The movie Happy Feet is meant to be a cute funny movie. This is mostly the case but it has some remnants of an ugly duckling type movie with some issues with the ecosystem thrown in. The movie starts with two penguins who fall in love and have an egg. While the mom is out gathering fish the dad penguin is watching the egg. He lets the egg fall out from under him and roll around in the snow. When the time comes for the egg to hatch it takes longer than the other eggs to hatch. Mumbo is born and immediately starts dancing around with his feet. His dad tell him to stop because this is not what penguins do. Throughout the movie Mumbo is chastised for being different and is told nobody wants him. He is told he will never find a mate because he cannot sing and that is the only way for penguins to find love. Mumbo leave and finds a different smaller type of penguin that find love a different way than him. They find a piece of equipment on the ice that they chalk up to belonging to the aliens which in this case are humans. Mumbo goes to try to find out about the aliens and ends up being captured. While in captivity, Mumbo dances with his feet and impresses the humans. They send Mumbo back out into the wild with a tracking device on him, Mumbo tells the other penguins they must dance to show the humans because they seem to like it and they are the ones stealing all the fish. The penguins all join in and the humans decide to pull operations that are happening there so the fish will return.

In this movie it shows the poor relationship between humans and wildlife. Humans disregard the impacts they have on the wildlife around us and cause harm without thinking about it. No matter what we do it has an ecological impact that we must consider and should consider before we do anything.

After reading the excerpts from and watching the Ted Talk I fell slightly more educated. Of course I already knew that CRT and Ecocriticism intersected in multiple ways but the ways that some of the reading and the talk explained it were ways I hadn’t really thought about before. In the book Earth Democracy there was one quote that really stood out to me. The author Vandana Shiva says, “The rise of extremism and terrorism is a response to the enclosures and economic colonization of globalization. Just as cannibalism among factory-farmed animals stops when chicken and pigs are allowed to roam free, terrorism, extremism, ethnic cleansing and religious intolerance are unnatural conditions caused by globalization and have no place in Earth Democracy.” This quote stood out to me because when animals and people are “caged” it makes them do things they would never do in their natural habitats. The Native people lived in peace and harmony with the earth until White settlers came and forced them into situations they had never had to deal with and they became “savage” because they had no choice but to fight violence with violence. In the Ted Talk by Shannon Price she speaks about the inequality of green space between the black communities in comparison to the white communities. She stated that while the white community has a hundred acres of green parks per thousand people the black community has 1.5 acres. She goes on to tell about how in black communities where there are more places to relax and enjoy the outdoors there is less violence and crime. The two theories overlap and make a lot of sense. The Natives lived a free life and while there were still land disputes there was never anything like the massacres that took place at the hand of the Whites.

This movie was never one I have gotten into but the idea and concepts are pretty good. It sort of reminds me of Fern Gully as well as Epic. These are all movies where one person is brought into another world they never thought could exist and manage to change their minds about it and try to save the world they grow to love and appreciate. This is the same for Avatar. You have a broken down war veteran that is paralyzed and is offered to go to another world where he has full use of his body. This is an exciting experience for him and while he was put there to observe the people and try to get them to leave he soon learns to appreciate their way of life and their culture and in the end warns them of what is to come and fights with them to save their world. In this movie the women appear to be pretty equal to the men and they all hunt and provide for each other. They have a respect for nature and only kill things they must. This reminds me much of the Native American culture where they only killed for food and used every part of the animal for something. There is not hunting for sport and they thank the animals they kill for providing for them. They live among their ecosystem instead of fighting it.

The movie Nausicaa Valley of the Wind takes us to the edge of a poisoned forest where different tribes of people live. Nausicaa is the princess of the Valley of the Wind and has a special bond with the dangerous insects that live within the poison forests. A tribe from a different area of land captures a princess from a nearby tribe along with a giant warrior they plan to bring back to life to help kill the poison forest and all the bad insects that live there. Nausicaa and her people are determined to stop this from happening as they believe they must live in peace with the forest. During one of their quests, Nausicaa crashes and ends up falling through the forest floor and realizes that was not the floor at all but a canopy of trees that is growing underneath and cleansing the water and the air. This makes Nausicaa realize just how important it is not to disturb the forest as they will then kill the trees underneath as well. Nausicaa is set with the task of not only saving her people but also saving the entire world from what could be destruction. In the end Nausicaa must risk her own life to save her village and all the people in it. This works and the insects that were coming to destroy her village go back to the forests.

For this film being as old as it is, it is well put together and thought out. It shows several different dynamics of the ecosystem. It shows the importance of trees and how they clean and filter not just the air but also the water. It also show that we must live in peace with nature to not throw off the balance we have.

Watching this movie was a little heartbreaking but that was the way it was meant to be to show us that not all our food comes from the nicest places. In the beginning of the movie Lucy Mirando is shown trying to show the world a new face on the company. She says they found this super piglet on a Chilean farm and brought it to the United States and bred her. Here was where I first thought to myself, if there was only one how did they breed her? This made me catch on pretty quickly that there was something fishy going on. Somehow they made 26 of these super piglets from just one and the Mirando company gave them to different farmers around the world to see how they grew over a ten year period. Again my thoughts were like, ten years that is an old pig. They wanted these pigs to get as big as they possibly could before bringing them back to the United States and showing the biggest one off in a parade. The little girl, Mija, that grew up with Okja loved her and cared very much for her. You can see the bond between them when Okja risks her own life to save Mija from falling off a cliff. Mija and Okja live high in the mountains with Mija’s grandfather since her parents both passes away. Mija’s grandfather tells her he bought Okja from the Mirando company and that she is not going anywhere. The very next day Mundo, the representative from Mirando comes to see Okja with the wacky animal lover guy. Mija’s grandfather then takes her for a walk and gives her a golden pig before telling her that Mirando would not let him buy Okja and the golden pig was to replace her. Mija did not take this news well and ran away to try to rescue Okja. While trying to rescue Okja, Mija meets the AFL group that is also trying to rescue but they also want to rescue the thousands of other super pigs Mirando has created by sending Okja into the afcility to get first hand footage of what they are doing. Jay the leader says he will only do it with Mija’s consent to which the guy translating tells him she agrees. Later in the movie we find out Mija did not agree and the guy translating gets beat and kicked out of the group. To save face, Mirando comes up with another plan to bring Mija to America to have her reunite with Okja if front of the world before Okja is set to go to the slaughter house. The ALF tries their best to keep their promise to save Okja but in the end it is the golden pig Mija brought with her that saves Okja. After Mija gives the golden pig to Nacy, Lucy’s twin sister, Okja is released and they are sent home. While walking out there is a baby super pig whose mother deals with the electric bolts of the fence to push the baby out for Mija and Okja to save. Okja hides the baby in her mouth and all the animals start almost cheering in both sorrow and appreciation that this one little baby could be spared.

This was a hard movie to watch with the week I had but I am glad I stuck it through and watched it. I have raised my own pigs for food and it is always hard when it comes time for them to be slaughtered. We always love our pigs and try to give them the best life possible and make them as comfortable as we can when their time comes. I think the movie shows many different sides. It shows how the corporate world can be deceiving in order to get people to buy their product. They only show you the part they want you to see and don’t show some of the horrible things they do to make things. For instance while they were showing you these amazing super pigs they were hiding the fact they were genetically modified to make them grow bigger faster to have more meat. This made it easy to sell the meat at a discounted price so the consumers were happy and would eat it because it taste good and was cheaper than other meat. The super pig that was the best was Okja and she was raised out in the mountains where she had free range to roam and eat whatever she pleased. It did not show how the other 25 super pigs were raised but when it showed the thousands of super pigs that were at the farm they did not look as healthy as Okja did. In this movie the United States is show to have corporate greed and they can not even spare the one pig that a little girl has fallen in love with over the past ten years. She has to buy this pig even though not having one of their pigs was not going to damage their company. In this movie animals and people are shown to have different relationships. Mija and Okja have a very close relationship and it show that they would do anything to protect one another. The ALF also proves they are willing to go to extremes to save all animals. The corporate world shows that animals are just money to them and they do not truly care how they are treated as long as they continue to make them money. This is a sad movie but it is often true in this world.

My understanding of ecocriticism is that it is a relationship between society and the environment that we live in. This is one theory that I have heard about. It is something that we have to consider all the time in the world of social work as we have to look at the environment the people we work with live in. This helps give us a better understanding of them. When we look at the environment we can see what is helping contribute to the problems they are having. On Purdue owls site it says there have been two wave of ecocriticism. One that started in the eighties and nineties and one that is happening now. The first wave was more concerned with the functions of nature and the second wave looks more at the people in the environment. I think we need to go back to more of the first wave thinking and look at our environment that our people are living in to get a better understanding of the people.

After watching the snickers and I was a little upset. They are trying to say that snickers can fix the world. But after really thinking about it I had to look back on other snickers ads. Snickers used to say when your not yourself eat a snickers. In that same sense they were saying that snickers could fix you. Now they are taking people that are acting sort of stupid and saying that a snickers will fix it. When the people at the end fell in the snickers hole while trying to use their selfie stick and the other guy says it’s working made me realize they are trying to say that instead of constantly being on our technology eat a snickers instead. I still think it is an off putting commercial and a little in poor taste as there are so many things wrong with our world and environment today that we all know cannot be fixed by eating a snickers.

I went into this movie not knowing what to expect. I had never heard of it and decided not to read anything about it before I watched it. At first I was very confused and had no idea how the stories tied together. The fact that it jumped from place to place was also very confusing. I still do not totally understand the ending when the dad called the nanny to speak with the children because from what I gathered he was speaking with the nanny that had been deported. I feel like the two stories had a lot of accuracy to their place in time. The fact that our government in the movie was quick to jump to conclusions about the white woman being shot and said it was an act of terrorism is something that probably happens more than we would like to admit. I was frustrated that the Morracan police just started shooting at the family instead of trying to bring them into custody. When the police first talked with the two young boys they were scared and did not know what to do so they lied. I do not think my this constitutes them being shot. Most children lie when they are scared of getting in trouble and these boys were probably scared that something just like what actually happened was what was going to happen.

The nanny taking the children across the border in hindsight was probably not the greatest choice and it was for sure not a good choice to get in the car with her nephew after the wedding. I feel that they accurately depicted what I am sure many South Americans and Mexicans fear which is being deported. So many people come here in search of a better life but then have to live in constant fear. Even if they come here on a work Visa if they commit any crime they can be deported. This woman had built a life here and started she had worked in this country for sixteen years. Yes she made a poor decision but due to the parents deciding to leave the children behind she felt that she did not have a choice. She pretty much was their parent as it seems their parents were not around much for them. It is sad that many families in America have someone else take care of their children. I myself have an infant and it is hard for me to go to work every day and leave her with someone else that I am paying to take care of her. It really makes no sense to me at all.

As for the deaf mute Japanese girl, it took me a while to figure out what she meant to the story. I am still trying to figure out why they decided to make her deaf and mute but I guess that is besides the point. I also understand that she is going through some traumatic events with her mother committing suicide but what I don’t understand is why they decided to make her so promiscuous. It appeared she was just looking for attention from anywhere she could find it which can and does happen for children that lose a parent and feel their other parent does not give them enough attention. I felt almost like I was looking at myself watching her. The way she was deciding to grieve was almost just like mine. My dad committed suicide and after that my mom got heavily into drinking and was never around. I looked for attention from anyone who would give it to me even if that meant it was adult men. I also got into the drug scene in order to cope. I think they did a good job of showing some of the things that can happen when you are not paying attention to your children after a loss like that.

Back to the white family in Morocco. The film makers made sure to show the kindness the villagers had towards them, bringing them into their home and caring for the woman for five days before help finally arrived. I feel that if our government hadn’t jumped to conclusions so fast help would have been able to get there sooner. Due to this being considered an act of terrorism, people feared to help as they thought by helping they may get killed too.

Once I got the story line and realized how they were all connected it was a facinating movie. I don’t watch many movies with subtitles as I get distracted and sometimes don’t catch all of what they are saying. I think the film makers did a good job of depicting some of what is going on in the world and what different things people have to face every day. I also feel they did a good job of showing that not just one country has issues but that we all have issues they are just different in some ways. Many people live in fear every day and I think this was a great eye opener for people.

Wow the movie was one that I had not watched and was not really sure how I felt about it. I know that it was supposed to show black men and women in a place of power but I felt that it still had many stereotypes in it. For instance the violence that was in the film against their family members. Another thing that I saw in the movie was that some people wanted to destroy people in order to bring themselves up which is something that happens all the time in real life. I feel that anyone in power has had to bring someone else down in order to get there. In the beginning of the film when Black Panther was named King he was stripped of his powers and had to fight for his position as king.

While I do feel that there were some powerful moments n the film it was hard for me to get into the movie and fully understand what was going on in the film. I am not very into violent movies and do not appreciate watching them and to me there was a lot of hate and violence in this particular film.

The debate in the articles to me felt like people were arguing whether or not it was the right portrayal of the Black community or not. I felt that there were compelling arguments and noticed a lot of what was being said I also saw in the movie myself. I think the fact that they had a brother have to kill their brother to keep other people safe was something that did not need to happen and they could have let him live. It could have been like one of the articles said that they could have let him live instead of killing him off in this movie.

So much information packed into such a small amount of writing. I have had some experience with the Critical Race Theory (CRT) but mostly just in the past couple years. Before my college experience I had not really ever been taught about white privilege. I don’t know if that was a normal growing up for most kids or not. I feel that in today’s school they are teaching a little more about this then they did when I was in middle and high school.

I learned about social construction in my sociology class a short four years ago and learned that while most things in our lives have been socially constructed and are really made up things that someone somewhere decided one day was a thing and people started agreeing. For instance somewhere along the line people made up the language we speak today. We call a chair a chair because someone at some point decided to call it that and so other people started calling it that and now everyone calls it a chair.

This is the same type of situation for race. One day someone decided that people with darker skin were less of people than people with light skin and people believed it for some strange reason. Instead of just saying they have different skin it became a horrible thing. IT was the same for Jewish people with Hitler. Hitler decided that Jews were less of people and since he was someone in power other people believed him and we had the Holocaust.

On the Purdue Owl site it states, ” it (broadly) emphasizes the importance of examining and attempting to understand the socio-cultural forces that shape how we and others perceive, experience, and respond to racism.” This is important because this goes to say that instead of just examining racism that we need to try to better understand it or we will never be able to move past it.

In the second article, Bell wrote, “In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, blacks who were successful at business or farming were targeted by the Ku Klux Klan
and other hate groups for death and destruction.” This was because at the time Whites did not want to see any black be successful as they believed they should all still be slaves. This was another social construct of how people at the time thought that blacks should be treated differently than whites.

A big part of this article that stood out was when Bell wrote, “Passing is well known among black people in the United States and is a feature of race subordination in all societies structured on white supremacy. Notwithstanding the purported benefits of black heritage in an era of affirmative action, passing is not an obsolete phenomenon that has slipped into history.” People should never have to hide their race and try to fit in with another group just to be accepted. People should not have to hide their race in order to find work and provide for their families. This makes me sad that this still happens in our country today.

I watched the TMZ video a few times and tried to find the positive in the video as that is just the way that I am. I could not. This man say that he came from an Urban community and lived in Hotels and at that instance you could see in his face that he knew he just said something he shouldn’t have. In that one sentence he pretty much said that all black people are poor are grow up poor and don’t make anything of themselves. Then he tried to justify what he said by saying he hangs out with black rappers and grew up watching black comics. While I do agree with him on one statement where he stated that people use to make fun of race and now it has become a serious issue. I think that is because more people have opened up their eyes to see that what was happening was racism and cultural appropriation. I do not think it was right for him to say that if there was someone better to play the role he would not be doing it because right there I feel he is saying that there are no black actors that are better than him.

Here is a question to ponder though, if a black man were trying to voice a white character would people be as concerned about it? I think that the biggest concern here is how this man answered to people’s concerns. He did it in a way that was inappropriate and he needs to learn some manners. I don’t care if you think it is fine for you to act like you are someone else when you are portraying that type of person in a negative light. When he did his impression saying, “Yo I wouldn’t step foot in that club less I can nae nae,” I believe this was also inappropriate as he is making it seem like that is how black people talk. I don’t think I have ever met a single black person that talked this way. I think his whole interview was out there and had many stereotypes that the black community is trying to break away from but when famous people still portray them in that way how are they ever going to get people to view them any different.