I still think Moana deserved an Oscar for this part
To me, the moral of Moana is that only women can help other women heal from male violence.
The movie starts with the idea that the male god who wronged Te Fiti must be the one to heal her. This seems to make a certain sort of intuitive sense in that I think we all believe that if you do something wrong you should try to make it right. But how does he try to right it? Through more violence. Of course that failed.
It was only when another woman, Moana, saw past the “demon of earth and fire” that the traumatized Te Fiti had become (what a good metaphor for trauma, right?) and met her with love instead of violence that she was able to heal. Note that they do the forehead press before Moana restores the heart, while Te Fiti is still Te Kā. Moana doesn’t wait for her beautiful island goddess to appear in all her green splendor before greeting and treating her as someone deserving of love.
Moana is only able to restore the heart because Te Kā reveals her vulnerability and allows Moana to touch her there. Maui and his male violence could only ever have resulted in more ruin.
This is a touching anaylisis but it’s extremely racist as not only have you completely ignored the whole point of Maui’s character, but have managed to incriminate a man of color on a tumblr wide scale.
First of all, Maui’s character does not represent male violence—it represent human greed. Maui did not take the heart because he is a man, and Te-Fiti is a woman. He took it because the humans asked him to. The humans asked Maui to do everything for them, not caring how greedy or selfish their requests were and in the end it was Maui who suffered for it. Maui is supposed to show the flaw of humanity.
This has nothing to do with sexism, it has everything to do with the fact that Maui gave and gave to the humans who could never stop being greedy. Moana giving the heart back wasn’t supposed to be her “making up” for the male violence that Maui represents. It was her making up for the greed she and her people represent. It was touching however because yes it was an important moment between two women, but you missed the point and you’ve come off racist and very disrespectful to a culture at that.
Yes, Moana is an empowering movie for women, especially women of color. But the last thing this is about is Maui being an abuser/rapist or whatever. That is not the point of Maui’s character.
And to assume so is racist. You are a white woman completely dehumanizing a man of color and ruining his image because of how you see him. And other white girls here on tumblr have happily picked up that image and interpretation and rolled with it. Maui’s character is now seen as an abuser or as someone who is violently because of white girls here on tumblr—which it doesn’t surprise me. (an in a historical context this is even MORE racist because white women would always make Maui’s people out to be savages and abusers etc., simply because of the color of their skin and their culture so yea, this is bad).
You can see the morality of the movie however you want, but do not be disrespectful toward a character and in this case a culture.
@i-want-cheese Please don’t write this off as another “butthurt comment” or “male guilt”, because this is really messed up. I see how you’re brushing off some other people’s comments and I honestly hope that you don’t see mine the same way because this is an issue I think you need to face/realize. You are being racist and brushing it off isn’t going to change that. the
@visibilityofcolor THANK YOU FOR THIS. As a Polynesian woman, reading that post and other replies painting Maui and even Tui as aggressive and violent men had me feeling some type of way, especially since White people have always regarded Polynesian men in such a manner.
I’ve thought about replying because I’m tired of seeing these kind of “Moana is a feminist movie” posts collect hundreds of notes despite the fact that these posts always conveniently fail to mention Pasifika people, but it always stressed me out, so thank you.
As an aside, Maui taking Te Fiti’s heart and Moana restoring it was symbolic of environmental preservation. Because the people who inspired Moana–Pasifika people, not just Polynesian–are always affected first when the environment is threatened. Our way of life is greatly influenced by the ocean and we believe that if you take care of the ocean, she will take care of you.
You’re very welcome.
This is insight for me as well (as I wasn’t aware that the movie also came fro the culture of the Pasifika people), and does give a very important perspective. I do agree with you, this movie is about environmental restoration, not some white fem bullshit.
I tried over and over again to explain to I-want-cheese about how she was being racist, but she responded by blocking me and other poc who called her out (even other polynesian people). People to this day are still trying to explain that she is being racist and culturally insensitive but she ignores us.
I’ve made a few posts about this, hoping that people realize how problematic it is to agree with i-want-cheese. Explaining to her racist white ass that this was problematic was like explaining to a bird. She wouldn’t listen and neither would have of her racist friends.
Sorry you’ve had to see this on your dash every so often, but I’m glad my portion of the post is starting to get around. (reblogged to the wrong blog at first lols)
Thank you so fucking much I always hated i-want-cheese’s analysis
