Are We Doing the Right Thing?

The movie by Spike Lee, “Do the Right Thing”, relates very closely with Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s Racism Without Racists and Charles Gallagher’s Rethinking the Color Line: Readings in Race and Ethnicity.  For instance, the movie and two textbooks all talk about interracial friendships and relationships.  The only such romantic relationship in the movie is Mookie and Tina who is a black male with a Latina female.  Bonilla-Silva found that his participants were more likely to support interracial marriage if a Mexican was in the relationships instead of a black.  Gallagher argues that white/black interracial relationships are becoming more common in movies; however this movie did not portray any white/black romantic relationships. 

An article written by Sandie Angule Chen entitled “The 10 Most Compelling Interracial Romances” argues that it is rare to see a relationship in a movie that does not involve a Caucasian like “Do the Right Thing”.  She continues on that there are two types of movies involving interracial couples.  Either the movie makes race a big issue, or where it is not that important.  Spike Lee’s movie does not focus on the interracial aspect of the relationship, but the majority of them do.  This movie depicts nearly every race which is uncommon for a Hollywood film.  However, there are limited cordial interactions between all the races. 

            Another area of overlap is Bonilla-Silva’s notion of colorblind racism (covert racism and avoiding racial terms) that plays out throughout the movie.  Two such instances occur in Sal’s pizzeria.  The first occurs when Buggin’ Out points out that only white people hang on the “Wall of Fame” despite the restaurant being situated in nearly an all-African American neighborhood with almost only black customers.  Sal says he takes pride in his Italian heritage and can do what he wants since it is his store.  In a subtle way, Sal is indicating that whites are superior to blacks and thus deserving of being on the “Wall of Fame”.  The other incident occurs when Pino tries to boss Mookie around as soon as he comes in to start his shift at work.  He thinks he is superior to him since he is white and not from the neighborhood.  Pino goes on to criticize his dad for giving handouts to Da’ Mayor.  This illustrates Bonilla-Silva’s “cultural racism” aspect of colorblind racism.

            Race relations serve as another aspect of overlap between the film and a textbook.  Bonilla-Silva says that America has a tri-racial order with an “honorary white” category being created as a buffer zone between whites and blacks.  Pino in “Do the Right Thing” illustrates how black celebrities can be considered an honorary white.  When Mookie points out that Pino likes black celebrities like Michael Jordan, Eddie Murphy, and Prince, Pino responds with, “It’s different… I mean they’re not black, they’re not really black.”  He continues on with, “They’re more than black.  It’s different.”  This shows that just because they are celebrities; it is fine to like them.

Spike Lee recently addressed his thoughts on the film at Eberfest 2014 at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.  He commented that “12 Years a Slave” winning the Oscar for best picture does not change the status of blacks.  This is similar to Obama becoming president; America didn’t become equal as soon as he took office.  He continued on by saying that not much has changed in race relations or race in Hollywood in the 25 years since he made “Do the Right Thing”.  This is evident by Los Angeles Clippers owner, Donald Sterling’s most recent comments about blacks.