My Good Friend Bort

A thing can be against empire and be amazingly racist simultaneously.

See it’s more the fact that it does a piss poor job of being against empire. Like yes I understand that Kurtz is a metaphor for Empire and Marlow’s obsession with him is supposed to be that of any colonist yearning for the wealth of nations and the ideas that get them there. But when Marlow describes the people being colonized there’s no sympathy, there’s no kindness, he doesn’t even see them as people truly. In fact the few times when he worries about the effect of empire he worries about the land itself and not even the people living there.

Hum. I DO think it's possible to split hairs and say he's against empire by having such a vast contempt for the Other, but for regular intents and purposes, yeah, you're right. The idea of being anti empire because it puts you unavoidably in contact with yucky brown people is obviously racist to the core.

See it’s not even that. Marlow couldn’t care less about interacting with the native Africans! He sees them as less than human, they’re regularly described in animalistic terms. At best they are merely tools for him to accomplish his goal (finding Kurtz). He doesn’t want Empire to end because of wanting to avoid interacting with Black people, his only moments of wanting it to end is because he’s scared of it consuming his life the way it did Kurtz’s. The entire focus of the book is on White Men and the psychological toll that perpetuating colonialism has on them. Like “oh no I’m colonizing a continent and I think I’m going crazy ☹️” is the vibe.

Book that was good: I liked it 👍

A thing can be against empire and be amazingly racist simultaneously.

See it’s more the fact that it does a piss poor job of being against empire. Like yes I understand that Kurtz is a metaphor for Empire and Marlow’s obsession with him is supposed to be that of any colonist yearning for the wealth of nations and the ideas that get them there. But when Marlow describes the people being colonized there’s no sympathy, there’s no kindness, he doesn’t even see them as people truly. In fact the few times when he worries about the effect of empire he worries about the land itself and not even the people living there.