The worst part about it being racist (aside from, you know, the racism) is that it's actually trying to be anti-racist. It just crit fails so hard it ends up being super racist.
The goal of it is to have audiences laugh at the way white American Christianity views and treats outside groups, especially those in non-white countries, and then walk away thinking "oh jeez, I do some of those silly things myself. Better fix that!" Instead, by choosing Mormonism as their "stereotypical white church" they solidly prevent any mainstream Christian from seeing themselves in the story. It then becomes "look at how ridiculous those Mormons (who I already hate) are! Glad I'm not like them at all!" And they walk away feeling superior and never once looking inward except to say how much better they are than the pretend Mormons on stage. So already it encourages the exact type of bigotry and self importance that it wants to discourage.
And then! It only depicts people of color as ignorant, violent, and diseased. You know, like a racist would. Now you COULD argue that it's supposed to be from the racist white character's perspective so of course they would appear that way. But here's the thing, narratively that only works if you, at any point say, "hey, actually this stuff isn't true". Otherwise, you're just doing racist shit.
And here's the rotten cherry on the whole shit cake: fans keep saying "yeah it's offensive, but the music is so catchy!" You know what else had catchy music? Blackface minstrel shows. Shit's still racist.
So to recap: the show that's supposed to be anti-racist is so bad at being anti-racist that it encourages bigotry, spreads racist stereotypes about a REAL country that REALLY exists, and the best defense of it has been used since the civil war. Like, I know that Mormonism doesn't have the best track record when it comes to racism, obviously, but we've NEVER fumbled it that badly.
areudirty
amandla
blakekathryn
titsay
turnnoffyourmind
gamechangershow
