The constant frenzy isn't anything special or new, I noticed that everytime I take off and come back, an extreme low, a crash is inevitable. But because this time my retreat wasn't just a vacation, rather, an intense experience for the brain and the heart, I'm expecting and hoping for the crash to stay.
I always say, "I wish I could be a hippie for a day", and I think in a very long time, I finally came pretty close, minus the weed. Followed by that week of overflowing to-do's and time constantly on my ass; not having to worry about school, work, future, and ridiculously immaterial things, was so liberating and gave me time to actually think without being interrupted by phone calls (there was no reception!) and post-it notes every where I look. The group was a gathering of 19 highschool students, 13 from Vancouver and 6 from Port Alberni and mentors (AKA tormentors); each one of us with our own stories and ideas to share and a goal of challenging discrimination. And with that motivation, we were to make a short video on anti-discrimination at a small film school called GIFTS on beautiful Galiano Island.
We were divided into sub-groups depending on what type of film (documentary, animation, drama, etc) we wanted to make. Inspired by Moby's "Sky is Broken", I wanted to make an animation film; I didn't know how tedious and complicated animation would be. During our working times, we sat in front of computers in the "Nerdhole" and worked while other groups filmed outside, in the sun! As jealous as I was, I don't regret choosing animation because I learned so much about Photoshop and Aftereffects, a program where you can make your picture move, and with animation, you can make anything happen, and ways of communicating your ideas is limitless.
But before we could start the process of storylining and drawing characters, we had to come up with the message we wanted to convey and how to show it through our piece. For my group, which consisted of Branden and Jonah, both from Port Alberni, and myself, this was the hardest process of all; we really had an overflowing of ideas and everything we decided on would complicate itself into an incomprehendable theme. Our first idea was a FPS video game film on the affects of discrimination on the racist. This idea couldn't work because we couldn't find a way to justify the racist's violent actions and couldn't take the risk of depicting a mixed message. Our second idea was a view into the minds of three strangers on the bus. The three stranger are of different colors, and we demonstrate both the random thoughts (eg. what to have for dinner, what to wear tomorrow) and the circumstancial and subconscious thoughts (eg. the way person naturally relates to a certain colored person when reading about crime, way a person resituates themselves on the bus depending on the color of his neighbor, and etc.)
Both our ideas revolved around a thing called "subconscious racism"; we were all devoted to this vague idea that only on the second day of the week, with five more days left to finish our film, we decided to change it. In truth, we were so blindly in love with the idea of "subconscious racism" that we didn't even know how to exactly define it. I first brought up the idea of "subconscious racism" because I discovered my inner racist. Having drifted from culture to culture, continents to islands, I have always considered myself to be multicultural and open minded; but one day I caught my mind freely and sneakily judging and justifying, after an anti-racism workshop that I whole-heartedly participated in. After the workshop and on the bus, a stereotypical emo girl walked in, and although I can't describe in words how the mind works, closest thing is, it was a split second of "she thinks she has the worst of everything". The duration of that thought was so short and the visibility so faint that it could have easily slipped away, but I caught it and had a holy shit, you hypocrite moment. And after catching my mind in action that one time, I caught a lot more. And constantly catching this subconscious mind in action and just being aware changed my attitude a whole lot.
We also argued that this "subconscious racism" idea creates a new intake into the whole anti-racism argument. The fight against racism has somewhat become a blaming game where fingers are always pointed towards the "racists", "others" or "bad guys", rather than us, and everyone. I think this piece had the potential to redirect the accusing fingers and reconnect people with the neglected little voices in our heads.
When we are aware of our thoughts, we can do more to control our actions followed by those quiet thoughts. With the help of Angela, the school board's anti-racism and diversity consultant who brought me on board, we discussed "subconscious racism" and came to a conclusion that "subconscious racism" in fact lines itself with prejudice. Prejudice is "a feeling, favorable or unfavorable, towards a person or thing not based on actual experience (negative and positive)". The minor difference between "subconscious racism" and prejudice is that subconscious racism is a subconscious division of people into categories, while prejudice sides towards one particular side of that division. Three cups of coffee and countless reconsiderations later, we decided to completely renew our idea once again. The topic of "subconscious racism" was very insightful and educational, but it was much too vague and difficult to convey. Hitting a stop point was difficult and having to acknowledge that we need a change of idea was even more disheartning, but we were warned beforehand to "love nothing" and with that, we let go.
Our new idea reflected the long caffein filled discussion we had in an attempt to revive our "subconscious racism" idea. In an attempt to define the word, we examined the origins of racism/prejudice. Needless to say, much history is involved, but the present media also plays a huge role. We're all affected by Hollywood's definition of beauty, masculinity, the smart kind, the obedient kind, the main character, and the extra. And with this in mind, our piece shows the dilemma of authentic self versus the media influenced self formed by the "layer of skin" media has wrapped her in. We used boiling for the background, to create a messy and unrealistic affect. We played with real images, cropped a bunch of random images into pieces and stuck them together into one body (sorta like Angela Anaconda) and placed them into TVs, magazines, posters, all of which represent the media.
On the last day, exhausted and caffeinated with coffee beans from the last minute work the night before, we showcased all of our videos. All of the videos turned out great, we put into film what we wanted to say, and we all left with the pride that we all had a part in them.
It's funny because before, I would have considered this week to have been either an excuse to miss another chunk of school and "take a break", or the most "ineffective" time I'd spent since spring break, "effective" use of time, meaning studying physics, cramming for chemistry test, practicing flute, constantly checking off my to-do list, and so on. I have single handedly avoided to do any of that "effective" stuff.
I think we have developed a fear of not being in constant action. We are afraid of taking a break because the world is going so fast, and it'll take that much longer for you to catch up. And from that fear, we became obsessed. Obsessed with our own futures, our own financial situation, our own survival. And with deadlines breathing down our necks, it's hard to not to be obsessed. In the midst of so many people to see, things to do, places to be, and physics, math, chemistry to learn, I can't say for sure that social justice and racial discrimination would have been my priority before this trip.
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