Not So Familiar

Okay, full disclosure, this post probably has just about nothing at all to do with Ignorance. However, today is the 27th of October, and that means that Season Two of Stranger Things is available on Netflix.
If you have a Netflix account, and you are only learning about this now, I fully endorse the decision to read this blog post later, and go watch it right now. In fact, go for it: here's a link to the Stranger Things page of the Netflix Australia site. Even after this post for a while, years from now, if you haven't yet seen the show, I still highly recommend that you go and watch it.
However, if you do decide to hang around, I want to talk about this show, and how it manages to be something original, despite being very derivative.
And although I will be talking about the show, I do not plan on talking about the plot, so this should be free of spoilers. Nonetheless, if you already plan on watching this show regardless of what I have to say, please be aware that this will most certainly contain Minor Spoilers.

You see, what I find amazing about the show is how real and tense and compelling it is, despite those elements which should, by all rights, take you out of the story.
This story is set in 1983 before I was born, it has nostalgic elements from several movies I've not seen, the characters reference music, pop culture and comic books that I've never been a part of & the setting cery much evokes “Smalltown America”, which I've never been a part of. Despite all of this, I connect with these stories, wholeheartedly.
I think the praise for that entirely goes to the writers and the actors. Not only are these kids written like real people, who are fun and enthusiastic and excitable with juvenile stakes and believable emotion, but all of these young actors have perfect chemistry and ability, to translate the writing to the screen.

I haven't lived that life or in that era, but I believe that they have because of the effort that's gone into every detail, from culture, clothing, comic books and cars all the way to the technology, music and themes present in the show.
I could geek out about this show for hours, but the reason I'm talking about it for this blog is because, as a writer, what impresses me the most is how this show has managed to take inspiration from multiple sources, even paid homage directly to certain films via costuming or cinematography. Yet, Stranger Things is an entirely original beast.

This series is inspired by (and references) several 80's movies: ET: The Extra-terrestrial; Aliens; The Goonies; Jaws; Indiana Jones; Firestarter; Evil Dead; A Nightmare on Elm Street; Poltergeist; Stand by Me & It.
It also references a lot of 80's pop culture: X-men Comics; Stephen King; John Hughes Movies; Punk Rock music; Ham radios; Star Wars; Dungeons & Dragons; Synth music; Walkie-talkies & Project MKUltra.
There's even some modern inspirations, such as the anime Elfen Lied; the videogame The Last of Us; sci-fi film Under the Skin & thriller film Prisoners.

However, despite all of these influences on the story, themes and characters, it doesn't actually influence the plot. Except for Prisoners that is, that directly inspired the story that the Byers family goes through, but even that inspired the premise of the story. Otherwise, none of these nostalgic homages actually affect the plot. The plot (which I am being deliberately vague about, so as to avoid spoilers) does follow the adventure of some elementary school friends; the drama and horrors of a trio of high schoolers & the intrigue and mystery of a pair of adults. These stories interact, intersperse and intermingle until they all eventually integrate into one story conclusion by the end. Sure, there are aspects of this story that borrows concepts from other movies, but never plotlines, instead it creates its own narrative that takes all of these ideas, but irons them out into the one story with its own sequence of events.

The show is often called "nostalgic", and this is a fair descriptor, because of the 80s tropes and the music and the clothing, and references to all these movies, this does evoke that familiar feeling. However, because of the way this show was made, that familiar comfort is often deliberately altered and twisted into something completely different.

It's akin to if someone took fifteen very different houses, demolished down and recycled the parts into one much larger house of your own design. Sure, you can stop, and point at a brick over here, a tile down there or a gutter overhead and identify which house that piece came from, but if you walk into a room, there's no room from the demolished houses that singularly inspired it.

And perhaps that's the reason why I can enjoy this as much as I do despite not being fully invested in the nostalgia, media or culture of this era. Unlike some shows that use nostalgia and homage as a cheap trick, or to make referential jokes, this show isn't mired in lazy writing and doesn't waste the potential of its inspirations on pointless callbacks.
You don't need to know the original context of a reference, because it has an entirely new context, a Stranger Things context.

Anyway, for this reason (and many others that I've not mentioned due to the potential for spoilers) I am very excited for the new season, and I hope you are too. I wrote this post ahead of time, so I will probably have seen it by the time this post is published; but if you haven't, then I have to again recommend that you get started as soon as possible.
I'm the Absurd Word Nerd, and I know I often don't geek out like a fanboy, but I couldn't resist the chance to tell people to watch this show.

Hatecraft

There are many genres and subgenres of fiction that I love. Sci-fi Drama; Urban Fantasy; Action Thriller; Detective Noir; Weird Western; Gothic Romance . . .
But when it comes to Horror, my favourite subgenre has to be Cosmic Horror. I can’t help but feel like the conceit of the genre resonates with me. Because I am not a religious man, I don’t believe in purpose or meaning in life. I believe that meaning is not objective, only we can decide what we want to do with our life - and what we choose to do only has meaning because it matters to us.
Nature does not exist the way it does because it was designed or crafted, but because it evolved that way. Not through choice or desire, but because every other iteration crumbled and died. Good and Evil are irrelevant, in the grand scheme of things, because morality is just another human meaning - there’s nothing right or wrong about the weather, disease, animals or sex, these are just things that exist in this reality. I don’t believe this because I want to, or because I prefer it that way. I believe it because that’s how it is.

To me, this is a powerful and beautiful point of view. Because there is no greater meaning than our own - and even if there were, even if there is some inconceivable god, our inability to conceive it makes our meaning the only one we can know.
But Cosmic Horror represents the only logical conclusion to this point of view. That, objectively, everything is meaningless. From the perspective of the Cosmos, we don’t matter any more than the billions of asteroids floating aimlessly through space. The same atoms that composed the rose that you gave your beloved were once the atoms within a star, that churned in a stellar cauldron of unfathomable heat, until it exploded and collected onto the surface of a gravitational cluster that became our planet.
It wasn’t fate. It wasn’t destiny. It’s just “what happened”.
But more than that, we are just one planet in a vast, vast universe. We have sentience, but what does that mean for the universe? There are two possibilities: Either we are alone in the cosmos, or we are not. Each possibility is equally unsettling to comprehend.
Either we are the greatest minds that this universe has achieved, meaning that all wonder and curiosity at the expanses of the universe are just echoes in the existential emptiness. Or there is something beyond us, which is so unlike us that we could be mistaken for shadows or reflections by their inhuman eyes. Yes, we have meaning because we give ourselves meaning, but all of this matter and meaning is irrelevant to the universe. The cosmos is indifferent to our lives.

I know it is probably just an assumption on my part, but cosmic horror feels like a natural result of knowledge, science and nature. Although he saw it as a call-to-arms for humanitarianism and environmentalism, I feel as though Carl Sagan touched upon the core of cosmic horror, in his reflection upon the photograph of Earth from the Voyager 1 Space Probe, 6 billion kilometeres away - known as “Pale Blue Dot”. In particular, these words:

“ . . . Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere, to save us from ourselves . . .”

— Carl Sagan, speech at Cornell University, October 13, 1994

This is science. This is truth. This is cosmicism. It matters a lot, to me.

So, I cannot express to you how shocked I was when I first learned that Cosmic Horror, the genre that encapsulates my awe at the equally wonderful and terrifying size of this reality, was born of hatred.
I call it Cosmic Horror, but most people know this genre as Lovecraftian Horror. First concieved by Howard Phillips Lovecraft, this genre of weird fiction does indeed celebrate certain sciences, in particular chemistry and astronomy, as well as warn of the potential harms and fears of such a craft. It explores how the universe is indifferent and uncaring.
But, this genre was inspired not just by Lovecraft’s adoration of science, but also his fear and loathing of foreigners. Lovecraft was incredibly xenophobic, and this is not just supposition on my part. Lovecraft was infamously reclusive - both due to childhood sicknesses and introversion - and so as well as his fiction he was an amateur journalist and prolific correspondent. In these myriad writings, he detailed his inspirations and opinions, as well as his anglophilic, xenophobic, elitist, puritanical views; both in his self-published magazine The Conservative, as well as many other essays, letters and even poems. If you have a strong constitution, I have included a fraction of these below, and I have even emboldened some of what I considered to be the most egregious statements. Remember, every single one of these words came from Lovecraft himself . . .

“The negro is fundamentally the biological inferior of all White and even Mongolian races, and the Northern people must occasionally be reminded of the danger which they incur in admitting him too freely to the privileges of society and government.”

– ”In a Major Key,” from The Conservative Vol. I, No. 2, 1915.

“But I, thank the Gods, am an Aryan, & can rejoice in the glorious victory of T. Flavius Vespasianus, under whose legions the Jewish race & their capital were trodden out of national existence!”

– Personal Correspondence, August 10, 1915

“The mongrel natives, in whose blood the Malay strain predominates, are not and will never be racially capable of maintaining a civilised condition by themselves.”

– an article from United Amateur, 1916

“The most alarming tendency observable in this age is a growing disregard for the established forces of law and order. Whether or not stimulated by the noxious example of the almost subhuman Russian rabble, the less intelligent element throughout the world seems animated by a singular viciousness”.

– “Bolshevism”, from The Conservative Vol. V, 1919

“ . . . if racial amalgamation were to occur, the net level of American civilisation would perceptibly fall, as in such mongrel nations as Mexico–& several South American near-republics.”

– Personal Correspondence, January 18, 1919

“Most dangerous and fallacious of the several misconceptions of Americanism is that of the so-called “melting-pot” of races and traditions.”

– “Americanism”, from United Amateur, 1919

“Heaven knows enough harm has already been done by the admission of limitless hordes of the ignorant, superstitious, & biologically inferior scum of Southern Europe & Western Asia.”

– Personal Correspondence, Demember 13, 1925.

“It is a fact, however, that sentimentalists exaggerate the woes of the average negro. Millions of them would be perfectly content with a servile status if good physical treatment and amusement could be assured them, and they may yet form a well-managed agricultural peasantry.”

– Personal Correspondence, January, 1931.

“The population [of New York City]  is a mongrel herd with repulsive Mongoloid Jews in the visible majority, and the coarse faces and bad manners eventually come to wear on one so unbearably that one feels like punching every god damn bastard in sight.”

– Personal Correspondence, November 19, 1931.

“When the alien element is strong or shrewd enough to menace the purity of the culture amidst which it parasitically lodges, it is time to do something.”

– Personal Correspondence, June 12, 1933

“Nothing but pain and disaster can come from the mingling of black and white, and the law ought to aid in checking this criminal folly. Granting the negro his full due, he is not the sort of material which can mix successfully into the fabric of a civilised Caucasian nation . . . Equally inferior–& perhaps even more so—is the Australian black stock, which differs widely from the real negro. This race has other stigmata of primitiveness—such as great Neanderthaloid eyebrow-ridges. And it is likewise incapable of absorbing civilisation.”

– Personal Correspondence, July 30, 1933.

It is also believed that, due to his extreme conservative views, he would have been very much homophobic (but, as he was reportedly a virgin into his 30s, and according to his wife, never initiated sex, it is believed by some historians that he was not fond of sexuality of any kind, and perhaps considered it uncivilized or ungentlemanly).

But these racist views are not just a facet of his time and culture, he was critical of America, immigration, the failure to maintain a “colour-line” and modern culture. Although the man died over a decade before America’s Civil Rights Movement, he lived through the turbulent era after the abolition of slavery and the granting of equal voting rights for African-Americans; and he was not in favour of either.
For goodness sake - even though he never travelled further than 300 kilometres from his childhood home in Providence, Rhode Island - he felt the need to express his disgust at Australian Aboriginals. As I, myself, am an Australian, I found that assessment particularly stomach-churning.
Although it was most likely due to his Puritanical, reclusive upbringing, and some of the hardships he endured, Lovecraft was uncommonly and irredeemably hateful and openly prejudiced against minorities. Even for those races he admired or considered “cultured”, such as the Chinese, Ancient Rome and some Jews (but definitely not all), he was convinced that you could only achieve a peaceful culture by segregating the races.

So, his personal views, somewhat naturally, bled into and corrupted his writing. His most famous early tale Dagon, speaks of an ancient, barbaric race of aquatic humanoids that rise from the sea to steal human victims.
In his story The Transition of Juan Romero he describes the titular character as an “unkempt Mexican” whose main features are that he is “ignorant and dirty”.
In the serialized Herbert West–Reanimator, Lovecraft describes a black man as incredibly ugly, and a “loathsome, gorilla-like thing, with abnormally long arms which I could not help calling fore legs,”
The tale of The Dunwich Horror recounts the tale of half-breed monstrosities, whose racial characteristics are inherently antagonistic, noxious and violent.
And of course, The Shadow over Innsmouth is the story of a town whose inhabitants are all half-fishman/half-human hybrids, and the initial horror of a character learning that his lineage is also tainted with this corrupted bloodline.

But this is more than implicit racism as determined by critical analysis, but Lovecraft himself made explicit mention that his xenophobia, or “fear of strangers” informed his horror fiction. In the June 1937 issue of the Amateur Correspondent, in an article called “Notes on Writing Weird Fiction”, Lovecraft had this to say:

“These stories frequently emphasise the element of horror because fear is our deepest and strongest emotion, and the one which best lends itself to the creation of Nature-defying illusions. Horror and the unknown or the strange are always closely connected, so that it is hard to create a convincing picture of shattered natural law or cosmic alienage or “outsideness” without laying stress on the emotion of fear.”

So, Cosmic Horror and Xenophobia are undeniably intertwined. The heart and soul of Lovecraftian Horror is hatred and fear of “otherness”. It's troubling that something so meaningful to me is born of something just as abhorrent.
However, after some thought, I found myself coming to terms with this fact rather easily.

Firstly, Cosmic Horror is not inherently racist. Despite there being dozens, dozens and dozens more retellings and expansions of Lovecraftian Horror and the Cthulu Mythos, none of these successors have perpetuated the hate. In fact, despite being inspired by hate, the genre functions just as well - and, in my opinion, better - without it. Horror writers weren't inspired by his fear of foreign things, but rather this fear of monsters that weren't so much "evil" as "too powerful to notice us". Rather than fear of aliens as an allegory for fear of "inferior races", most of them focused on exploring the horrors of cultists, unknowable gods and creeping madness, many used as an allegory for losing your humanity. Or even, like me, they played on our existential dread of infinity and cosmic worthlessness.

Secondly, there is much more to Cosmic Horror than Lovecraft. See, what inspired me to write this post is my research for yesterday’s post, looking for bigoted Horror Movies. In my search for a xenophobic horror movie, I explored adaptations of Lovecraft’s work, but none of these movies were xenophobic. Some even took Cosmic Horror, and the “horrific outsider” trope to explore the views of minorities in regards to the majority - so rather than a local being confronted by invading immigrants, it becomes a discourse on the experience of the migrant or persecuted minority, surrounded by cruel neighbours - my favourite example is that of the film Cthulhu, (actually an adaptation of “The Shadow over Innsmouth”) which made the main character gay, entirely changing the focus of the story so as to explore the fear of being considered an outsider in your own community.

Thirdly, and to me most importantly, unlike Lovecraft, I do not judge something as inferior just because it was born of something alien to me. I am not prejudiced against ideas merely due to its parentage. I fully accept that Lovecraft was a racist - like I said, I accept things not because I want to, but because that's what they are. But, I also accept that his views were wrong. And whilst I will spend an entire blogpost explicitly calling out these racist remarks, and calling the man close-minded and bigoted for it (and, in fact, I think I just did), I aso accept that he was not famous during his lifetime, and considering how many of his family went mad and died within the walls of a madhouse, I think he suffered enough. Of course, we ought not forget his contribution, but I do not celebrate him as a person because his personhood is unworthy of celebration. I merely accept that he had a cool idea, and I thank him for it, despite the rotted garden bed of his mind from whence it grew.

In conclusion, this leads me into, perhaps, the most important aspect of ignorance that I think we need to all consider. Ignorance is dangerous and cruel, but it need not be so destructive. Even those whose views are disgusting and toxic are still capable of art and beauty, and perhaps even elucidating upon the subject of their ignorance.
Whilst I do not, and cannot, abide by the hatreds Lovecraft held - I can see that, perhaps, the reason he was so hateful was because he was so very, very scared. Like I said in my Foolery Pox blog post, fear is a weakness in our critical thinking which makes it easier to fall victim to dangerous ideas. But, even if someone is ignorant, if we take the time to listen to them, we may even find the opportunity both to teach and to learn with them.
I'm the Absurd Word Nerd, and I honestly believe that if you have an open mind, you can take something crafted by hatred, and with the right touch, craft it into something inspired by Love.

The Dark Past of the Horror Movie

I enjoy Horror Films. I can’t say they are my favourite genre, but they are a lot of fun. Even if I don’t find a film in the horror genre particularly “scary”, the stories are often dramatic, affecting or exciting. Hell, even the horror movies I don’t like tend to be interesting in their own way.

However, I can’t shake the feeling that horror films are dreadfully tainted. Through no fault of its own, the horror genre has a dark history of persistent bigotry.
If you have an interest in horror movies of the past and present, then you may be aware of what I’m talking about.
The Black Guy Dies First; Sex Equals Death; Killing Off the Queer; Creepy Crossdressing & Ethnic Monsters.

In the past, when people created monsters in their movies, or killed people off, they chose women or gays or ethnic minorities, because . . . well, things were worse back then.
There is a deep and detailed history of Homophobic, Racist & Misogynistic themes in Horror.

Now, don’t get me wrong. In modern times, Horror Films tend to be some of the most tolerant movies. After all, Horror is one of the easiest genres to get right for new, Indie filmmakers. In Action movies, stunts are expensive; in Drama, you need great actors; in Comedy, you need a good writer; Science-Fiction needs expensive props and make-up . . . but Horror? All you need is some vegetable oil and red food die, or some fascinating shadows, and you can make a bloody brilliant horror film.
And in this age, not only are more and m  ore people open to equality and freedom, but some people go out of their way to defy the ignorant, bigoted tropes of Horror’s past. So, more and more horror is well-thought out, open-minded and inclusive.

But, I am not here to talk about those movies. Today, I plan on talking about Horror Films and their Dark Past. Today, I want to expose the most Bigoted Horror Movies I can lay my hands on. In fact, I have chosen five horror films, each with their own brand of intolerance which I believe to be the most bigoted horror films I’ve ever seen.
If you can think of any worse, well . . . I wouldn’t be “happy” to find more of this garbage, but I would appreciate the insight nonetheless. So, allow me to present . . .

THE A.W.N.’S TOP FIVE MOST BIGOTED HORROR MOVIES
Before we begin I’ll give you a heads-up, although I don’t consider a lot of the movies on this list to be worth watching, I think it’s worth mentioning that THIS LIST CONTAINS SPOILERS for some of these movies. For the most part, you can avoid these spoilers by not reading the Explanation portion of the entry. So, if you plan on seeing any of these movies in the future, do not read that section.
However, as this list will occasionally reference a reveal in regards to the killer’s ethnicity, sexuality or minority status, then you should consider there to be a risk of MINOR SPOILERS by reading the Bigotry section as well.
So, if after reading the title of a movie, you have a desire to watch that in the future, have not done so yet, and do not want any plot points, even minor ones, to be spoiled - skip that entry entirely.

Also, some of this list may seem unusual, but please keep in mind that I am counting only Horror movies, not Psychological Thrillers, and some of the most infamously homophobic movies are not Horror, but rather 'Comedy' or 'Thriller'. Also, some of this is determined not only by my own opinion, but also my interpretation of the film in question.
Just as importantly, in the interests of fairness, I have not included films that I have not seen. I researched and watched as many films as I felt would be relevant for this post, but if a film is too obscure or unpopular, that may explain why some films have been left off this list.

With all that aside, let's get into some HONOURABLE MENTIONS:

When it comes to RACISM, Creature from the Black Lagoon has some unfortunate implications. The big-lipped, degenerate monster from the jungle who seems hellbent on raping white women - and it is called the "black" lagoon after all. Later films even show how it fails to fit into modern society, even when there is a half-gillman half-human hybrid, it succumbs to its animal nature and returns to the water. But, this isn't on this list because a lot of this is sub-text moreso than context, and since this was made in the 1950s, if the film wanted to be racist, it would have been explicitly racist.
In regards to TRANSPHOBIA, I was interested to find that in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, it is implied that Leatherface is transgender, at one point wearing female skin with lipstick, female clothing and an apron, acting demure and passive. But, I don't feel like this is transphobic, since this is clearly just a nod to notorious serial killer Ed Gein (this link includes explicit details of his crimes), but he was not transgender, he was just a religious nut with creepy mommy issues. At worst, this is just a transvestite in a gory version of drag. For that same reason, I've left off The Silence of the Lambs whose antagonist also drew inspiration from Gein. Similarly, I was also keen to include The Rocky Horror Picture Show for its exaggerated and villainous portrayal of a gender non-conforming character. But, despite the disgusting transphobic views of one of this film's most iconic writers and actors, Richard O'brien, this bigotry was not evident in the film itself, and the main character was a transvestite, not transgender.
In regards to MISOGYNY, the only honourable mention is perhaps Teeth. But I could not include it for three reasons. One, I haven't seen it, so that would be very unfair. Two, from synopses I've read online, it appears that this is more misandrist than misogynist, portraying all men as rapists and abusive - and although I hate sexism either way, again, I haven't seen this so I can't judge. Three, from people I've spoken to, it seems like this movie is pretty campy and self-aware, so being mildly sexist might jusst be "part of the joke".
But, when it comes to HOMOPHOBIA, I have to mention A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge. This does appear to have themes of predatory gay men, with Freddy wanting to "get inside" of the main character, and some key scenes filmed within a leather bar. However, from what I can tell (as I haven't seen this film either), it sounds like this film is fabulous. Although Freddy is analogous to a predatory gay, the main character is shown to be gay as well, and seeks refuge in his "close male friend" by "going to his room at night" to "sleep with him", so it sounds like this film has some intriguing, homoerotic themes. Similarly, I left out Hellraiser, as although the Cenobites were inspired by the gay leather/BDSM community, Clive Barker himself is a gay man, and this represented some of his own fears exploring the subcultures of gay clubs and nightlife as an inexperienced, young man.
In regards to XENOPHOBIA . . . I considered The Island of Lost Souls, a movie inspired by The Island of Doctor Moreau, as it had refrences to human-animals succumbing to their bestial, aggresive nature; and Dr Moreau forcing them into line with a bullship. But, when I discovered the item I chose for the following list, well, it made a potential Doctor Moreau slavedriver seem tame by comparison . . .

Anyway, without further ado, allow me to present, from least to most bigoted, some of the worst horror films I've ever seen.


The Serpent and the Rainbow
Bigotry: RACISM
Plot: American ethnobotanist Dennis Allan is hired by an American pharmaceutical company to go to Haiti to recover a supposed “zombie powder” so it can be replicated to hopefully create a powerful anaesthetic. But, when he goes to Haiti, his efforts are hindered by Dargent Peytraud, the leader of the Tonton Macoute, and a practitioner of voodoo. Peytraud wants to keep this magic a secret, as he uses it and a variety of other black magic to control the Haitian population. Things get worse and worse as Dennis gets closer to the truth, until he gets poisoned by the powder himself . . .
Explanation: This movie is based on a non-fiction book, but the first problem with it is that this story isn’t true. In the original book, there was no such conflict with the Tonton Macoute, no black magic, no pharmaceutical company and definitely no evil bokor. In the film, Dargent Peytraud is the leader of the Tonton Macoute, and keeps the locals in-line using black magic to invade their dreams and create zombies, all through the loa Baron Samedi. This is insulting and racist for three reasons.
Firstly, the mythology is condescendingly wrong - Baron Samedi was not an evil monster, in fact in Voodoo he was opposed to zombies and human sacrifice. Secondly, the real Tonton Macoute only ever used references to Voodoo to scare locals, their real horror was through state terrorism, rape, violence, murder and extortion. Thirdly, the real leader of the Tonton Macoute was named Luckner Cambronne. He was scary, not for using black magic, but because he lead this team of knife-wielding Macoute, and would sell the bodies and blood of victims overseas for medical uses through Hemo-Caribbean, a blood bank he co-owned. He was called 'The Vampire of the Caribbean' for that reason.
He was a corrupt politician in a dictatorship, yes, but he was not a monster because he was black, Haitian or a used 'Voodoo'. Then,  despite exploiting Voodoo for the whole movie, they literally drag him to Hell - although sone Americanized Voodoo believes in the Catholic Hell, Haitian Vodou traditionally believes that the souls of the dead return to nature after a year and a day spent under water. So, ending a Voodoo Horror movie with a reminder that, "Oh yeah, but our religion is the real one" is what made me put this on the list.


Scary Movie
Bigotry: HOMOPHOBIA
Plot: As this movie parodies horror and movie cliches, a masked killer like the one from Scream hunts down a group of teenagers that have a dark secret, akin to I Know What You Did Last Summer, and the masked man kills them and many others in ways reminiscent of The Blair Witch Project, The Sixth Sense & The Matrix. But, as the police and adults seem useless, what remains of the teenagers attempts to uncover the mystery behind this killer, before he kills the last of them.
Explanation: This is a horror-comedy. The horror comes from a lot of the blood and murder, but some of the “comedy” comes from negative homosexual stereotypes as portrayed by Shawn Wayans playing a character named ‘Ray’. Ray is effeminate, re-enacting many gay stereotypes of dress, dancing and hobbies; he is predatory and sexually aggressive, molesting men without their consent, touching naked men, and speaking lecherously about them. There's no twist to this, no wordplay and no irony. The 'joke' is, entirely, that he's gay.
This alone would be pretty condescending and a poor representation. However, the movie takes it a step further. And, heads-up, this is where things get into SPOILER territory. You see, Ray is not only 'gay', but near the end of the movie he is revealed to be a villain. Another character, Bobby, declares that he is going to kill his girlfriend because she has not ever had sex with him, and as a result he is "deviant", so he turned gay, he became Ray's gay lover, and they are going to kill his girlfriend so that they can run away and start a new, gay life together.
Yes, you heard that right, lack of sex turned him gay and psychotic.
I know this is meant to be a comedy and a parody, but this joke is trying to be funny by making fun of homosexuals. The humour is meant to make heterosexual people laugh at homosexuals.


Hostel
Bigotry: XENOPHOBIA
Plot: Paxton and Josh are two Americans tripping around Europe with a friend they met on their trip, Óli. Josh is getting over a breakup, so Paxton is seeking young, hot European girls for sex, when they meet a Man in Amsterdam that promises, if they visit a specific hostel in Slovakia, they can find dozens of young, hot and horny women.
But, when they head there, things take a strange turn when they meet some other unusual tourists and violent, street urchins & then Óli goes missing. The hostel says he went home, but the next day, Josh disappears too. Paxton goes looking for his friend, but in the process gets trapped in a gory maze of murder.
Explanation: Okay, as a horror concept this kind of works. The basic conceit is, this is "Murder Tourism" - People are lured to a location, drugged and trapped, then rich people travel there for the opportunity to experience murder, firsthand. That is creepy, and as a writer, I would love to write a story like that. But, why is this set in Slovakia? I mean, it would make sense if this was based on truth or Slovakian history, or if Slovakia had different laws or a weaker police force or corruption. Or, although a bit unkind, if it had a struggling economy this might explain why they aet it there. So, let's see . . .
Is this referencing a true story, or based on some dark, Slovakian History? No.
Is Slovakia isolated, geographically, or known for high crime rates? No.
Is Slovakian law limited or corrupt, or is the country struggling economically? No.
So, why on Earth is this story set in Slovakia? The only explanation left, that I can see, is that Slovakia is a strange-sounding place that Westerners would be nervous to visit, because it sounds scary and foreign.
The film presents Slovakia as a "hotspot" for murder tourism, with a running plot-point of murderous child gangs that threaten tourists and locals for candy or money with improvised weapons; and the murder facility itself is within the abandoned ruins of a factory, making the whole country seem like a bleak, grey, filthy, dangerous, poor, crime-ridden, third-world country. Slovakia is not a perfect country, but it is a first-world country with a rich history, beautiful landscapes, universal healthcare and free education. There's even a minor plot-point that the price for murder depends upon Nationality, with Americans the most expensive - so, American life is literally worth more, according to this movie.
Considering that Eli Roth, who wrote and directed this film, also co-wrote and directed The Green Inferno, a film about a fictional cannibalistic tribe in the Amazon that captures, tortures and eats several Americans, I can't help but feel like these xenophobic themes weren't accidental . . .


Antichrist
Bigotry: MISOGYNY
Plot: A couple is left grieving after the death of their infant son, who climbed out a window whilst they were having sex. The wife is hospitalized due to her depression and self-hatred, blaming herself for her son's death; but her husband, a therapist, takes her home to treat her himself. When that fails, they head to a remote cabin in the woods called "Eden" for some exposure therapy.
But far from their old life, in the middle of nature, things take a dark turn as the husband comes across disturbing creatures, sinister plant and insect-life, darkness and evil. The woman continues writing her thesis on misogyny and gynocide, but succumbs to the dark mythology and becomes entangled in cruelty and lust.
Explanation: The ultimate evil in this movie, the monster, the "antichrist", is Women. Not just 'this woman' not 'the female character in this movie'; the only named character is Nic, the dead son, the woman is called 'She' in the credits, the man 'He'.
She uses sex to distract herself from her grief to the point of raping her husband; she is revealed to have abused her son when he was alive; she eventually attacks and tortures her husband, mutilates herself and prepares to murder him.
And this isn't presented like she summoned the devil herself, it's not as though she spoke some dark spell, insulted a demon or was born on an Indian Burial Ground - no, she is evil because she's a woman. She is cursed by womanhood, akin to a witch, because she is female. Did I mention that this was by Lars Von Trier?
This film, and this filmmaker, hates women and acts like sex, especially female sexuality, is inherently disgusting and destructive.
But worst of all, according to the director, this film is supposed to be about how "Nature is Satan's Church". But, I can't accept that. Sure, there are some clear themes along those lines, and some characters even state this thesis by name, but if Nature is Hell then Women are the Devil - at least, according to this movie.
And that's what truly pisses me off. I disagree with the conceit of this movie - that Nature is Hell - as I think Nature is amazing (cosmically indifferent, it is as ugly as it is beautiful), but as an artistic, experimental film concept, that could have made a fantastic horror movie. But, this director's sexual hang-ups got in the way of a great idea. Almost every one of his movies throws in pointless sexual deviancy, rape and cruelty, and this film is no exception. Considering how much he seems to be terrified of sex, I think this filmmaker should go fuck himself.


Sleepaway Camp
Bigotry: TRANSPHOBIA
Plot: After her father is killed in a boating accident, young Angela goes to live with her aunt and cousin Ricky. However, due to this trauma, she is incredibly shy, quiet and scared of the water. So, when Angela and Ricky go to Camp Arawak together, Angela's introversion and fear of swimming makes her the target of several bullies, a lecherous camp cook and some pranksters. Ricky tries to intervene, to take care of his cousin, but things take a dark turn when several of Angela's attackers are killed in horrific ways. Angela starts to enjoy camp, and even opens up to a cute boy named Paul who starts a budding romance with her, but this also causes more people to pick on her and so more people to die. As the bodies pile up, and everyone starts to get more frightened, the camp leader starts to suspect that Ricky is behind the murders . . .
Explanation: This one is MAJOR SPOILER territory, but I guess that's par for the course with a story like this. The reason why people are dying at Camp Arawak . . . is that Angela has a penis. Seriously.
A cook tries to molest her - and as such, would learn about her penis - so she kills him. A boy mocks Angela for not swimming - since swimming requires her to remove her clothes - so she kills him. A bully pegs a water balloons at her - forcing her to change her clothes and potentially expose her penis - so she kills him. A girl throws her into the water at the beach - wetting her clothes, and potentially exposing her penis - so she kills her. She even kills her potential boyfriend after they get naked together.
The worst part is, although Angela is "forced" to be a girl by her aunt, she is transgender. Angela is shown enjoying the attention of boys, she only ever kills to hide her secret, she gets upset when people taunt her for not having noticeably reached puberty and she never acts upset when called a girl. This movie equates transgenderedness and homosexuality by showing that Angela's father had a gay lover which she saw lying with him in bed as a child - and seems to imply that this is why Angela is transgender. But worse, the final shot of the movie, showing the true "monster", is a girl with a flat chest, covered in blood with her dick hanging out. The way the movie ends on a freeze-frame of her face, open-mouthed, as she makes a croaking noise. It would be funny if not for the implication that this human being is supposed to seem like a beast now because, well . . . she's trans. If that's not transphobic, I don't know what is.

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Thankfully, it is pretty had to find a truly bigoted modern horror film. Unfortunately, I found dozens and dozens of bigoted films which I could not include, as they were the wrong genre for this list. Even the small number of films on this list are all in colour, which means it was made after the mid-1930s, when Technicolour became mainstream. At time of writing, that just about a lifetime, but I know for a fact that most were made during the 80s and 90s.
Ignorance and bigotry, yet still, pervade the Hollywood scene and the silver screen.

I'm the Absurd Word Nerd, and I hope you found this list enlightening. Personally, I fond the fact that these films were written, produced, directed and distributed, much more disturbing than any horror film I've ever seen.