Attack on the Non-Human
Avatar and Equality
by Elifsu Gürtaş
The world’s natural resources are subject to depletion due to extreme human access. The possible catastrophic results of excessive resource consumption have stimulated human into looking for a new habitable environment. The movie Avatar directed by James Cameron (2009) exemplifies a posthuman setting where people misuse technology to exploit the natural resources on the moon, Pandora, due to the humane destruction of resources on Earth. The movie revolves primarily around the relationship between the indigenous Na’vi race and Jake Sully who is sent to Pandora to establish a communication network. The process of convincing the indigenous race to move to another place, which is one of the aims of this network that Jake formed, reveals the imperialist behaviour of the human. The colonial policies implemented by the company and army on the moon Pandora represent the criticism on inequality created between human and non-human which consists of animals, nature and the Na’vi race in the movie.
Imposing human culture on the indigenous race is the first act of the company exposing inequality. Establishing a school and teaching English to the Na’vi race to force them to communicate in the human language reveals the disrespect of human for the existence of the indigenous race. Although the Avatar Programme conducted by the company appears as a politic act for getting involved in their social environment, the humans have attempted to re-establish some cultural norms for their imperialist benefits. When the residents of Pandora have decided to fight against existential inequality, the human has used technology for its colonial purposes and violated the Na’vi rights to live as free as the human. The movie criticizes the fact that while technology should be used fairly and should not result in any catastrophic future for humankind, we have been using it as a means of proving our superiority over the non-human.
The development of technology has also caused income and health service inequalities for the Earth inhabitants. The miserable life of Jake Sully before departing the Earth reveals the excessive wage gap between the poor and the wealthy. While Jake tries to survive in a small room with the minimum wage as a disabled person, the company employees spend their lives in comfort thanks to their beneficial characteristics for the company’s purposes. The reason why Jake is sent to Pandora is to take the place of his deceased scientist twin brother in the Avatar Programme. To achieve high living standards, the protagonist is supposed to demonstrate his efforts in contributing to the company’s imperial aims on the moon Pandora. The posthuman setting provided in the movie presents the audience with a possible future scenario. It warns the human about the possibility that the poor will get poorer and non-human will be more otherized if the inequality between the creatures increases due to human development. (468)
