Avatar 2: The Way of Water has been in German cinemas since last week. Using state-of-the-art film technology, James Cameron creates a fictional planet: the untouched Pandora. Pandora is inhabited by the peaceful Na’vi, who, like in Avatar 1, defend themselves against the human invaders who are after their raw materials. The role model is obvious: Avatar 1 and 2 move them America’s colonial history in a sci-fi setting. The Native American population was gradually expelled from the so-called “New World”.
Some voices in the US Native American community are now calling for people not to watch Avatar 2. The criticism was triggered by statements made by director James Cameron more than 12 years ago. But the criticism of the films goes deeper.
Boycott against Avatar 2: It’s about these statements by James Cameron
Avatar 2: The Way of the Water – Trailer 2 (German) HD
In 2010, James Cameron spoke to The Guardian about his time with an Amazon tribe who were displaced from their homeland after plans were made to build a hydroelectric dam there – a process that reminded him of the oppression of Native Americans, such as the Lakota Sioux .
I felt like I was 130 years in the past and could hear what the Lakota Sioux might have said when they were expelled and killedwhen they were resettled and received some kind of compensation for it.
That’s important as context. The crucial part and real reason for the excitement comes now.
That was the driving force for me to write Avatar. I couldn’t help but think that if the [Lakota Sioux] could have seen their children commit suicide at the highest suicide rate in the country…because they were hopeless and a dead-end society […] then they would have fought harder.This is how Native Americans are now reacting to Cameron’s statements
These statements were already noticed and criticized in the Native community at the time of their publication. With the launch of the Avatar sequel, Native American Johnnie Jae drew attention to Cameron’s comments again.
Natives tell you that James Cameron’s avatar racist and repulsive is. The way he talks about the Lakota in this article is terrible.
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Author Shea Vassar took up the criticism that same day:
James Cameron, basically saying that Native communities might have fought colonization harder if they knew the suicide rates of Native American youth is not cool on any level. So no, I will not see his films and will never support him again.
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Outrage at the comments spread throughout the community and grew into one Boycott Request:
Don’t watch the movie. He’s so wrong with his “they would have fought harder” I don’t even know where to begin.
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Do not watch Avatar: The Way of Water. Join and boycott Natives and other indigenous groups around the world terrible and racist movie. Our cultures have been appropriated in a harmful way to gratify a White Savior complex. No more bluefacing! Lakota People are powerful!
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What does White Savior mean and why does the criticism hit Avatar 2 so hard?
In the reactions from the Native American community, various terms are used to describe exactly what is problematic about James Cameron’s statements. The most important term is: White Savior. Translated, that means first White Saviora narrative character from literature and film.
The cliché is fulfilled, for example, when Afro-Americans are portrayed as helpless and stuck in “typical” social problems of Afro-American milieus. In Green Book or Blind Side – The big chance that happens for example. A white person rushes to the aid of a black person in distress and “rescues” her. In Avatar, Jake Sully becomes the White Savior. As the noble, white representative of an evil white crowd, he rescues the Na’vi people from the plight he helped cause. He even rises up to their leader.
As mentioned, James Cameron’s quotes are more than 12 years old, which makes them no less worthy of criticism. However, we do not know how the director feels about his statements today. He has not yet positioned himself on the current controversy.