "spade" was a derogatory term for blacks at one time, this saying must be racist. Yet it isn't since the saying vastly pre-dates colonial slavery. Now if someone like the KKK later took the saying and tried to give it a racist meaning, they certainly could. Yet the original saying is not racist.
Anyway, my point was, and still is, that a man of Irish descent is racially slurred in the film. Everyone picks up on a saying which may or may not even be racist yet they miss the even more obvious (to me) racism in what is said to the Irish man. I'd also like to add, I have no problem with racism being portrayed in any film, just as I have no problem with infidelity, murder, etc These are things that happen in real life, like racism, so it makes no sense why they should be excised from a film and there's no reason anyone should be astonished or upset that they appear in a film.
Also, the mentioning of the Tea Party is superfluous and has no bearing on this conversation. I see no reason to throw that in except to stir crap up. So if that's what you're after, why not head instead to some political thread where the Dems can complain about the Reps, the Reps can complain about the Dems, and both sides can sit there spouting rhetoric, nonsense, and blame while the entire country collapses on both sides of morons. -
Devans00 — 10 years ago(December 22, 2015 12:58 PM)
I see. One of those fools who refuse to learn verifiable history. And is proud to be ignorant.
Life must be so hard what with everyone else being so "wrong" all the time. Only you and your buddies know the "truth", right?
No two persons ever watch the same movie. -
dannieboy20906 — 10 years ago(March 03, 2016 10:37 AM)
Devans00, I think you're a schmuck, but I also think that you are partly right, even if you are partly wrong.
I refer you to this URL: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3179
I had heard through most of my formative years that the phrase originally had no reference to skin color, but was a reference to character. The site I reference above summarizes considerable research on the phrase and it is a positive reference to character. However, those uses also make it clear that the phrase is racist implying that people who do not have "white" skin can not be trusted to have virtuous character. In particular, non-whites are by implication not expected to behave honestly and fairly. It is a good phrase to drop from polite use and I am glad that we have.
At the same time, it is also apparent that the phrase was usually used outside of the southern states and was used to mean white as opposed to: indigenous American tribal people, Jews, Irish, Italians, sometimes Latinos, and in some cases Blacks or African-Americans. In other words, African-Americans are among those 'victimized' by the phrase, but they are far from alone and probably not those foremost in the thoughts of people who used the phrase as not being "white."
The best diplomat I know is a fully charged phaser bank. -
zill_o_the_wisp — 14 years ago(January 14, 2012 02:25 PM)
Original definition:
"Mighty White of You": It is an insult that means that you are both clueless and arrogant. It is said in a situation where someone has said or done something as a gift or a favor for which they believe they should earn thanks, but is so ineffective or was delivered in such a condescending manner, that they have insulted the person they are pretending to help.
It has gone through several transformations through the years, and by the late 1970s it is almost exclusively used sarcastically, in the racial context.
In the Coen brothers movie 'O Brother Where Art Thou?', the young blues musician who is rescued from the KKK by a trio of nitwits (Three Stooges style) thanks then profusely and says "That's mighty white of you boys." Of course, this is the ultimate irony for contemporary usage.
I don't know of it's historical usage within the Klan of the 1920s and onward.
As far as I know, it was spoken without racial inference for many people, for many years.
Think of how many phrases have "black" in them that aren't referring to skin color.
If somebody says in a movie that another character is in a "black mood," (to mean a foul mood) that may strike some hypersensitive modern ears are having a racial connotation.
Let me assure you, in the history of language, "white" and "black" have a meaning that predates the modern obsession with race.
Often, using these words has nothing inherently to do with racism. -
balducci2 — 9 years ago(April 12, 2016 09:14 PM)
When Huston is interrogating the two gunmen in his office, just after he catches them in their lie about the card game, he mentions how they also forgot to tell him about 'killing one of the finest white men that ever lived'.
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deltascorch90 — 14 years ago(December 12, 2011 09:53 PM)
You people are ridiculous it is like you go through the history of civilization to brand everything as racist in order to justify the backwardness of the modern day. They lost a fine white man, isn't that a fact? What makes it racist? ISN'T he a white man? Should we pretend that he isn't of the Indo European race and instead metaphorically replace some of the characters in our minds with an even distribution of people from all races so as not to offend precious racial minorities whose entire communities are offended by minuscule things?
Why not just accept it: your calls for racism are, at heart, fueled by anti-white sentiments notice that nothing can ever be racist if it is directed at white people, because, according to your modern day doctrines, racism only applies to every single person who isn't an Indo European.
I watched this film and found it to be glorious. I expected to come to IMDB and see people praising Walter Huston on giving a great performance, who -took my breath- in being such a character of good virtues with true justice at heart, yet this is what we have instead.
I am an Indo European and I am proud I understand that that automatically makes me a racist in modern society, and that's something I've accepted a long time ago. We've built an incredible civilization. It' something to be proud of. -
john kenrick — 9 hours ago(April 03, 2026 07:44 AM)
The use of the word white as a compliment is true to life; or rather, was, in America, and I've heard it in other films. My father told me that that was a common turn of praise when he was growing up and as a young man. When I asked him the meaning, as in "is it a compliment due to someone not being black?" he said no, that it wasn't specifically about that. It was closer to white being something closer to "bright", like the sun, or lamps, and phrases like "pure as the driven snow" (I think that's right) when referring to someone's morals, most commonly for a woman.
Darkness, leaving aside race, has always had a negative aspect, at least in the Western World, as in "dark deeds", the dark side of the street. Then there's the "let's clear things up" being referred to "let's shed some light on this". Black is generally not a popular color. House are seldom painted black. I had a friend, in high school, and a big fan of what was often called black or dark humor, and he painted his bedroom black as an ironic "statement". In psychology books, not much now but back in the early to mid-20th century, Depression was being in a dark or black mood. No less an admired public figure than Winston Churchill referring to his bad days and depressive spells as "black dog", or a black dog came for a visit; that sort of thing.