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Colonial Crimes is an immensely fascinating look into how beyond the pillaging of resources, colonization also pillaged people. Colonization took peoples autonomy and forced them to act as commodoities. The thing however about the commodification of human labor is that it can take many forms beyond buying and selling bodies to work fields. Human labor can be commodified as entertainment as well. Its because of this that I think that the depiction of colonized peoples as being forced into roles as "Circus Freaks" is so discomforting, its the commercialization of a persons existence. Lastly, i felt like how the film explained the almost animalistic way colonizers viewed indigenous peoples is a contributing factor to things like circuses and human zoos.

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This documentary was incredibly upsetting to watch. I had known that human zoos existed, but hearing about it through the stories of actual people who experienced it made it much more impactful. Many of those zoos seemed like they just a different and almost more humiliating form of slavery. It made me think about how those people must have felt, being forced to take part in the spread of propaganda about the "savagery" of colonized people. I honestly can't understand the mindset that would allow someone to feel justified in putting human beings on display as though they were animals. It seems to me like it could only stem from a combination of fear and a desire for power. People tend to fear things or ideas or people who are different, and it can cause them to do horrible things. Desire for power was probably even more of a factor, since portraying colonized people as something horrible to be feared or disgusted by was a way to maintain power over them and influence the opinion of the Western/European public. This reminded me of the reactions to the BLM protests because a lot of people (and often the media) portrayed the riots as people being crazy and irrational, and over-emphasizing the few instances when protests were not entirely peaceful. One part of the documentary that really stood out to me was the part about Barnum's show because it made me think about The Greatest Showman, and how that movie portrayed Barnum's show as a place where "freaks" could be accepted, as though it was somehow just a big misunderstanding and he didn't exploit and humiliate and mistreat the people who were essentially forced to be a part of it. It made me really angry because I remember seeing it a couple years ago and just accepting that propaganda.

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A main theme of the film was the justification of colonization as a moral and social duty to “civilize” foreign cultures and people, specifically indigenous people outside of Europe. Human zoos were used as justification for the dehumanization of indigenous people as a less evolved race.  Enslaved people taken from colonized nations were forced to perform horrific acts depicting animalistic behaviorism, including cannibalism, without any personal autonomy. The political, scientific, and entertainment aspects of European cultures used the false narratives depicted in human zoos to push social and political agendas that benefited people and institutions invested in colonialism. This theme of justifying colonization as a moral endeavor using false narratives has been present throughout our study of global colonization, especially in Spanish and British colonialism. Watching this film was deeply disturbing because I had known about the ableism and animal cruelty in circuses but not that circuses were fundamentally racist. The lack of general knowledge about the racist history of circuses, even when there’s general knowledge about the moral and ethical implications of circuses, reflected a lack of care and education around colonialism and racism’s effects.

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Ota Benga really stuck out to me for several reasons. How because he was from Congo, his, and the people from the area's, short stature made them seem like the missing link between man and ape. That really just completely took any remnants of humanity out of how they were perceived. Another thing was his teeth and how they were sharpened into points, which was a common practice in his culture, made him seem completely like a savage and just wild. But the biggest thing to me, was how he was loaned to an actual zoo, and put in the monkey cage. If this was something that happened now, in this country, then there would be national news coverage. But stuff like this, the complete dehumanization of people, still goes on today, just not in "places of consequence" to people here, so we don't hear it. News today, I think, is very dependent on what they think the targeted audience wants to hear, and everything else is not going to draw people in and get them views. That's why I think the news is so unreliable.

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Ota Benga really stuck out to me for several reasons. How because he was from Congo, his, and the people from the area's, short stature made them seem like the missing link between man and ape. That really just completely took any remnants of humanity out of how they were perceived. Another thing was his teeth and how they were sharpened into points, which was a common practice in his culture, made him seem completely like a savage and just wild. But the biggest thing to me, was how he was loaned to an actual zoo, and put in the monkey cage. If this was something that happened now, in this country, then there would be national news coverage. But stuff like this, the complete dehumanization of people, still goes on today, just not in "places of consequence" to people here, so we don't hear it. News today, I think, is very dependent on what they think the targeted audience wants to hear, and everything else is not going to draw people in and get them views. That's why I think the news is so unreliable, and you can't take anything you hear from it as 100% fact.

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One of the main themes that I found in the video was the justification of colonialism through the atrocious treatment of the people placed in the zoos. It reminds me of one of the ideas we discussed from Insurgent Empire of how countries like Britain and France would only allow their citizens to see one side of the colonization story to keep their support and act like they were helping the people in the colonies. The marketing of the zoos and exhibitions, while horrendous, was important to gain people's interest and generate revenue. Another theme of the video was the constant degradation inflicted upon the Indigenous and African people for entertainment and to establish a "scientific" hierarchy of human evolution. This hierarchy was an effort to demonstrate the difference between superior and inferior people and reminds me of eugenics. I think the most striking theme of the video was during WWI when countries realized they could use the people in their colonies as soldiers and switched from treating them like animals to having them work for war profit. This was difficult to watch and I was shocked by the stories, but I am glad they're coming to light and people are acknowledging the racist history of circuses and zoos.

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After watching the documentary I was able to more closely see the intertwining of racism/superiority complexes and colonialism.  The people who colonized often saw those who they colonized as inferior, or even inhuman.  They even made up lies and created propaganda about the people whose land they were colonizing in order to justify their actions.  I think as a child, I never really thought about or knew about the atrocities that went into colonialism.  I would probably just think of the Pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving if someone said colonialism.  Now, I can see that things were not nearly as peaceful or humane as American history tries to portray them as.  I can see that racism is tied directly into colonialism, and a lot of native people were harmed under the pretenses of being perceived as "savages".  For someone with Native American ancestry (not necessarily a lot, but a little), I cannot imagine what those people went through and how they felt.

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While watching this short film a relevant theme that stood out to me was the dynamic of power between different races and cultures. There was a certain hierarchy between the French and Tribal groups and there were countless instances of the French oppressing them (for example putting them in so called "human zoos"). We have seen many examples throughout history of racial hierarchy and it is still something that is very prevalent today. I find it very interesting that throughout history there is a sort of re occurring pattern based on racial hierarchy .

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While watching the documentary I noticed many themes that can relate to the knowledge we have gained during class. One of the biggest themes being the interlacing of power, greed, and race in the Western nation. Throughout the history of globalization one can see the many damages done to a certain group of people that racist white people have created, and this documentary serves as a prime example. Their want for power contributes to the cruel behavior they inflicted on others, some examples being with Native Americans, people of color, and the Aborignal Astrailians talked about in the documentary. This idea of Western superiority can be seen in the circuses as racism and greed was embedded within its function. The circus was used as a way to perform dehumanizing acts on groups of people for profit, which ties into greed. It's important to take note of this as the history of globalization was ultimately fuelled by the want of power. I found the documentary to be very insightful as I knew circuses included people with disabilities but didn’t know people of color as well.  At times it was pretty shocking and upsetting to hear about some of the things featured in the film, but overall I learned a lot and it helped further my understanding of how racism, power, and greed expressed by the Western nation was brought onto others throughout history.

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The documentary was terribly tragic and difficult to watch. To see people commit such acts of dehumanization towards other human beings was horrific and shocking. While watching the documentary, I noticed that it tied into the themes we have been studying in class, including the violence that comes with white colonization, oppression and slavery. Throughout history we have seen white people use their privilege to exploit and harm others. In class we have discussed and read about how white people believe that they have "superiority" over people of color. The human zoos were used to display this "superior status" they claimed that they had. Human zoos were an outrageous display of racism. I learned a lot, and think that the terrible events that happened during this time period in history are important to acknowledge and be aware of.

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After finishing the documentary, I think that the concept of human zoos and some of the other horrific forms of racism present in the work are indicative of a much larger problem that with imperialism that the documentary alluded to. to me, the through-line between all of the topics we've discussed in class pertaining to colonialism is the powerful desire which western nation states have had and continue to have for power. This has been demonstrated in many of the events and periods we've discussed in history class thus far, through concepts like slavery, discrimination against minority groups like Native Americans and Aboriginal Australians from the documentary, and the construction of rules and regulations to keep those perceived by white Europeans as less than behind. while watching the documentary, I was struck deeply by the realization that almost every corner of the western world, and in this case circuses and zoos have been warped or touched in someway by the forces of racism. I also thought that it was really great to get to see the opinions and thoughts of those who were directly affected by the events to get to speak on them. Generally, it's important to educate ourselves on the history of colonialism so we can understand and work to never repeat the events of that time period in our day and age.

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This Colonial Crime documentary really really looks into the theme of dehumanization that was going on during colonization. We see how white people labeled people of color as less civilized as they spread false information about how they were “cannibals”.  It was very disheartening to see how one group of people made other people feel like animals placed on display just for the color of their skin and were so blinded by these false narratives they created that they failed to recognize people of color as human beings and equals. These people were not embracing one’s culture in these circuses they were putting people who they found strange and put them on display so they can profit off of their look and way of life.

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While watching this, I saw many prevalent themes, but the main ones I saw were surrounding superiority/ inferiority within racism, othering, and greed, all of which relate directly to global colonization. Within global colonization, we see ideas of Western superiority which we also see in the circuses, as the US and France, among other countries, took people that they found inferior from their land and homes and forced them to perform dehumanizing acts on stage for profit. I think that it is important to recognize this correlation, as the greed exhibited by the owners of the circuses was directly related to the racism being exhibited by Western countries.  This film was definitely informative because I had no idea that the circuses and shows were so rooted in racism.  I only knew the circuses to be disparaging towards people with disabilities, so this was very informative.

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One of the themes that I noticed throughout the film was the huge separation between power, race, and different abilities. It showed to me once again how cruel people who weren't white were treated, without respect, and neglected. Though this documentary was emotional to watch at times, it was filled with a ton of interesting information and helped me better understand the circumstances that people had to live through what felt like a long time, but in reality it was not.

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This documentary really shows the greed for power and wealth by racist white people. This greed contributes to horrible things such as the circuses that we learned about in the documentary. We also really see the theme of "superiority" and therefor also "inferiority". Sadly, we are still seeing remnants of these completely wrong ideas today.

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The themes of this documentary fit a lot with everything else we've been learning this year. Time and time again, we see white people exploiting people of color for financial gain. White people continuously stress that people of color are less "civilized" than them, while making money off of their hardships. Though I knew of circuses show-casing people with disabilities, I had no idea that people of color were also featured in these. It was really shocking and heart-breaking to watch, but I learned a lot.