Yes, We Watched MTV's 'White People'

Back in the day, MTV had been known for fostering tough conversations via shows like The Real World, documentaries, and their election coverage. Now, MTV is mostly known for not playing music videos. But with a recent crop of critically acclaimed scripted shows and Laverne Cox's documentary series about trans teenagers, it seems like MTV could get their political groove back.

So, when the trailer for MTV's White People dropped a couple weeks ago, the Complex staff was naturally curious about what this documentary could actually accomplish. The premise of the doc, hosted by Pulitzer prize winning journalist Jose Antonio Vargas, was fairly simple—white people would be faced with thinking about what kind of advantages being white gives them.

In actually watching the doc, for many of us, it didn't accomplish much in white people being called out. But, at the very least, White People could be a start for critical (and necessary) conversations about race.

White People premieres on July 22 on MTV.

After these past couple of weeks—writing about the White People trailer and then having White Supremacy Twitter come after me—MTV's new documentary feels weirdly personal to me. (A big part of that probably has to do with the fact that angry, Confederate Flag-toting tweeters were looping me in the mentions along with director Jose Antonio Vargas—telling both of us to leave the country if we hated it so much. Sigh.)

What I first brushed off as laughable new MTV trash suddenly seemed so necessary to America's education system. I'm so used to living in my liberal NYC bubble that I forgot that a huge chunk of this country has a completely different outlook on racial dynamics; as the doc shows, many of them have rarely interacted with a person of color, and even those who don't fall cleanly into the "racist" category have never really thought about race. One of the many advantages of white privilege, I suppose. To my disappointment, the 40-minute doc doesn't accomplish much. A lot of healthy conversations are initiated but the ends are tied too loosely—if at all. Most of the white people who had volunteered to appear on film seem to be already aware of their white privilege, rather than—as I had hoped—having their stubborn beliefs bent because of the project. So many of them were so aware of the camera filming them that they would dance around their words, muddling the doc's focus. The only really eye-opening moment was when a white student realized that she wasn't being snubbed from scholarships because of her privileged skin, like she had expected. Sadly, that was also the least effective part of the documentary. Preaching to the choir rarely stirs the nation, but I sure hope somebody learns something good from it.

--Kristen Yoonsoo Kim

White People is, essentially, Iyanla: Fix My Life.............for white people. And really, this is the last thing white America could've needed: another over-promoted show about itself.

As if white guilt were some previously untapped natural resource, Vargas is digging for candor, compassion, catharsis, and consensus, no matter how superficial. His white subjects regard these conversations as a purifying exercise, like confession. His black subjects clearly regret their participation. Vargas talks over all of his interview subjects, black and white. In any case, most of these people are too obsessively decent to approximate candor in a documentary about how viciously white people suck. This whole doc is Jose Antonio Vargas leading his witnesses, e.g., in an extended discussion of racial preferences in scholarship selection, the participants are line-reading and play-acting stereotypically assigned biases, which they discard as soon Vargas recites some topline, #WellActually statistic to the contrary. As if white supremacy were high school mock trial, so theatrical and flimsy. —Justin Charity

Oof.

When I saw that MTV was going to be showing a documentary entitled White People that was going to take an honest look at what white people go through living in America, I welcomed it. Growing up as a black man in a predominately black city in Jersey who then graduated from a prep school a stones throw from Princeton University, I've understood what it's like to be a minority. Mind you, that high school had a mixture of races—it was nothing to share classrooms with kids from Korea, Brazil, the Middle East, and yeah, white people. I figured our generation would be the kickstart of the real racially-mixed America that we're still trying to achieve. Couple that with my being married to a woman who has Irish, Polish, and Puerto Rican ancestry, with a bouncing eight-year-old in tow, and race has been almost my entire 30+ years on this earth. Be it as "the guy from that part of the city we won't go to unless we need cheap liquor or trees" or "that funny black guy" or as a father who has to figure out a way for my son to live life without becoming a Trayvon Martin.

Yeah, oof.

Growing up on MTV's harder-hitting journalism, I've become accustomed to how they've tried to stir the pot and create conversations; I was tuning into Kevin arguing with Julie about their differences on season 1 of The Real World, and respected the hell out of Tabitha Soren and the other heads who really made their documentaries pop.

White People isn't really that, but it MIGHT be a saccharine start.

I respect, and am overly not mad at White People. For all of the post-racial talk that came out of Obama winning the presidency, we've seen an uptick of horrific, racially-motivated crimes over just the last two years: if someone mentions Ferguson, Baltimore, or Charleston, or names like Eric Garner to you, there's nothing but a truly disgusting look at how horrible Americans can be towards one another. No one really asks white people "hey, how do YOU feel living in America," but then again, no one seems to have been ready for this conversation.

Throughout all of the situations White People brings up, that's what stuck out to me the most: this idea where people say they're "color blind." Please fuck right off. If America is truly poised to go "post-racial," we need to have these conversations out in the open. America is the land of opportunity, not the land of "oh I couldn't Google properly, so all I saw was scholarships for other races, woe is me" malarkey. It's also not the place to have people say "oh I heard people say 'ghetto' on The Real Housewives, so I know what it means." We need conversations like these, and they're going to hurt. I just hope that if MTV plans on doing a White People, Part Deux, that we have real dialogue. Or, better yet, get back to holding necessary forums on a regular basis, so the kids of the world can be just as informed about the issues behind, for example, the Confederate flag ordeal and why people in Baltimore felt the need to burn their town down out of frustration than reruns of whatever is popping at the moment.

Let White People be the failed striking of the match that forces MTV to grab that can of lighter fluid and really get this fire going, so those who are truly trying to change have something warm to sit by while we hash all of this out.

--khal

Commenters on this here website have called me a social justice warrior, the most politically correct writer at Complex, and a pussy when I’ve dared to make cursory acknowledgement of white male privilege (of which I benefit from myself). So, naturally, I expected to revel in this documentary featuring white people forced to face their whiteness—for the purposes of both progress and entertainment.

Unfortunately, White People fails to deliver either. The very nature of its structure, recruiting volunteers to talk earnestly about race, attracted a group of people who already “get it.” More of the short, 40-minute running time was spent with (white) people stating the obvious instead of learning anything. And the few people brought in who don’t understand race aren’t willing to budge and aren’t really pressed to. Fox News viewer/step-dad Mark reacts to his Lucas’ White Privilege course exactly like you’d expect him to. Angelo says it’d be easy for the Chinese people in his neighborhood to learn how to say “Hello, how are you?” No one points out it’d be easy for him to learn to do the same in their language. Katy eventually admits whites aren’t at a disadvantage for scholarships, despite the widespread myth. But first she becomes sullen and bratty when host Jose Antonio Vargas recites the statistics and her non-white friend points out the facts refute Katy’s claims of unfair treatment. “Now I’m like the victim here.”

LMAO.

Ultimately, White People is too concerned about covering white privilege delicately. Vargas doesn’t want to hurt the white people’s feelings, and this approach prevents him from truly (and fairly) calling them on their shit. White people need to be hit with some bluntness for the truth to come through. It may be upsetting, but it’s time to get over it and realize it’s not about us.

--Ian Servantes

Whew, this may be MTV's biggest troll yet. No shots at the highly capable Jose Antonio Vargas, but this doc is one big white-ass softball. It is neither uncomfortable, progressive nor even laugh-out-loud funny in the way that oblivious racists can sometimes be. (A mom's suggestion that minority-geared college scholarships are like "reverse discrimination" is the sole LOL). There are brief flashes of intrigue, like a white kid who teaches a white privilege course in lieu of a Fox-news loving stepfather, or when someone points out that the Italians who feel encroached upon by ever-increasing Chinese neighbors, were the encroachers themselves less than a century ago. But what does this documentary hope to accomplish by limiting itself to covering Caucasians who mostly like, get it? Racists aren't going to watch this and be moved. No progress is made on-screen, no barriers broken. And when a girl has scholarship stats thrown back in her face, sure she feels "attacked" but she's in her home, surrounded by her own, helpfully non-white friends. Jose you should've went to like, Darien, Connecticut fam.

--Frazier Tharpe

When I first got wind of White People, I’ll be dead honest: My intrigue was driven by an itch to get these jokes off. Perhaps it was the trailer: White folks discussing things that seem obvious to me; some tears in between. Conversations about white privilege need to happen, but from the way White People was marketed, it didn’t appear to be the right discourse. My opinion hasn’t budged, but it wasn’t a complete waste of time.

One segment I found interesting featured a white male who attends a historically black college for academics and proximity, as well as the diversity his small, southern hometown didn’t offer. As someone who also attended an HBCU, I’ve long been fascinated by how the majority adjusts to being strangers in a strange land. During the inevitable meeting between his college friends (black women) and friends from back home (white women), the non-malicious use of the word “ghetto” abruptly sends one of the black women from the dinner table in tears. Her frustration is based on the fact that people use “ghetto” with little understanding of the negative connotation it carries. It was frustratingly reminiscent of conversations I’ve had with people who innocently use it in reference to things that malfunction. The fucking remote control not working is not cause to reference something you don’t understand, and while this lesson won’t be learned without the introduction of another perspective, everyone isn't fortunate enough to have a patient friend on hand to lend it.

Furthermore, the discussion about “reverse discrimination” proved to be an eye-opener—just not for me. White students who believed they were being discriminated against because they couldn’t find scholarships were shocked to learn that, not only are they eligible for almost all private scholarships, but that they’re far more likely to receive them. Other white students’ revelations that they had no problem finding scholarships only proved that their beliefs were based on misinformation and poor research. It’s always refreshing to see facts debunk myths.

Did I find White People enlightening? No, but I didn’t expect to. It will, however, be a conversation starter. Two questions to ask are 1. Is this how we want the conversation to start, and 2. Will it even amount to anything?

Actually, one more question: Anyone want to guess what my answer to the latter is?

—Julian Kimble