Kylie Jo Schilling, 18. “If there were a poetry where this could happen not as blank spaces or as words stretched like skin over meanings but as silence falls at the end of a night through which two people have talked till dawn” Adrienne Rich igtwitter
I don’t understand what’s Jewish about mother gothel… she has a typical Disney face doesn’t she? Is it the curly hair..? I mean her nose and everything else seem normal?
I’m sorry, I’m just trying to figure it out, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.
dark curly hair - long hooked nose - darker complexion than the blond blue eyed heroine 9and really the rest of the cast - portrayed as greedy and evil.
Lisa Edelstein is Jewish. As are Idina Menzel and Amy Winehouse, both of whom I have seen compared in looks to Gothel. Gothel’s design is a pretty clear caricature of ethnically Jewish women.
This is a pretty good contrast between Rapunzel and Gothel. Rapunzel has the “typical Disney face”:
Here’s a more close up look at her features.
The hooked nose becomes even more pronounced as she becomes “eviler.”
If you wanted to claim that there was noting out of the ordinary for Disney animation when it came to Gothel’s features, you would have to find at least one Disney princess or heroine with similar characteristics (long hooked nose and dark curly hair, etc).
But here is what we have is -
small noses that turn up at the end:
wide, flatter noses (though cheers to Disney for not putting button noses on their characters of color, although Esmerelda’s clothing design deserves another essay on Rromani stereotypes and there are some major issues with Pocahontas as well)
And then a few misc noses (again, props for Jasmine’s nose not being a button):
Apart from just the design of Gothel, there’s also the whole: “obviously ‘other’ (read Jewish) woman kidnaps the pretty blonde (read: gentile) kid to use her for ritualistic/magical purposes”
Like that right there on top ofthe aesthetic Jewish-coding is what pushed the antisemitic caricature over the top for me. It harkens back to antisemitic blood libel that claimed that Jews stole gentile children for all manner of nefarious reasons. Even when Gothel is in “mother” role to Rapunzel, she’s is shown as nagging and passive aggressive, both antisemitic stereotypes of Jewish women.
There is no one thing that makes her an antisemitic caricature, but the design, plus the storyline she plays out, plus her characterization cement the overall character as antisemitic.
Jew-coding a villain is not in itself always antisemitic when there are also Jewish coded heroes. Rapunzel does not have that.
Having a villain steal a baby for magical/ritualistic reasons is not always antisemitic as long as the villain is not Jew-coded. Rapunzel fails this as well.
Having a nagging and passive aggressive mother character is not antisemitic provided that she is not, again, coded as Jewish. Rapunzel fails once again.
Hope this helps.
EDIT: @ariminak pointed out that some of my wording made it sound like Gothel’s features only stereotypically caricatured Ashkenazi women when in fact that is not the case. I changed the language to remove that phrasing and make it clear that any ethnically Jewish women can be affected by this type of aesthetic trope. If you reblogged the old version, could you please delete it and reblog this one instead.
Spread this version so people recognize that this stuff harms all Jewish women.
omfg can y’all chill the fuck out, any race can be portrayed as hero or villain, it’s a fucking kids movie not a political statement
So I’m guessing you’re white and a gentile. As such, you’ve more than likely grown up looking at tv and movies and fairytales and seeing your face in those of the heroes.
Jewish people don’t get that. When we are portrayed in live action, our characters are more often than not whitewashed and in other media, our features are used and caricaturized to create “evil looking” villains.
You don’t see it because you’ve been ingrained with the idea that “ethnic” features are just “how you make a character look evil.” You don’t look at Gothel and see your mother. You don’t see yourself and your people. You don’t see decades of propaganda aimed at fostering hate against you and ultimately seeking to destroy you.
So really, you need to chill the fuck out and stop telling marginalized people to stop talking about the tools of our own marginalization.
Let’s play a game I like to call: Movie Villain or Antisemitic Propaganda:
Many “evil witch” tropes were built on European antisemitic stereotypes, not just in appearance but in the storylines they play out as well. Greediness, stealing children, killing children, hunger for power, etc. Every time a movie villain design uses stereotyped Jewish features to communicate “evilness” to an audience, they perpetuate the marginalization of the people they are using.
One big issue I have is that Gothel’s didn’t start out as the antisemitic caricature that made it to screen. Much of the early concept art has a more dark romanticism feel.
They changed the original design. Presumably to make Gothel more “other” from the good characters in the movie. At some point, a decision was made that dark curly hair and a hooked nose wound better convey their villain.
It really doesn’t matter if any of this was intentional, I’d actually bet that it wasn’t. However, antisemitic tropes are so engrained in our societies that people like you, even when confronted with a step by step break down of what it is, feel comfortable thinking that there’s nothing wrong with it and mocking those calling it out as if we are overreacting.
You seem to have completely ignored the majority of my post. It is the character design, plus the characterization, plus the story line that mirrors blood libel that makes Gothel an antisemitic character. It’s not just about someone of a certain race or ethnicity being a villain. It’s about how stereotypes of a certain ethnic group are understood as “villainous” due to villains being repeatedly coded as Jewish over decades of film and tv.
And contrary to your naive belief, all media is political to some extent. Every time a historically present minority is not included in film (ex: lily-white Harlem in Fantastical Beasts) or when a minority character is whitewashed, or when the “ethnic” features of a minority are used almost universally to portray bad guys, it is a political and social issue. When you never see yourselves as the people who play the hero or even see your people existing in a portrayal of a place where they should be, it is not benign.
Reblogging again for these additions.
I’m screaming @ this jackass saying it’s “just a movie not a political statement” as if literally every decision that goes into making movie - ESPECIALLY an animated movie, where literally EVERYTHING the audience sees is the result of a deliberate decision - isn’t made within a larger cultural context
Being a good person is a choice. Don’t let people fool you into believing that truly good people never have bad thoughts, are never tempted by the easier path, by the low road, never mess up or act out selfishly. Never believe a person can be good without making a conscious effort.
Every single time you do something good, you’ve made a decision to make the world a little brighter.
Goodness is not an inherent trait, it is a choice. Keep making it! I see you, I’m proud of you, and I’m rooting for you!
When you love someone, it doesn’t really matter if they love you back or not. Having love in your heart for someone is its own reward or punishment, depending on the circumstances.
First of all, love is a joint experience between two persons — but the fact that it is a joint experience does not mean that it is a similar experience to the two people involved. There are the lover and the beloved, but these two come from different countries. Often the beloved is only a stimulus for all the stored-up love which had lain quiet within the lover for a long time hitherto. And somehow every lover knows this. He feels in his soul that his love is a solitary thing. He comes to know a new, strange loneliness and it is this knowledge which makes him suffer. So there is only one thing for the lover to do. He must house his love within himself as best he can; he must create for himself a whole new inward world — a world intense and strange, complete in himself. Let it be added here that this lover about whom we speak need not necessarily be a young man saving for a wedding ring — this lover can be man, woman, child, or indeed any human creature on this earth.
Now, the beloved can also be of any description. The most outlandish people can be the stimulus for love. A man may be a doddering great-grandfather and still love only a strange girl he saw in the streets of Cheehaw one afternoon two decades past. The preacher may love a fallen woman. The beloved may be treacherous, greasy-headed, and given to evil habits. Yes, and the lover may see this as clearly as anyone else — but that does not affect the evolution of his love one whit. A most mediocre person can be the object of a love which is wild, extravagant, and beautiful as the poison lilies of the swamp. A good man may be the stimulus for a love both violent and debased, or a jabbering madman may bring about in the soul of someone a tender and simple idyll. Therefore, the value and quality of any love is determined solely by the lover himself.
It is for this reason that most of us would rather love than be loved. Almost everyone wants to be the lover. And the curt truth is that, in a deep secret way, the state of being beloved is intolerable to many. The beloved fears and hates the lover, and with the best of reasons. For the lover is forever trying to strip bare his beloved. The lover craves any possible relation with the beloved, even if this experience can cause him only pain.
1. Friendship is a matter of convenience.
It can be true and beautiful and fun and full of love until she moves to another city for college and finds 10 more people she can ‘connect’ with.
2. You don’t have to pursue a boring degree for a boring job. Yes, your passion is for things that make it harder to fetch money but you have one life. Do you really want to spend it doing something you don’t absolutely love?
If you’re passionate about something, no matter what, you will excel, you will thrive. That’s the key to real success. Not some statistics stating the most lucrative jobs and industries.
3. You will exercise. You will drink more water. You will eat healthier. Not because you’re not beautiful the way you are but because your body deserves to be treated better. It literally has carries you around, has your back and actually has your heart from that first moment to your very last.
4. If they are a bitch to others what makes you think they won’t be one to you when the time comes? How people treat others is always a tell tale of how they will treat you. Pay attention. It’s better than feeling like a fool 6 years later.
5. Cook your own meals sometimes.
You know just the amount of oil, salt and ingredients you want. You may not be a masterchef but you know what your stomach wants.
6. Surround yourself with happiness, inspiration and positivity and a very major part of that is social media. Who you follow is so important. Social media is supposed to be a happy and safe place for you. Choose the right people and the right works to fill your feeds because eventually those fill your mind and heart.
7. Nature is all healing.
It’s the one thing in the beautiful presence of which even the most talkative person like you feels the need to shut up. Nature requires no words. It’s completeness is something to learn from.
8. Your parents live a life apart from being your parents. They have moments you’re not a part of, moments you don’t even know. They have not only had a life before you but also a life with you being there that you don’t know about. That’s okay and that’s not something to be mad about.
9. People will leave you. Always.
Some in days, some in months. There are those who take decades and then there are those who never leave in physical form but withdraw all meaning and that’s when you must leave.
But just because people leave their stay doesn’t become any less wonderful or important.
10. Sometimes the only person you need at 3 am is yourself. Give yourself mode credit. You can always help yourself. It may just take a little longer and be a little harder but you don’t need another person to help you. You are enough. You are strong. You will never disappoint.
11. Music of all type is necessary. Songs that make you cry and the ones that make you think and then those that make you only want to dance.
12. Draw.
Everyone is an artist. And your drawings may look like those of a middle school kid but isn’t your joy just like hers?
13. Read more books. Yes, you’re older now and busier too but ‘busy ’ is an excuse and you know it.
Find time for something that saved you. Find time for something that you love.
14. Lipstick is life.
People may stare at you and they may get intimidated by certain shades but that’s okay, one smile and they will be at peace.
15. Click more selfies and click them without any shame.
If you’re happy, if you look at yourself and feel like capturing that one moment where you feel good about yourself - go fucking ahead.
Capture all your happiness, beauty and goofy-ness.
But remember, they are for you and not your social media.
16. There’s literally no way you can help someone without helping yourself.
And they may give you nothing in return and they may be ungrateful but who cares?
They aren’t half the person you are and you can shrug it off and move on but remember unlike you, Karma never forgets.
Also, karma is only a bitch if you are.
The darkest moment is the very moment before sunrise. It’s a fact.
So 2016 may have been your darkest time but that only means the sunlight of happiness and inspiration and love awaits you in 2017.
be poetic. if you find the way the light falls through your window and onto your bedroom wall pretty, write about it. call it soft and golden as sunlit honey. if it makes you glad to be alive then it’s not silly. you look for the beauty of things, be proud of that. say the heavy rain is kissing you. write about the glow of the moon, the dancing of flowers. make your world magical. collect your metaphors and treasure them.
In French, we don’t say “ninety nine”, we say “quatre vingt dix neuf” which roughly translates to “I’ve never heard of a functional numeric system before” and I think that’s beautiful
Mindlessly self-deleting, it turns out, is addictive. And while these little accommodations have simplified some experiences, there is the gamble that my willingness to write myself out of my daily encounters will curb the potential for A Tremendous Me: big goals, big wants, and dreams I’ve left in the cold or, you know, crystallized into just that, the unattainable. I’ve often wondered if my friends whose identities have meshed more seamlessly with the world, who’ve never had to repeat their names in line for a coffee, say, are more readily encouraged to occupy ineffable spaces too. Like their future or the incommunicable load and levity, both, of ambition.
1. I know letting go may feel like hitting pavement but sometimes staying is like getting hit by a train you’ve seen coming for miles.
2. There are symphonies that are screaming it is going to get better. Listen to the music.
3. The most fight you’ll ever feel is from inside your heart.
4. Nostalgia is only good for telling you bedtime stories. Don’t let it tuck you in at night, don’t let it keep you warm.
5. Keep the moments that you wish could live on for a gazillion years close to your heart, never let them burn out.
6. You’ll find someone that’s not them. You’ll love again and it’ll be pure and significant in its own way.
7. They remember it all. They’ll see how much you impacted their lives much later.
8. You may hate high school, but it’s when it’s almost over that you get flashes of when you were young and passed notes with your first love in art class and had talks with teachers that really mattered and you’ll want it to slow down. Take it in, there’s good in everything.
9. Sometimes the one that was your perfect match will be the one to watch you burn.
10. What’s meant to be yours will always find its way home.
11. It’s okay to change without them. Remember that you are the main character of your story.
12. Music cures it all.
13. Telling the story of how I fell in love with you still warms me from the inside out. Teach me how to let go of you.
14. Falling out of love makes you feel like you’ll never want to do it again, but the feeling of your heart dropping when he tells you he’s wanted you all these years is worth the stab at the end.
15. You jump off the cliff hoping there won’t be daggers at the bottom, and when you’re young you think you know how much it’ll hurt. When it comes, you’ll realize you had no clue.
16. My biggest fear was not being with you. I’m becoming someone without you, and it doesn’t feel right.
17. The nicer you are, the more beautiful you become.
18. One day you’ll meet again, and it’ll be just as scary and beautiful as the first time.
19. You’ll find your person. You may not recognize them at first because they’re not as shiny as they are in the movies, but you’ll know by the calm they bring.
20. Thank God for him.
21. The boy who runs in my dreams isn’t as dishonest. He holds my hand whenever I need to feel less alone and I sit around his kitchen table and talk to his mother about poetry. She goes on to say something about how statistically people are more afraid of love than anything else and the things I don’t say- tell her all there is to know about me. That I’m afraid beyond measure of what love can do to a person. Because I spent the last two years loving someone who didn’t know anything other than tearing apart the sole purpose of my existence. The boy who runs beside me in my dreams convinces me that love isn’t always teeth and bite marks. In my dreams, my scars aren’t there because I never tasted a bitter love before. The boy in my dreams loves me enough to let me meet his mother and destroys the idea that love is what I came here to die for.
22. Maybe love stays, maybe love can’t. Maybe love shouldn’t.
23. I glance off in another direction, but I always glance back at you.
24. Things that are sweet like this attract the worst kind of hungry.
25. I don’t think you’ll ever realize you changed everything for me.
26. I found faith that summer. The lips told stories I fell asleep to, the hands promised to hold on. But bliss is temporary when you pull your hands away from your eyes, and summer only lasts 3 months.
27. Let it pass; April is over, April is over. There are all kinds of love in this world, but never the same love twice.
