Born Free: Ginger Discretion is Advised
Born Free, an MIA music video, was released in late April, 2010, removed from Youtube the same day, re-posted with an age restriction and pulled again the next day.
Boingboing describes the video, directed by Romain Gavras, as a “global ginger jihad.”
Of course, I don’t think this video is really about rounding up redheaded boys and injecting them with as much fear as possible before a violent death, but it’s produced with enough authenticity to make you think it is.
Whether it had to do with the current political climate in the States (the video was released right around the time new immigrant identification legislation was introduced in the state of Arizona) or it heralds back to MIA’s Sri Lankan roots (her father is Tamil), “Born Free” is about visible minorities and obscene violence. There isn’t one element in this video that isn’t designed to provoke a reaction, from the naked couple having sex in bed before being pulled from the sheets and beaten or the old man smoking crack cocaine, to the climactic and bloody end.
Here’s a quick summary care of The Guardian, in case you want to skip the video altogether:
“Here, in summary, is the basis of this year’s version of a controversial super-violent short film/promo for a new single: a set of grim looking policemen are conducting raids on grimmer-looking blocks of flats and targeting only young men with ginger hair. These men are rounded up, put in armoured buses, and taken away.
There is a suggestion that there is some kind of movement to resist this state-controlled ginger-genocide, but whatever it is, we only see a glimpse of it in this film. Anyway, when the red-headed young men arrive at their destination – a desert – they’re told to run for their lives, into the sunset. And when they pause, one of them (the youngest) is shot point blank in the head.Here, in summary, is the basis of this year’s version of a controversial super-violent short film/promo for a new single: a set of grim looking policemen are conducting raids on grimmer-looking blocks of flats and targeting only young men with ginger hair. These men are rounded up, put in armoured buses, and taken away. There is a suggestion that there is some kind of movement to resist this state-controlled ginger-genocide, but whatever it is, we only see a glimpse of it in this film. Anyway, when the red-headed young men arrive at their destination – a desert – they’re told to run for their lives, into the sunset. And when they pause, one of them (the youngest) is shot point blank in the head. “
Viewer discretion is totally required. Nudity, sex, blood, guns and murder are all depicted in this video. As Billboard.com puts it, “watch Born Free at your own risk.”