As I have mentioned on Hillbilly Music, my wife and I used to go see live music, a lot. No, I mean a whole lot. If I wasn't playing music myself, we were out to see our favorite local, regional or international groups. We also traveled all over the western world. Now we stay home and watch TV. It isn't as sexy as running down the Rue Royal in Versailles, France in the pouring rain but it is all we got now.
She likes police dramas. I have my concerns about why we seem so enamored with the subject and if dwelling on what can often be disturbing content is healthy for the English speaking world but I endure it. I will even guiltily admit that I like some shows such as Xstine's favorite: The Closer. The show is pretty good and the interplay between the characters is entertaining. I even like the “Easter Eggs” such as the name of the coroner, Dr. Crippen. I am fairly certain this is a nod to the notorious wife murder, Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen. I also find it amusing that the boyfriend of the lead character, Brenda Johnson is named Fritz Howard. Howard Johnson!
Last night's episode was disturbing for more than just the subject matter. The story revolves around the abduction and murder of an eight year old girl by a child molester. As a father and a human being there is nothing more frightening in my mind and I am positive that James Madison and the founding fathers may have given the 8th Amendment a second thought in such cases.
To say that this is an emotional subject is an understatement and I am generally critical of using this sort of thing for entertainment purposes but after three seasons it is reasonable that the fictional “priority homicide” unit of the Los Angeles police department would have dealt with at least one such incident. To the producers' credit they have not built a show on such emotionally charged content. As fiction or as a reality series, the subject of pedophilia is not entertainment and certainly should never be seen as humor. I was very disturbed to see Chris Hansen and To Catch a Predator do a cameo on 30 Rock.
So we have established that the producers of The Closer do not over use lurid and emotional subjects like child molestation. Why did this episode of The Closer upset me beyond that which should be expected by such a horrible topic? The child molester had an Appalachian accent.
Now given that Kyra Sedgwick's character, Brenda, has a pretty horrible southern accent for an ex-CIA spook who speaks multiple central European languages, I could see where the producers may not even realize that this odious character had an Appalachian accent instead of a southern accent. Indeed when I said, “great, the child molester had to have an Appalachian accent,” my wife said, “I think it may just be a southern thing and not necessarily an Appalachian accent.” The problem is she had that tone in her voice. After 26 years I have come to recognize that tone as the one that says, “I don't believe what I am saying but I just want you to feel better about an obvious slight.” I have no idea who the actor is who plays this unfortunate role and indeed he may be a native Appalachian. In that case I would be horribly conflicted as I would be glad that a fellow hillbilly found work in Hollywood but I would just as soon he affected a different dialect for this role.
I like Ms Sedgwick but as one of the producers and someone who obviously has a great deal of control over this project I would have hoped for a bit more sensitivity. It would have been just as easy for this character to have had no accent at all. The show takes place in Los Angeles for crying out loud. It wouldn't be out of place for the character to have had no discernible accent given the cosmopolitan nature of southern California.
My fear and suspicion is that the “accent” of the child molester just “seemed to fit” the character in the eyes and ears of the producers and director. Of course this intangible appropriateness comes from a deeply held and seldom examined prejudice common throughout America. This is the degenerate hillbilly. This is the voice that haunts Ned Beatty's career. This is the punchline in a Tarantino film. And you wonder where the stereotype comes from? If folks with an Appalachian accent are often portrayed in such ways it is going to rub of on the real Appalachians and make life difficult.
How can it be that a region that has one of if not the lowest crime rate in the nation always seems to get stuck lending a voice to any criminal who is not Tony Soprano or a South Central gang banger? Is it that all of the folks who leave the hills become criminals and degenerates?
Hollywood treated blacks pretty badly for generations. They were either step-and-fetch-its or pimps back when being a pimp was correctly seen as a bad thing. Morgan Freeman started out playing pimps in movies even though his television work had been in educational shows for children. Now Mr. Freeman is God. Black guys aren't always the first dudes killed off in a movie now and they even get to be the hero. Maybe hillbillies just have to wait their turn.
But while we are standing in the mercy line, I hope Ms Sedgwick will reflect on the people who are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. She has a 19 year old son who plays in a band like his dad. I am sure she has thought about what it would be like if he was one of those young soldiers and she is thankful that he has options that those other young folks did not have. A lot of those young soldiers have the same accent as the child molester on last night's episode of The Closer and because of the way human beings hold on to stereotypes and how we punish groups of people because of those stereotypes there will be fewer opportunities for those people with that accent.
The child molester character told Ms Sedgwick's character that he had been out of work for three week since he had lost his job as a landscaper. He said it was hard to find work when you were a registered sex offender.
It is often hard for people with an Appalachian accent to find work but being a hillbilly isn't a crime.
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Posted by: sjbimpwy esifjvma | April 13, 2008 at 09:52 PM
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Posted by: Loyadegessy | May 13, 2008 at 11:52 AM