More About Snake Dick

Hey Gene and Ash! I just wanted to say I had so much fun tonight! Thanks for reading my email, I was gushing! I also felt so welcome by you and everyone in the chat, thank you so much!

I think I just have one more thing to say about the snake *dick* scene that hopefully makes the scene more palatable — it has to do with the voyeuristic nature of that segment. I listened to HBO’s pod about the show, the two hosts of the pod are two black female writers from the show. They didn’t give a lot of insider knowledge about the show’s intentions, but they did discuss at length the sheer horror of white people watching black characters having these hallucinations. Along the line of misogyny discussed earlier, I think it’s possible Letitia is having this particular fantasy/hallucination forced on her, as opposed to it being an actual formulation of her repressed fear.

My impression of that segment is that the characters are hallucinating their deepest darkest secret/fear. For Letitia, this doesn’t make sense, there’s no way her biggest secret is having some affection for Tic, or that her biggest fear is being raped (I think Ash you said something similar on Twitch). I think she was placed in this specific room, and given this specific hallucination because her voyeurs, the white men watching through portals, want to see her raped. It’s gross and terrible, but I think it makes this scene all the more horrific.

I also have one thought about the “campy” nature of the show, especially in this scene. I think by having some cgi elements that are less than great, the show alienates the audience (ala Brecht) in these moments and keeps us from becoming voyeurs ourselves, which helps keep the focus on the message of the show. I’m not positive this is actually what’s going on, it may be that JJ Abrams and co are George Lucasing the show, but I think the show could be taking extra caution that it doesn’t become a cathartic opportunity for non-black people to get off on the struggles of others.

Anyway, I might be wrong, and I don’t know why I feel the need to defend snake peen, it may just be a bad scene. ?????

Thanks again!
Beth B

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