Former Ole Miss and NFL star tackle Michael Oher has been in the news all week after surprisingly filing a lawsuit against the family who helped raise him.
Oher, who played for the Baltimore Ravens, Tennessee Titans, and Carolina Panthers as a pro, is taking the Tuohy family to task as he’s claimed they made him sign documents under the belief he was being adopted only to find out many years later that he had actually made them conservators with rights to his name, image, and likeness.
The former player’s story was portrayed in the 2009 film, ‘The Blind Side’, something he says made the Tuohys millions while he got nothing.
Professor Robyn Autry has since written an opinion piece for MSNBC in which they claim that the movie catered to the egos of white audiences and showed them off as heroes instead of truly depicting Black people “as complete and complex human beings.”
An excerpt from the piece, titled ‘The Blind Side’ got it wrong. As all white savior movies do’ can be read right below:
“While Oher’s lawsuit is an indictment of sorts against the Tuohys, it is just as much an indictment of movie audiences that over and over again lap up stories about white people saving some downtrodden Black person or some downtrodden group of Black people.
“…That’s probably because the white public craves feel-good stories that portray them as heroes more than accurate stories that portray Black people as complete and complex human beings.”
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Autry also claims that the movie is nothing more than a “twisted version of ‘Beauty and the Beast’ which pushes the belief that white folks are heroes instead of urging people to fight for social change.
The outcome of Oher’s lawsuit remains to be seen. But it appears most people are taking his side.
