Racism and Sexual Predation
By now, the words Birth of a Nation and racist propaganda are almost inextricable. The state of things have reached the point where it is all but impossible to separate the sheer cinematic genius on display in the film from its aggressively forthright racism. But what exactly is the racism about in the film? It is complex to be sure and make no mistake that it is not rooted in a logic of its own. That logic is perverse, but it can be traced. The racism is not really directed toward black woman, though they hardly come off well, either. But the racist ideology is defined by the threat of black males; specifically, it is linked to the threat they pose to white women. The much-touted situating of the KKK as heroes is intensely connected to the idea of an aggressive black male sexuality posing a threat to the purity of the races through the process of miscegenation. Because the virtue of white women—and by metaphorical extension the virtue of the white race which women breed—is at the stake, the violence of the KKK becomes justified through the lens of protecting that purity. Even more perversely, this means that the film was also intended to suggest that the Klan is actually working on the behalf of the black race as well since it is works to protect their purity by ensuring mingling of bloodlines.
The Preservation of the Old South
The director uses the power of film like a cannon to blow through reality and recreate a post-war conditioning that the South before the war was an idealized utopia. And, indeed, for many wealthy whites it probably was as close as America ever got. The imagery of white southerners is heavily veered toward the prevailing mythic stereotypes of the gentlemanly aristocrat and their devoted women. The only images one gets of a cruelty existing there arrives after the war when Reconstruction gives power and freedom to blacks who apparently are congenitally unequipped to handle it. The film’s message is simple and startling: it was, by racist logic, abolition which made the south ugly.
Who are the Planters?
Even more disturbing is one of the film’s intertitles—those cards appearing on the screen of silent movies in lieu of spoken dialogue:
“The bringing of the African to America planted the first seed of disunion.”
Defenders of the film on purely cinematic terms as well as apologists suggesting the movie only seems wretchedly excessive in its racism when viewed out of the context of its time may have several viable points to argue. It is undeniably true that regardless of the political content, Birth of a Nation is nothing less than a work of a visionary genius who can truly be said to have something never done before. And, yes, there are certain allowances to be made for viewing a film made a century ago through the lens of racial sensitivity gained through a hundred years of struggle. Given all that, however, there should be just and only one possible interpretation of that that title card which essentially sets for the film its foundation of socio-historical thought. By any logical application of the facts relative to this statement, the meaning is unambiguously clear that the seeds of disunion were planted by the slave traffickers who abducted Africans from their homeland and white plantation owners who bought them at auction and kept them in bondage. The problem is that the context is far from clear and is, in fact, purposely ambiguous and misleading. While it is certainly not accurate to suggest that the title card explicitly places blame on the African who was brought to America, it is equally accurate to point out that it does nothing to absolve them of this blame either. What is left is an unclear statement about just which part of this transaction the film is casting aspersions upon for planting the seeds of disunion. What is not unclear is how the film then proceeds to make it very clear that the roots of the Civil War and all the bloodshed leading to it, during it, and following it were sewn not by the traffickers and plantation owners but the slaves themselves.
