• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

“poverty porn.”

Audie

Veteran Member
I saw a few minutes of it.

Too bad their places can't be taken by
some actual poor people from a culture
that would teach them to take quick
advantage of the incredible opportunities America offers.
 

Samael_Khan

Goosebender
I watched a powerful movie on Netflix, “Hillbilly Elegy,” staring Glenn Close, and then read an equally powerful review. The question arises as to the difference between understanding and exploitation of humanity's suffering.
Is Netflix’s ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ poverty porn? | America Magazine

I am undecided on where I sit with the opinion of the article.

Basically a movie about the poor shouldn't leave the viewer feeling superior to them but should get the viewer to empathize with them.

I have first hand experience with this:

There is an area called Hanover Park here in Cape Town that has a gang filled, drug filled and largely uneducated poor community. What we knew about it from TV was that the people were basically degenerates and we had no empathy for them, often making fun of them and thinking that the place was a hell hole which we all feared travelling through.

Then, later in life, due to circumstances, I had to move to the area next to it. I became part of the JW congregation in that area which was made up of people from Hanover Park, and that changed my perceptions of them greatly. They are fun loving people and a laugh a minute, despite what they have to go through, like stray bullets going through their house on occasion and the death of friends.

Soon I had to preach in Hanover Park. I was scared and my parents didn't want me to go there because "I would be killed". I preached there for 5 years and I am still alive aren't I? Actually preaching house to house helped me to understand the community very well and relate to the people who live there. Now my father doesn't have a problem travelling through certain areas of the area.

Poverty Porn caused my first perception of the community. Reality helped me develop my second, more accurate perception of them.

And in South Africa this is a HUGE problem because of the gross inequality. The upper and middle classes have an irrational fear of poor people, which is also due to the Apartheid segregation laws, which placed people of colour in areas that became poor, and a long history of fear mongering because of tension between "blacks" and "whites" due to white supremacy.
 

Audie

Veteran Member
I am undecided on where I sit with the opinion of the article.

Basically a movie about the poor shouldn't leave the viewer feeling superior to them but should get the viewer to empathize with them.

I have first hand experience with this:

There is an area called Hanover Park here in Cape Town that has a gang filled, drug filled and largely uneducated poor community. What we knew about it from TV was that the people were basically degenerates and we had no empathy for them, often making fun of them and thinking that the place was a hell hole which we all feared travelling through.

Then, later in life, due to circumstances, I had to move to the area next to it. I became part of the JW congregation in that area which was made up of people from Hanover Park, and that changed my perceptions of them greatly. They are fun loving people and a laugh a minute, despite what they have to go through, like stray bullets going through their house on occasion and the death of friends.

Soon I had to preach in Hanover Park. I was scared and my parents didn't want me to go there because "I would be killed". I preached there for 5 years and I am still alive aren't I? Actually preaching house to house helped me to understand the community very well and relate to the people who live there. Now my father doesn't have a problem travelling through certain areas of the area.

Poverty Porn caused my first perception of the community. Reality helped me develop my second, more accurate perception of them.

And in South Africa this is a HUGE problem because of the gross inequality. The upper and middle classes have an irrational fear of poor people, which is also due to the Apartheid segregation laws, which placed people of colour in areas that became poor, and a long history of fear mongering because of tension between "blacks" and "whites" due to white supremacy.
Hillbillies don't have that excuse
 

Samael_Khan

Goosebender
Hillbillies don't have that excuse

I think there is a similar correlation though. Hillbillies stereotypically are portrayed as poor, uneducated, drunkard, in bred trailer trash. I haven't been to a Hillbilly community, but I am pretty sure that not all "Hillbillies" are like that. Therefore, excluding the film in question, the media does portray them as poverty porn.
 

Saint Frankenstein

Wanderer From Afar
Premium Member
I saw a few minutes of it.

Too bad their places can't be taken by
some actual poor people from a culture
that would teach them to take quick
advantage of the incredible opportunities America offers.
Excuse you, but some parts of America have third world levels of poverty. Appalachia is an extremely poor region. America isn't a giant city where decent-paying jobs are easy to find.
 

Audie

Veteran Member
Excuse you, but some parts of America have third world levels of poverty. Appalachia is an extremely poor region. America isn't a giant city where decent-paying jobs are easy to find.

Like I don't know that.

Illegal refugees get,to the US from all over the world. They don't start in Tennessee with a car.

They leave third world, real third world,

If your hillbillies stay that's on them.
 

Saint Frankenstein

Wanderer From Afar
Premium Member
Like I don't know that.

Illegal refugees get,to the US from all over the world. They don't start in Tennessee with a car.

They leave third world, real third world,

If your hillbillies stay that's on them.
It takes money to move to a different country. Are you proposing they illegally emigrate?
 

Audie

Veteran Member
It takes money to move to a different country. Are you proposing they illegally emigrate?

Desperately poor people risk everything to get to the USA.

I'm saying your hillbillies are already there. USA, in all directions.

They have gas and a car. They don't have to stay in 3rd world areas of the uss.
 

The Hammer

[REDACTED]
Premium Member
Desperately poor people risk everything to get to the USA.

I'm saying your hillbillies are already there. USA, in all directions.

They have gas and a car. They don't have to stay in 3rd world areas of the uss.

And those desperately poor immigrants, usually, have the benefit of entering into a more affluent border city with amole access to food, access to financial assistance programs, and healthcare.

You are vastly over-simplifying the subject of abject poverty to a case of "move where it's better". This is a very privelaged viewpoint, whether or not your background supports it idk.

A lot of poor people have gas and a car sure. But could it support driving them further then the nearest grocery store/work, without massive expensive repairs? Do they have skills that are needed in the community they want to move to. Do they have a job that allows them the income to even support a move into a better town? Can they afford to take their children out if school and interrupt their studies? With school sometimes being the only option they have for childcare.

Also, hillbilly is as much a Sub-Culture as it is the result of poverty. So, of course they are "everywhere".
 

Saint Frankenstein

Wanderer From Afar
Premium Member
Okay, I literally just watched this movie to see what all the fuss is about. It doesn't seem like the critics watched the same film as me. I didn't see it as exploitive at all. You have to keep in mind that you're viewing it through JD's eyes and he has some shame over his roots. But his family aren't depicted as backwards redneck morons. His mother and grandmother were very strong, intelligent women and his grandmother was extremely wise. Hard-working, too. Flawed, for sure but just human beings. Amy Adams and Glenn Close gave great performances, with Close especially being excellent. I recommend this movie.

I'm not really interested in reading a dissertation about it. I find most film critics tend to miss the point of movies, sometimes to a striking extent. Many of the movies I like were panned by critics.
 
Top