Ashley Mellinger
Stories (2)
Filter by community
Let's All Clap for the White Man
The White Savior Complex is sometimes accredited to Rudyard Kipling's The White Man's Burden, a poem espousing the moral obligations of white folks to civilize non-whites living in the darkest corners of the earth. Inspired by the Phillipine-American War, Kipling urges the White Man (sic) to exercise patience and fearlessness in meeting the needs of his captives, (in this case the Filipinos,) who are described as "Half devil and half child". It seems strange that an India-born White Man would describe his brown-bodied brethren in such a way; yet the roots of white supremacy run deep and does not require strength in numbers, and remember that his most famous work does center around a brown-bodied man-cub who was raised by wolves. And how lauded Kipling is today for having brought such humanity not only to the beloved animals of The Jungle Book, but to the uncivilized Mowgli as well.
By Ashley Mellinger6 years ago in The Swamp
