What's Race Got to Do with It?

When I first saw the 1993 movie What's Love Got to Do with It?, I found it sadly amusing how much they played down the influence of racism in the life of Tina Turner as if the average moviegoer was supposed to believe that it was possible for a black woman in 1960s America to go through life without meeting one white person who was mean to her.

However, I did not realize how ridiculous that assumption was until I started adding up the number of white women I have known who have been beaten by white men (either husbands, boyfriends or whatever) -- and found that number to be depressingly high. (And I'm an introvert. Just imagine how many women in that category a more outgoing person would know.)

Yes, I realize that even the best movie in the world can't cover every pov in view in the space of two hours but there seemed to be something obscene about the way the script seemed to imply that white men -- as opposed to non-white men -- were above that type of thing. As if it somehow improves the problem of domestic violence if we can "prove" that it's their problem and not our problem.

Then again I guess I'm biased because one of those women I mentioned above was not only my best friend but a woman who later on saved my life.