Hire the Morally Handicapped

A long time ago, as a student at a Baptist college, I was on a Christian service assignment that took me to a hotbed of liberalism, homosexuality, and recreational drug commerce. There I saw a bumper sticker, "Hire the Morally Handicapped," and I've been chuckling about it ever since.

In fact, every time I drive up to a store and see all the empty parking spaces reserved for the handicapped, I remind myself that I can say I am morally handicapped after all...

Of course, you can't say someone is good or evil in our society. It's double-plus-ungood. And I suppose that saying one is morally handicapped is single-plus-ungood, too. So, to be politically correct, let's just say that those Republicans (if you're a Democrat) or those Democrats (if you're a Republican) or those Republicans and Democrats (if you're a Whig like me), are neither evil nor morally handicapped, but differently ethic-ed.

Though I started out joking about being differently ethic-ed, the term has explanatory power. Though moralists have had to go underground in Hollywood (unless it's attacking Christian hypocrisy), you can find moralists alive and well in Bollywood. And I'm cool with this, because I like a moral message in the stories I consume.

I've mentioned before that watching Bollywood and paying attention to its morality is illuminating. For instance, when a bad guy kills the good guy's mother in the 2nd reel of a movie, it is obligatory for the good guy to exact an eye-for-an-eye, tooth-for-a-tooth vengeance in the 3rd reel of that movie. Contrast this with the American pattern of killing the antagonist just as dead, but after s/he/it goes for its gun leaving the hero No Choice.

Mindful of this I watched a snippet of a Shahrukh Khan movie. It didn't have subtitles, but it was very interesting. It is called Pardes. So, I looked it up on Wikipedia for an explanation of what I'd just seen.

(By the way, if you ever see a Shahrukh Khan movie and he's all bloody in the climatic scene, it's likely a romantic comedy.)

In Pardes, we see a conflict between Indian and American morality. The presumption in Pardes is that America is morally corrupt and it has no problems with smoking, drinking, or sexual infidelity. And that Indian morality is much better.

This isn't quite fair. Unless you're President Clinton, Americans think that adultery and sexual infidelity is morally wrong.

If you're a good Baptist who doesn't drink, smoke, or chew, nor go with girls that do, we think these things are as moralistic as Indians. Nevertheless, many good Baptists do not live up to these moral aspirations. (BTW I hear there are more Baptists in India than anywhere outside the US and Britain.)

The antagonist of this film is morally handicapped in both the Indian and the Baptist sense, while the heroic Shahrukh Khan works to protect the antagonist's reputation at great cost to his own reputation. And his own happiness, because he hides the antagonist's evil from his love interest who happens to be engaged to the antagonist.

As you'd expect of Bollywood, the source of conflict is family honor: it requires the girl to marry an obviously unsuitable fellow.

Ultimately, the antagonist's father relents, acknowledges Shahrukh Khan's virtue, and grants a happily ever after to everyone save the lothario. The Moral Of The Story is clear: Indian Morals are better than American Morals, as seen by Shahrukh Khan's nobility versus the Americanized antagonist's vice.

I was nodding and going along with this line of thinking until I tripped over this little bit of the wiki plot summary:

"Ironically, it also highlights one way in which Western culture can be viewed as more just and compassionate than Indian culture, since a Western bride can break off an unsuitable engagement without risking death at the hands of outraged family members."

Oh.

That.

Good point.

This shows us something important about moralizing. It's easy to be blinded by the customary, and traditional to that which is obviously very wrong. The Savior's warnings about motes and beams in eyes come to mind as do his woes upon those who idolize tradition.

I'm not suggesting that your storytelling refrain from moralizing or from espousing a moral position or condemning wrongdoing when you see it. However, when you do, maintain the humility to recognize your own moral shortcomings.

Honor Thy Father And Mother

Christianity shares the moral foundation of Judaism in that it asserts unconditional, perpetually binding obligations upon all mankind: the Ten Commandments. Whether you believe in these things or not, it makes sense to understand what they say, how they reflect human nature, and their relationship to culture.

American society routinely disrespects parents. I've known several professed, devout Christians who have no problem talking about how legalistic their parents were and dysfunctional their families were. I've seen Christian preachers get all Freudian about their childhood wounds rooted in a father's absence or a mother's over-protectiveness.

Had these same people said, "sh*t" or "f*ck," they'd be immediately castigated as sinners. But they slide through slanders of their parents without problem. This makes me think American Christendom regards the 5th Commandment as just a mere suggestion.

Conversely,when I see a Bollywood movie wherein the parents arrange a protagonist's marriage to the "wrong" partner, I shake my head in disbelief at the conflict. Americans are culturally programmed to feel no obligation to honor their parents' wishes in matters of the heart. Any American Evangelical would just shrug and walk away, while thinking herself more righteous than the Hindu who honors her parents.

(A common misconception is that one performs the Ten Commandments to get something nice. A better view is that one performs these obligations because they shape one's character in a beneficial way. In the Bollywood movie, dealing with the disappointment of parental opposition to a potential lover and honoring parental wishes certainly appears to build character. It certainly makes the story more interesting.)

In particular, I think it is interesting when someone honors parents who are not honorable characters. We're all human and we all make mistakes. Parents are certainly make their share of mistakes and some parents are downright evil. What does it say of a child who nevertheless honors that parent? I think it is wrong to excuse evil, but nobody requires a child be an accuser (except totalitarians).

In these cases, I feel much more sympathy toward the character, because my mind revolts at the injustice. It is not fair that the boy or the girl should be denied happiness just to honor the parents' demands.

The first objective of the novelist should be creating sympathy toward the protagonist. Americans like underdog stories. Most commonly the underdog is the poor kid who suffers at the hands of the mean girls. Or the sports team with a disgraced coach composed of a motley crew who faces off against an all-star team. But I think the adult child honoring a dishonorable parent is an even more sympathetic figure.

Who among us hasn't at one time or another said to our parents, "That's not fair."

The writer just needs to create a situation where it really is not fair to evoke the reader's sympathies. Be careful here, some of your readers are like me. I said, "That's not fair," when I was just being a jerk and I didn't know any better. The situation has to be undeniably not-fair.

You can work in a twist, too. Perhaps your protagonist is a scion of a very rich family who says, "If you marry that girl from the wrong side of the tracks, you are disinherited." The twist is to test the kid and the love-interest to see if their love is bigger than money. Just try not to be obvious about it.

Of all the Bible stories, I like the story of Joseph best, because he doesn't become bitter despite being mistreated by his brothers, falsely accused, tossed into jail, and suffering his fellow-prisoner's broken promise.

Here's a fellow who's better than I could ever be because he keeps on doing his best while suffering serial reversals. And when he has a chance at payback with his parents dead and his brothers at his mercy, he points out their evil toward him was part of a larger purpose that saved many lives.

That, dear writer, is what you must do. Feel free to be your own Old Testament deity.

Make your protagonist suffer every possible misfortune or injustice. The greater the heroism in scene N, the greater the unfairness for it in scene N+1. (This is the only thing what prevents Horatio Hornblower from becoming a Marty Stu.) Your story arc should drag  your protagonist through Purgatory. Honoring dishonorable parents is a great way to make your readers sympathize with your protagonist.

Bonus points if your protagonist can win Paradise in the denouement.

Hooray for Bollywood

I've been savoring the differences between Hollywood and Hindi Cinema. (My friend Nitin tells me the correct term for Bollywood is Hindi Cinema.) I was pleasantly surprised a year ago when I first experienced it. Though Sholay shows its age, it provides a good starting referent to Bollywood. Kudos to my friend Debraj to got me started with this film.

In a Hollywood movie, you are best advised to start with a short story, and make a screenplay from it. That is because a typical novel would take many hours were you to do a scene-by-scene adaptation to a screenplay. Bollywood has no problem with time. They typically make much longer movies. This results in a lot more story to enjoy.

Another difference and the main one I want to bring to your attention is Bollywood's moral compass. It is magnetized differently than Hollywood's. I'm not taking this opportunity to cast aspersions on either Hollywood or Bollywood--different does not mean wrong. I am only going to note differences. And if you think those differences constitute depravity or something very good, that's your decision.

The first thing I noticed about Bollywood is that they are not afraid to mention God. In the USA, any movie that mentions God had better do so in an ironic or comedic fashion, or it's going to be filed in the "Inspirational/Faith & Spirituality" section of the video store. The only time secret agent 007 was ever in church was at his wife's funeral. Otherwise, if you hear deity's name taken in a Hollywood movie, it is most likely taken in vain. Bollywood, not so much.

India has had to negotiate a diverse collection of faiths, and Bollywood wants to sell tickets to Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, and Christians. Pious members of each of these religions will likely hear respectful mentions of deity in a fairly inclusive fashion. The US solution to the problem of religious pluralism is total silence. To Hollywood, deity is something like Voldemort of whom no one dares speak his name.

In both Hollywood and Bollywood movies it is altogether right and proper for the antagonist to die in the last reel. But the protocols for killing off the villain differ. In Hollywood, it does not matter how much evil the villain inflicts upon the hero, s/he'll try to take him alive--then helplessly watch him die. The script writer will then oblige the audience by making the villain go for his gun or fall onto some stabby object, like a wrought-iron fence, or a wood chipper, or molten lava. Whereupon the Hollywood hero will then respond with regret while the audience is doing fist-pumps.

Bollywood is a lot more eye-for-eye and tooth-for-tooth. If you smother my asthmatic family member with a pillow, I'll smother you with a tractor exhaust pipe. If you jam my race car into the wall resulting in a fiery crash, I'll do the same to you. I was shocked when I saw this happen in a kid-friendly family drama.

The only counter-example of this was a movie where a woman serially married men who for various reasons needed killing, and she murdered them one after another only to get off Scot-free by becoming a nun.

All the while nobody is allowed to kiss nobody on screen.

Bollywood also seems to have a greater tolerance for government and official corruption. If you ever see a dirty cop, a bureaucrat who takes bribes, or a corrupt politician in Hollywood, they are villains most vile. But in Bollywood this kind of behavior is laudatory provided he share his ill gotten gains with the poor. I have no way of knowing whether Indian official culture is more corrupt than American official culture, but its cinematic portrayal seems to be much more accepting of it.

They say that a fish can tell you nothing about water. This is because he's in it all the time. Foreign cinema provides a window into not just other cultures, but by way of contrast it tells you something of your own. The US has enjoyed a dominant place in world culture for most of the 20th century. In the 21st century, we're seeing other countries developing sophisticated movie making establishments.

It was a bit shocking the first time I heard two characters conversing in Hindi and lapse into Hinglish, uttering a word or two of English. This is the future of world culture: a mix of distinct national cultures that holds lessons for everyone. I think we'll see a convergence on the good and an appreciation of the differences.

Hooray for Bollywood. If you don't agree, I'll give you a tight slap.

Knox's Irregulars

I've been watching a lot of Bollywood and they have no problem talking about God or gods or Allah whatsoever. They seem a lot more free about such things.

I have a friend who is a Christian. When he saw the Avengers movie, he remarked about the line when Captain America says there's only one God. And when he saw Prometheus he remarked about the cross that the girl who played Elizabeth Shaw wore. He claimed the character was a Christian and I remain skeptical. Yes, the girl wore a cross and this is the symbol of Christianity.

But I want to see something more in the depiction of a Christian or what it means to be one. Something more like this. Why, yes, that is almost the picture of a cracked pot.

In both cases, my friend made me a little sad. He's so used to any kind of faith being deprecated on the Hollywood screen and he seems like a starving man grasping at crumbs.

Now, you can find movies where faith is not just mentioned in passing, but a central part of the narrative. I don't like them much. They are often heavy handed.

I like my religion kept between the lines like they did in the Lord of the Rings or the Narnia movies. The narrative doesn't tell you about deity or our moral obligations as much as show you Frodo and Samwise doing rightly.

The word Evangelical implies some overt sharing of one's faith, and commonly Evangelicals are exhorted to witness. But this is all too rare, because Evangelicals too often preach instead. Witness means to relate one's own experiences. E.g. I witnessed the bank hold up and I saw three men wearing masks, et cetera. Preaching means to assert propositions generally on the basis of authority.

In writing, we're told "show don't tell" and that's like the Evangelicals' exhortation to witness, not preach. Thus I prefer Lord of the Rings because Tolkien is showing Christian living instead of telling it to us.

Recently, I read a novel, Knox's Irregulars. It is a military Science Fiction novel about a resistance effort against foreign invaders on another planet.

The story begins with a setup. A bunch of communist atheists with Islamic-sounding names from somewhere-i-stan in the former Soviet Union colonized a planet a few generations back and they do what socialists generally do: make a hash of it and run out of other people's money.

Meanwhile back on Earth there's a second Reformation and a bunch of Calvinists want to start a colony, but all the planets are already taken. They can get a deal on buying an undeveloped hunk of land on the planet of the communist-atheist-space-nazis. They call their colony New Geneva.

Things go well for a couple of generations as the Calvinists' work ethic creates a ton of wealth while the communist-atheist-space-nazis creates envy. As you'd expect, after a purge of the moderates in the bad guys' government, and some ethnic cleaning in their own country, they decide to invade New Geneva.

All of the place-names in New Geneva will be familiar to the student of the Reformation. Many of the characters surnames are those of old-school Princeton divines.

The hero is a young man in a mechanized suit of armor named Knox and his dad happens to be the governor of New Geneva. So, after everyone in the regular army is overrun, Knox starts a resistance movement behind enemy lines.

Now, if this were David Drake writing the story, the good guys would be Satanists and the bad guys would be Baptist Brethren. Everything is turned upside down and the Calvinists are the good guys for a change. I liked to see that change. The story even makes reference to Thermopile. The pattern of the war follows that of the ancient Greeks vs Persians: free Greeks using their wits and initiative to defeat a much larger force of enslaved Persians. So far, so good.

I liked the setup, but around midway through the story, the author had to start preaching. Not in a heavy-handed way, but it wasn't as graceful as C. S. Lewis in Narnia. His heroes are good, and his villains are evil, and we get a nice redemption story. But the preaching to witnessing ratio was off.

The story's end was suitably dramatic, but it lacked the almost pornographic aspect of good guys you really love just putting it to the bad guys you really hate. There's a pattern I've grown to expect in military science fiction that was missing here. The good guys need to have an ace in the hole, a plot device that visits wholesale destruction and mayhem upon the bad guys. In this story, the good guys and bad guys just punched each other to exhaustion. Maybe this is more realistic, but I missed the amazing technological gizmos that laid waste to massively overwhelming numbers of bad guys.

I so wanted to love this novel, but I have to admit that I only liked it a lot. 4 of 5 stars.