Instead, it illuminates that there is no creative endeavor in which conservatives cannot find evidence of a liberal plot to rip apart America's social fabric, encourage anti-white prejudice, promote the LGBTQ agenda, and — as General J. Ripper said in “Dr Strangelove,” — enable “Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.”
Let me tell you what has so bunched MAGA panties this time. In the movie, as things go sideways, the Black father G.H. Scott (Mahershala Ali) tells his daughter Ruth (Ma’hala).
"I'm asking you to remember that if the world falls apart, trust should not be doled out easily to anyone, especially white people."
Heavens to Betsy — the horror, the horror.
I have to be honest. When I watched the film, I must have heard Scott say it, but it hardly registered. Especially as the white mother, Amanda Sanford (Julia Roberts), a misanthrope who seems to dislike everyone equally, is distressed when two Black strangers show up at the door of her luxury vacation rental, claiming to be the homeowners. It will escape no rational person that some of the edge to her concern is due to the strangers’ race.
However, even-handedness is oil to conservatives' one-sided water. And they ignore that the father warns everyone is potentially untrustworthy in a cataclysm.
Adding spice to the MAGA’s poisonous stew is that the movie was co-produced by Michelle and Barack Obama’s production company, Higher Ground. Worse, the movie’s director and co-writer, Sam Esmail (an Egyptian-American Muslim), consulted Barack Obama about how a global crisis might play out.
Conservative social media gadfly, ‘Libs of TikTok,” took to Twitter to claim the scene was "demonizing" toward white people. In their words:
"Netflix film called "Leave The World Behind" produced by the Obamas includes a scene demonizing white people. White people are the only group you're allowed and celebrated to be racist towards and it will be put into movies by the most influential people."
Another Twitter user, Matt Wallace, predicted that white outrage was going to explode.
"This racist clip from Barack & Michelle Obama's first fiction film on Netflix called: "Leave The World Behind" is about to go viral!"
The Citizen Free Press, a conservative news aggregation website, said the scene "warns about White people if the world falls apart."
I am a white person who has obviously missed the memo. At no point during the movie did I feel I was the target of a racist attack.
I will go one step further. When you look at who has been charged with inciting an insurrection, who abetted the insurrectionists, and who rioted to strip America of its constitutional government, a rational person has to conclude that mistrusting whites is the sanest starting point in a crisis.
The vast majority of those wannabe democracy-killers are people who look like me.
The conservative hysteria is, of course, "projection." That psychological trope has become a cliche. As has “every accusation is a confession.” However, just because things are trite does not mean they are wrong. Rolling stones still gather no moss. And conservatives are ever industrious in fingering others for their crimes.
I could point out the institutionalized bigotry of the MAGA cult. And the strident, non-stop, monomaniacal racism of its godhead. But that is hardly news to anyone reading this. It must be so tiring to be on constant alert for liberal machinations lurking on every screen, in every book, and throughout the government.
Some people need a vacation.