The FedEx Arrow
Following on from my last post about ideology, I want to introduce a new concept which I’ll probably be mentioning a lot in the future: the FedEx Arrow. I got this from yukie1013 via Debi Linton. The basic idea is that the FedEx logo has an arrow in it. Some people notice it and some people don’t, but once you’ve seen it you can’t unsee it. This is analogous to ideological assumptions in texts (and for the historian this applies whether those texts are fiction, primary sources, or secondary works; it also applies to films, comics, art and any other cultural artefact you can think of). Some people notice ideology in a text, and some people don’t. Once you’ve noticed it you can’t make it go away, and that changes the meaning for you.
Probably my first major experience of this effect was the film The Spitfire Grill. Maybe it was never a great film but I used to really like it. It was kind of like Twin Peaks re-imagined as a chick flick, which somehow appealed to me. But then I read somewhere on the internet that it was anti-abortion propaganda funded by the Catholic Church. That wasn’t particularly obvious from the film itself. Although it was obviously very sentimental and manipulative, Percy’s situation was so far removed from reality that I didn’t connect it with real women having real abortions. It doesn’t really matter whether the rumour is true or not, because once the possibility was there in my head it wouldn’t go away and I started to notice things in the film which were definitely there but which I hadn’t noticed before. Suddenly it became unwatchable because it seemed so misogynistic. The message I get from it now is not only that if you have an abortion you’re a murderer who deserves to die, but that if someone rapes you and gets you pregnant, and you decide that you definitely won’t have an abortion, but the rapist beats you up until you have a miscarriage, that you’re still a murderer and deserve to die. Now it doesn’t quite say that explicitly. Percy doesn’t actually get tried and executed for the death of her unborn baby. But it’s strongly implied that she has an unbearable burden of guilt that won’t ever go away until she dies. No-one ever tells her it’s not her fault. Yes, I’ve spoilt it now, but spoilers or not, just don’t watch it. I’m never going to watch it again.
But as Debi says, seeing the arrow doesn’t have to ruin something completely. It’s still possible to enjoy something while seeing the arrows in it. I really like old TV action series like The Sweeney and The Professionals even though they’re full of casual racism, misogyny and homophobia. Actually, having watched every single episode of both of them earlier this year (there’s a limited range of things you can do when you’re recovering from RSI) I think they’re not quite as bad as they’re often assumed to be, but there are still lots of problems with them. I can still be influenced by Nietzsche even though I can see that he had some very dodgy ideas about race and inadvertently encouraged the Nazis. The Smiths will probably always be my favourite band despite Morrissey’s blatantly horrible misogyny in songs like “Pretty Girls Make Graves” (and the fact that it’s such a great song probably just makes it all the more dangerous).
So that’s the FedEx arrow. Try and spot some. They’re everywhere even if you don’t realise it.
