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Huck Finn :racism [mumbling]

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[mumbling]

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[mumbling] well Huck's got a huge problem. Any

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guesses on what it might be? besides I mean old pap and being on the

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lamb? Huck's got some seriously racist tendencies, especially when we first meet

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him. he drops the N bomb a lot and isn't sorry about it. it's one of the reasons [Huck drops N bomb out of window]

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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn ends up on all those banned books lists.

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seriously what do you want to read a story about a 12 year old bigot? so yeah [novel "huckleberry finn" with a banned stamp on it]

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Huck starts out as a racist but Twain has a reason behind casting Huck this

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way. he wants to show us how ridiculous racists are. and he has a really sneaky

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way of doing it. well the problem starts like it does for a lot of racist, with [Jim walks away and Pap appears]

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Pap. Pap likes to drink. a lot. and even when he's sober he has a lot of stupid

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ideas about hating black. people he doesn't just hate us because he thinks

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we're criminals or dumb or dangerous. so all of those are probably [Pap throws a bottle at Jim]

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what he thinks. it's our very existence the man hates and kids pick up on that

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much hate. but racism exists at every level of society, no matter where you

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turn it spits in your face, at any time for no good reason.

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well Twain wanted to say that racism can be built into people. that it was a

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permanent part of culture. Well, just take a look at how pap talks

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[mumbling]

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[mumbling]

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[mumbling]

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Twain used local vernacular to show us how common people in Missouri could be

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seen as bigots. and how they might teach you this grand philosophy to their kids [vernacular explained]

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too. in fact that's another big point Twain wants to make :racist act like

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children. not smart ones. they don't think rationally about what they're doing or

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saying they base their assumptions on silly reasons that don't make sense they

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stick by them no matter how much evidence to the contrary piles up. well

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it's just like a kid who doesn't want to eat her meatloaf, except

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stead of meatloaf it's treating other people like human beings.

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and instead of a kid well it's the mayor. which brings us to Huck who as I've

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stated is pretty racist himself. uses the n-word whenever he can. he argues with me

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me about the merits of slavery. and he treats me like a fool even though he's

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the one with his priorities all out of whack.

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he's a kid just like all racists. in the ways that count but even that's not

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deep enough for a guy like Twain. he shows us how systemic racism is and how

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foolish it is .but then he shows us that Huck can grow and change and rise above

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his ignorant upbringing. that a kid can figure things out and become a better

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person. that idea hits hardest in chapter 15 where husk apologizes to me after

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trying to trick me. it was 15 minutes before I could work myself up to go and [Huck Finn novel quoted]

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humble myself - but I've done it and i warn't ever sorry for it afterwards

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neither. well suddenly we see something that had always been there but was just

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waiting for this moment to come tap-dancing out .huck learns to respect

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me to treat me as an equal and suddenly that racist label looks a lot less

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appropriate. we actually see him fighting against his racism in that line. he had

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to think about apologizing for playing a mean trick which is something you do for

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a dog after only pretending to throw the tennis ball away. and yet after a

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struggle he is able to give me a sincere apology. he doesn't even regret doing it

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and the bars pretty low, but even so it's a change for the better.

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Huck's still too young to know the difference. and he's fighting the lessons

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of a whole society who thinks it's cool to treat black people as something less [woman carries laundry basket]

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than human. but as we head down the river together Huck sees that I'm much more

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than just a slave ,and he revises his opinion. ready for the part that will

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really blow your mind? well that spiritual journey Huck takes

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the one from being a racist kid to being a worthwhile human being ,matches the

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actual journey we take down the river .a journey away from the society he knew. a

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journey away from the racism that society was way too comfortable with,

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and journey towards what? peace freedom acceptance ?I don't know but he sure

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looks comfortable over there doesn't he? well naturally some people

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didn't like the way Twain delivered that lesson. they didn't think it was right to

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show a young bigoted a hero or to use the n-word so many times. it's an ugly

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word after all maybe ugliest. but some people even thought that Twain himself

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was a racist simply because of the language .even though he was saying the

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most anti racist things imaginable with this book. and for the record Twain

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raised a lot of money to help educate freed slaves after the Civil War,

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still it rubs people the wrong way and you'll see classrooms and libraries ban

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it from time to time. there was even an edition of the book released in 2011

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that replaced the n-word with the word slave .which kind of misses the whole [revised text pictured]

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point. well it's supposed to be an ugly word it's supposed to make you

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uncomfortable .hiding it just waters down what Twain was trying to say. but

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confronting racism and seeing what life was like for people back in the day is

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well worth writing about. and that's too important to let some twitchy politician

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take the story out of circulation. as much as we may want it to be otherwise

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racism is a big part of our history .only by seeing it for what it is can we get

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rid of it for good. like Huck does. and seriously like if he can do it anyone

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can. [Jim stands next to river]

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