Icon vs Reality

I got word yesterday that MTV and Paramount have bought the rights to Marla's life story and are in the process of producing a film about her life, staring Kirsten Dunst as our Marla. This has unleashed a flood of emotions in me that have me feeling like we lost her all over again. But this is just one episode in a string of things that have upset me since her death (besides the very basic and gut wrenching fact that she is gone at all).

Overall I feel like since the day she died, people have been using her death (not her life) as a tool to further their own agenda. This includes people from both sides of the "aisle" so to speak. You have your fuck faced David Horowitzs out there saying that marla was guilty of treason and that she painted the brave people of the armed services in a bad light, and she was just out to bring down the U.S. then you have your super left wing fuck faces out there sitting behind their computers all day long with their supposed moral righteousness blaming her for not being "pure" enough in her ideals, not speaking out against the war strongly enough, not protesting enough, becoming a media darling apologist for the bush regime etc etc.

WTF people?! both of these portrayals are so wrong and so untrue to Marla's life and memory. They don't really have anything to do with marla AT ALL. They aren't about HER. They are about an iconic vision that they want to paint in order to make their point. I'm disgusted. I'm outraged. To the right wing ass holes who don't even listen to the actual military who they are supposedly "supporting" I say: i wish it were you that had been killed. To the left wing "protesters" I say: what the fuck have you done lately to actually ease the suffering of the innocent people who are being harmed by the Bush regimes policies that you are so self righteously opposing and protesting?

Most people who are protesting the war and the atrocities that are happening in the name of the United States, ostensibly are doing so because they care about the people who are innocently being affected. So why tear into and question Marla's motives/actions. She was so affected and so hurt by what we do and have done all the world over to make innocents suffer that she worked her ass off to ease that suffering IN A REAL WAY. Not just ideologically. When we were living in Jerusalem, she would stand up and debate with anyone who didn't agree that the occupation had to end, as it was unjust and was causing pain and suffering for innocent Palestinians, not just those who perpetrated attacks on innocent civilians from the other side. But IN ADDITION to writing papers, debating, working against demolitions of houses etc., she also volunteered her time at a daycare in a Palestinian refugee camp, taking the kids to the zoo, playing with them, hugging them, loving them. She wasn't just against injustice on an intellectual or academic level, she really truly felt the pain of each individual as if they were a member of her family, and dealt with the situation how, I hope, most people would if it were THEIR family member experiencing the injustice and pain. You would do the most pragmatic things possible to end the suffering, and change the situation at the same time. Even if that meant swallowing some things from time to time.

I just wish people would stop using and misjudging Marla to the public in order to make their point.

Back to the movie/Kirsten Dunst thing. All I can think of is "Bring it On" because that movie is one of my stepdaughter's favorites, and it upsets me that they didn't pick a more serious actor to "play" her. But if they do end up making a good and honest and compassionate and MOTIVATING film, then its a good thing to pick a big Hollywood actress for it, in order to bring more folks to the theater that might not have come elsewise. But at this point I could also see it going the route of the overly sexualized, ditsy "memories" of Marla that have been floating around publicly since her death. I guess only time will tell. Maybe my problem is less in who is "playing" her than the fact that ANYONE has to do it. I just want her back, and for HER to portray herself. I want all this media attention to have happened while she was alive. While she could revel in it, and use it to HER end goals.

Marlita baby I miss you, I wish you could tell me what you think of all of this.