Movies and Media: Journaling Questions

Why do you think examining racist and stereotypical media is essential for real solidarity work, rather than just a “nice-to-have” add-on? How might avoiding this discomfort quietly protect the status quo in your own life or community?

We frame unity as something built through truth-telling, not bypassing harm. How does looking honestly at media you once loved strengthen your capacity to stand with, listen to, and advocate for people whose stories have been distorted or erased?

When you look back at movies, TV shows, or cartoons you loved growing up, which specific titles now feel different to you in light of what you’ve learned about blackface, brownface, yellowface, redface, and white‑savior narratives?

Can you name one character or storyline (from film, TV, animation, or theater) that you now recognize as stereotypical or harmful? What cues—casting, costume, accent, framing of the hero—help you see it differently now?

How do you feel when you realize that something you once enjoyed is rooted in erasure or mockery of people of color—do you notice sadness, anger, defensiveness, a sense of loss, or something else? How do you sit with those feelings without shutting down?

Think of a time when a story centered a white “hero” while people of color served mainly as victims, helpers, or background. How might that have subtly shaped your ideas about who is competent, trustworthy, or “universal”—and who is not?

Where do you notice yourself wanting to say, “But it’s just a movie / just a joke”? What might change if you treated these patterns not as isolated incidents but as part of a long history that kept actors and creators of color off the call sheet and out of the spotlight?

As someone on a solidarity and unity journey, what is one concrete way you can respond when friends, family, or colleagues recommend or quote a beloved but problematic movie—ignore it, defend it, gently contextualize it, offer alternatives? What response aligns most with the solidarity and trust you want to build?

Looking ahead, what “media literacy promises” do you want to make to yourself—about what you’ll notice, question, or seek out—so that your viewing habits more fully support the kind of multiracial community Brave Sis Project invites you to help create?

We talked about the difference between surface-level diversity (changing faces on screen) and structural change (changing who holds creative power). Where in your own life or work do you see this same distinction playing out?

“The repetition is comforting, the harm is cumulative, and children absorbing it have little context to question what they see.” What did you absorb in childhood that you’ve had to consciously unlearn as an adult?

The most meaningful shifts, the document argues, come when targeted communities control the storytelling—not just appear in it. What story about your community, your lineage, or your people do you most wish existed on screen?

Think back to a movie or TV show you loved as a child. Who were the heroes? Who were the sidekicks, servants, or villains? What messages were you absorbing without knowing it?

The document describes how racist stereotypes were built into the film industry from its very foundation. How does knowing that history change the way you watch movies or TV today?

“Blackness matters most when it is in pain or instructing white audiences.” Where have you seen this pattern—in film, in news, in your workplace or community? How does it make you feel?

The “Magical Negro,” the loyal servant, the comic sidekick—these are roles designed to serve white protagonists. Have you ever been cast in a version of one of these roles in real life? Or have you cast someone else that way?

Hollywood’s Indigenous representation kept Native people frozen in the past, erasing their present and future. Whose present and future gets erased in the stories your community tells about itself?

The “model minority” myth flattens real diversity and is used as a wedge. Have you ever had your identity or struggle minimized by comparisons to another group? How did that land?

Asian women have been consistently defined in relation to white male desire—passive, exotic, tragic. What images of women from your own background did you absorb from screens growing up? How did they shape your self-image?

The document notes that Sidney Poitier’s characters had to be “nearly flawless, controlled, and non-threatening to white sensibilities” to be tolerated. Have you ever performed a version of that kind of acceptability—at work, in school, in mixed company? What did it cost you?

Nat King Cole was attacked on stage despite carefully avoiding association with civil rights—and it radicalized him. Has a moment of shock or betrayal ever shifted your own political or social commitments?

Arab and Muslim characters have been almost exclusively cast as threats or terrorists, and the document argues this bleeds directly into real-world surveillance and hate crimes. Where else do you see fictional narratives causing real harm to real people?

Media literacy is framed here as a solidarity practice—a way of building cross-racial trust. Who in your life have you had a conversation with about representation, stereotypes, or media? What made that conversation meaningful or difficult?

The document ends with a call to insist that everyone—on screen and off—gets to be “fully human, fully seen, and fully heard.” What would it look like, in your specific life and relationships, to practice that insistence this week?