American population is mixed with persons from all the parts of the World and the African-Americans form a significant part of the population here. But questions of racial discrimination and access of other basic needs like education, socio- economical empowerment, and political powers are still in question as it was in the past. And these issues still haunt both the “white” population as well as the “black” people in America.
Directed by Ian Inaba, American Blackout is an intelligent piece of film-making that deals with the “systematic disenfranchisement” of the African-American votes through the eyes of a Congress backed candidate Cynthia McKinney. The director gathers a lot of evidences to support his statement that the black population of USA, who generally vote for the Democrats, generally and systematically being excludes from the political process of the country. The basic truths shown here are convincing. Voting frauds in Florida (2000), Ohio (2004) dealt with utter importance in the film. The film points out that the people of the United States of America were missing some serious issues that were going throughout there, and how un-democratic the elections were going (Inaba 2006).
The most important fact here is that the media here does not show everything to the common public and they suppress many very important things which, the public have rights to know. A country runs on the money of the common people, the general mass is responsible for the development of the country and they have the rights to know every thing that is happening in the country. In other words the documentary is a strong statement about the problems encountered during the recent elections in America. Irregularities in the voting have been highlighted in the film. The point that has been dealt in the film is that it tells the audience that they must not take anything for granted; they must research the topic before believing it. This has been instrumental from the 1970s and the heated days of the Civil Right Movements and it is an interesting point of view to find the oppressions are still instrumental (Kelley and Lewis 2000).
The film focused on the fact of the loss of McKinney to Democratic Denise Majette. Both the candidates were African-Americans. McKinney claimed that her loss was an effort to bluff the minority African-American voters. She evened filed a lawsuit to claim that there were violation of 14th Amendment, but it was later dismissed. The film questions a fundamental issue, it is said that the foundation of America lies in the democracy of the republic and it shows how shocking are the actions of the policy-makers. It shows how with various tricks the working class people made disillusioned by different means (Leach 2009).
The criticism of Bush Administration after the 9/11 massacre is also one of the focal points of the argument. The rampant acts of racism and the “criminal acts” to win votes are the real eye openers. Actually it is a study that a section of Americans, even today are still cannot avail their fundamental rights due to the criminal acts of a certain section of people. And according to wise persons this problems will one day sure start some separatist movement that will put the stability of the country in question too. This documentary is really an enlightening treatment for the audiences.
References
Inaba, I. (2006). American Blackout [Video file]. Web.
Kelley, R., and Lewis, E. (2000). To make our world anew: a history of African Americans. NY: Oxford University Press.
Leach, C. (2009). Against the notion of a new racism. Sussex, Brighton: Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology 15(6), 432-445.