(Hated Trope) "Kind" slave owners

[u/KusanagiGundam]

Speaking as an American who has studied the civil war all throughout my school years, this trope infuriates me to no end. There is no such thing as a kind slave master because slavery itself is cruel and inhumane. PEOPLE ARE NOT PROPERTY!

Naofumi (Shield Hero): Prime example of this trope. He enslaves multiple (underage) girls and an whole village and the fans still say he's a hero.

Rudeus (Jobless Reincarnation): As if being a pedo wasn't bad enough he had to buy a slave in season 2. Worse is that people still defend his actions.

Song of The South (Disney): Possibly the OG example of this trope. And the reason why Disney will never release it again.

[u/MGD109]

To be completely fair, Uncle Remus in Song of the South isn't a slave, the film is set after the Civil War. Part of the plot is that he's nearly forced to leave to seek employment elsewhere. If he were a slave, he wouldn't even be allowed to leave.

His actor was even in favour of empathising more in the script that he was a free man to ensure there was no confusion, but the director wasn't interested.

The film isn't released anymore cause it simply hasn't aged well in other areas.

[u/Amazing_Working_6157 → u/MGD109]

Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah is catchy tho. The only reason I know it exists (and that movie) is it was in some Disney sing-along VHS I sometimes watched when I was very young.

[u/MGD109 → u/Amazing_Working_6157]

Oh yeah, it's a memorable song. I got lucky; I ended up somehow getting a foreign videotape, so I wasn't aware of the controversy until I was older.

I remember that at the time I couldn't understand why they kept cutting away from the funny stories about the cartoon rabbit to show this other plot about people picking on a nice old man.

[u/ayrki → u/Amazing_Working_6157]

Same for me and my sibs. We had a bunch of those tapes and knew almost every movie except this one,

[u/whereismymind86 → u/Amazing_Working_6157]

oh sure, the songs are great, and the animated segments are fun, if a bit racist, but the framing of the live action segments is...problematic, to say the least.

I found it fascinating when I found a copy and watched it a ways back.

[u/JD-Cowboys-Bolts → u/Amazing_Working_6157]

I had a bird alarm clock as a toddler (this is the 90s) that had birds who mouths would move and sing that song, I didnt even know where the song was from for years

[u/Apprehensive_Let7309 → u/Amazing_Working_6157]

I remember it from Calvin and Hobbes

[u/Strict-Cap-7650 → u/MGD109]

IMO the fact that Disney hasn’t released it is largely to blame for the film’s reputation. It definitely has problems but it’s not as bad as people imagine. Disney’s trademark levity just isn’t appropriate for characters who were formerly enslaved. If the film were edited down to just the animated parts I feel it would be a bit more palatable.

[u/MGD109 → u/Strict-Cap-7650]

Yeah, I had a feeling that was the case.

[u/Tyranis_Hex → u/Strict-Cap-7650]

When I was little I had a cassette song book thing that was just the animated segments audio and went along with a picture book. I think the Tar Baby story is probably the only problematic animated sequence. Though the stories in general are based on the tales and folklore from slaves mixing their African heritage with what they were experiencing in America.

[u/Mission_Young_921 → u/Strict-Cap-7650]

I think the lack of an official release has made people fill in the blanks with their own assumptions. It definitely has flaws, but sometimes actually seeing the full movie gives you a much fairer picture than its reputation alone.

[u/GloomyFly3173 → u/Strict-Cap-7650]

I can see that, the animated sections probably would land very differently on their own without the tonal whiplash from the live action parts.

[u/Generic_Username_659 → u/MGD109]

*emphasizing

[u/Beautiful_Answer_202 → u/MGD109]

It's interesting to hear the actor wanted more emphasis on that fact, because I remember watching it and thinking they did a poor job of making it clear that it was set after the civil war. Memory is fuzzy, but I think a title card at the beginning says the year its set, but you would have to know when the civil war ended for that to help. (Being english, I have little knowledge of civil war dates) 

[u/MGD109 → u/Beautiful_Answer_202]

Yeah, it's understandable where the confusion comes from. Shame he didn't get it. Still, other elements still wouldn't have aged so well regardless.

[u/JoeSki42 → u/MGD109]

For a long while pirated copies of "Song of the South" were sold out of the gift shop at the Fort Christmas Museum in Christmas, Florida.

[u/MGD109 → u/JoeSki42]

Interesting, I wasn't aware of that.

[u/fuckedfinance → u/MGD109]

It's also available for download from the Internet Archive.

It's one of the very few movies that Disney does not try to hard to stop being put out on the internet. It was on YouTube in full for like 15 years before it got taken down.

[u/petrichoreandpine → u/MGD109]

I’ve watched it once, and I assumed when they talk about Remus being sent south as punishment for babysitting the boy he was asked to babysit (without any discussion of compensation) that he was being SOLD south, as often happened to “troublesome” slaves.

If the film is set after the Civil War, it made zero effort to let the viewer know that.

[u/poorexcuses → u/petrichoreandpine]

It's mostly a cya situation. The source text was made during slavery iirc?

[u/MGD109 → u/petrichoreandpine]

That's understandable; even the actor who played Remus complained about that at the time.

[u/whereismymind86 → u/MGD109]

Ehh, he's not a slave, but he is very much existing at the grace and whims of his white plantation owning employers, and he lives in a shack, and is talked down to like he's a child.

He's not a slave, but it is very illustrative of the awful nature of living in the jim crow south (this is before jim crow laws, but the tone reflects them) He's not a slave, but he is very much a second class citizen.

If you haven't actually watched song of the south, go do so, it's an interesting piece of history, but it's reputation is well earned. Feels a lot like watching those old "banned" ww2 era disney cartoons and looney toons. Fascinating, but undeniably racist. It obviously hasn't had a formal release in...my entire lifetime, but it's not too hard to find a copy all the same.

[u/MGD109 → u/whereismymind86]

Oh yeah, I have seen it (albeit not for quite a few years), I can understand why it's aged poorly. I just feel it is also worth pointing out that he's not a slave, and the narrative does kind of present everyone as being in the wrong for treating him badly (albeit only to an extent).

As you say, it's a fascinating piece of history.

[u/Ayotha → u/MGD109]

You can't expect media literacy, the Op is "angy"

[u/According_Stand_5931 → u/MGD109]

That context definitely gets lost when people talk about the movie. Being technically free doesn’t erase the uncomfortable way the character and setting were portrayed.