Wakanda is an Alt-Right Paradise
Warning: mild spoilers
You read that headline correctly. Wakanda is a white supremacist’s stained-sheets wake-up-with-stupid-smile-on-his-face dream.
Wakanda is Richard Spencer’s idea of a perfect country.
Now, before taking this dive, let me say I loved the movie, and I get why it’s being so widely embraced. It’s unapologetically Black, and offers an enticing vision of how sub-Saharan Africa might have developed had it not been for the Portuguese, jonesing for a flavorful dinner, pushing their caravelles further and further down the African coast, picking up and amplifying some nasty, but not widespread, local habits along the way. Black heroes are awesome and necessary, and I’m happy that the fantasy hero stories my daughter is growing up with now include the full spectrum of humanity. The film is a triumph on many levels, and I especially appreciated T’Challa’s UN speech at the close. Dammit, we should all treat each other as members of the same tribe.
So if you, dear reader, are now asking me to STFU, I understand. If you wish solely to revel in this fantasy and remain entirely ignorant of Wakanda’s nagging issues, by all means, put down your device and go see Black Panther again.
Still here? Cool.
Reason #1 Richard Spencer would love Wakanda: It’s ethnically monochromatic. They have sealed themselves off from the world and allow no immigration. Wakanda remains Black by essentially hiding behind a technological wall. That’s what Spencer wants to carve out for himself and his ignorant melanin-deprived brethren somewhere in the US — a place where everyone’s white and a giant wall keeps it that way.
The second reason white supremacists can totally relate to Wakanda: no democracy. Wakanda’s a monarchy. There is no indication whatsoever of elections or collective decision-making within Wakanda. The king has a council — yay — but the final decisions are all his. Their rituals for succession are also, shall we generously say, anachronistic. Ritual battle to either a yield or death? For white supremacists who teach racial superiority, yeah, they’d be quite comfortable with choosing the strongest dude of royal blood as their next warrior-god-king.
Yup, strongest dude. No woman challenged T’Challa for the throne. No woman was asked. This is the third thing Richard Spencer and his misogynist buddies would love about Wakanda: patriarchy. Yeah, there are bad-ass women generals and warriors, and T’Challa’s 16-year-old genius sister Shuri designs cool tech, but the king’s a man, and he’s totally in charge. And it’s been that way for a long freaking time. Aside: in fairness, Asgaard has the same bloody problem — patriarchal warrior-god-monarchy.
Just as Richard Spencer’s white fantasy paradise nation is simply an untenable concept in these post-post-post-modern interconnected times, so too is Wakanda’s model unsustainable. Killmonger (we need at some point to have a separate conversation about how Marvel names its villains) proves that beyond a doubt. The Leviathan is a great model for governance until, you know, someone who’s not terribly Leviathan-esque gains absolute power. To rid itself of the cancer it invited by dint of its antiquated system of succession, T’Challa’s family had to violate Wakanda’s long-cherished rules. If you have to violate the rules of your system to save it, the rules need an update. Wakanda has successfully put off that day of reckoning, and yes, it does appear they’ve got a good king, but it’s coming.
So enjoy the movie for the wonderful fantasy it is, but don’t peddle #WakandaForever as anything more than the joy of that fantasy. They’ve got some amazing cool tech, impeccable fashion, and a royal family that’s smooth AF, but this fantasy nation, like every real developed nation, has issues.
