Recently I expressed some concern at the look of the new film adaptations of the Earthsea novels by Ursula Le Guin. She’s not a happy bunny either, as she explains at Slate, under the title “Whitewashed: Earthsea How the Sci Fi Channel wrecked my books“.
16Dec04 — 1
She says:I think it is possible that some readers never even notice what color the people in the story are. Don’t notice, don’t care. Whites of course have the privilege of not caring, of being “colorblind.” Nobody else does.I’m not sure how I sit with that. I think she’s grouping all whites together and attributing them with a “privilage” with strong implications. A privilage that reflects a certain kind of thinking or feeling to them (or perhaps a state of mind). Is there a word for this attitude of hers?