this post was submitted on 16 Feb 2025
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Showerthoughts
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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The most popular seem to be lighthearted, clever little truths, hidden in daily life.
Here are some examples to inspire your own showerthoughts: 1
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We have an American commercial illustrator named Warner Sallman to blame for the canonical Jesus’ melanin deficit.
Yeah, I think Italian Renaissance painters may have pre-dated that somewhat.
Blonde, light-skinned with blue eyes? Nope.
That's a ridiculous claim.
Here's a picture of Jesus' baptism from Normandy, painted in 1185.
Plenty of others here: https://smarthistory.org/standard-scenes-from-the-life-of-christ-in-art/
Europeans tended to paint Jesus as white because they didn't understand there were no photos or movies or TV around, so someone in Norman France didn't know there was an alternative possibility.
i think it goes back a little further than some dude from the US...
That would go against the narrative that every thing bad comes from the US
After reading that I just had an idea for what I think would be a good premise for a film. In the 70s Jesus "returns" in the US somewhere, but as someone who gets labelled as a black man, noone believes him. Because he keeps getting knocked down at every turn due to systemic racism, and because he is so fed-up with the "White Jesus" trope he joins the Black Panther Party. He ends up being shot by a cop. Final shot slow-zooms in to show cop's name on a tag. First name Judas.
Do you think Ancient Jewish people were black? Have you ever met anyone who lives around the Mediterranean? He would look like a version of that guy who worked outdoors. He was from the Levant not sub-Saharan Africa. He wouldn't be "black" rather he would be seen as Middle Eastern.
I live in Greece, so ...yes, I meet lots of them every day. Firstly when I had the script-idea I didn't think there would necessarily be a need to "prove" that he "returns" as the same race as previously anyway. Of course just having him return "not white" would nudge people to connect dots to the historical whitewashing regardless. As an atheist I would see the whole thing as a fiction-based-on-fiction-based parable anyway. Aside from that there are quite a few who debate that he wasn't from the Levant, as mentioned here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_appearance_of_Jesus (not that I agree with any particular theory, just that there are many competing theories, and I'm not even convinced such a human even existed).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Jesus_(TV_series)
Nah, he would have been seen as Arabic and thus be labelled as a Muslim, being even more intenselly and more widelly hated in the US than if he had been deemed a Black man.
Also in terms of probability he would've probably 'return' to somewhere in Asia or Africa since there's were most of the population is nowadays.
Due to deep frustration with cultural imperialism and pervasive US exceptionalism I am one of the first to cheer when some popular-culture artefact dares to [shock, horror] not be based in the US. When District 9 was based in Johannesburg I remember thinking 1. Due to the apartheid subtext it makes sense, and 2. How on earth did they get decent funding without it being based in LA?! Having said that, I think the premise of such a script requires he "return" to the US in order to comment on events and prejudices there during that time (and the after-effects of events leading up to it - Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr, etc).
It's funny that District 9 is one of my favorite films and yeah, I also felt both that it was very much a comment on Apartheid and was pleasantly surprised with the quality of their production values and their cast.
Yeah, I guess that if the purpose is for Americans to "see themselves through the eyes of Jesus" then said film with the return of Christ would have to be set in America.
I was going to paste the same link. :) Have my upvote instead.