We're Not Friends : Jon Snow and the Wildlings in Hardhome

I wanted to actually focus in on that rousing and bad ass speech that Jon Snow and The Wildlings have at Hardhome (moments before all hell broke loose). “We’re not Friends. We’ve never been friends.”

There is a lot of commentary here at SoPoCo surrounding the society we’re in. There are articles about ending racism, whether or not our currency is real, how our society got to this point – and so many others which all speak to a common enemy. We live in a society that largely exists in darkness.

Darkness is actually a symbol of ignorance – and is contrasted by Light as a symbol for knowledge.

It is why, so often the forces of ‘good’ are symbolized with light – the sun – or some similar metaphor; and often has nothing to do with how we’ve come to see these words in our modern times. I think of the famous scene from Spike Lee’s Malcom X film; where going through the dictionary it starts to seem that all words having to do with the color black are negative; and all words dealing with white are positive. It speaks to the negative propagandized ideas that help oppress entire nations of people.

And Game of Thrones, like any good fiction will do, addresses these themes in such a brilliant way.

You can if you’d like, envision ‘the Free folk’ – as having a similar narrative to that of African Americans. They were driven from their lands, and are forced to live North of the Wall; an area that is mostly inhabitable.

They are treated ‘like’ criminals – as laws were created to keep them North of the Wall; and anytime they come South they are hunted down and killed by the Nights Watch.

There is not much dialogue between the two as to why this ongoing ‘war’ exists – it just exists.

So much like the bullshit connected to the Racism we see today; None of us were ‘there’ – but an ongoing war continues.

This storyline is also similar to Gangs; the bloods vs. the crips – 99% of blacks involved in ganglife today have no idea HOW it all began; So many are just keeping a war going; because it’s always been that way; Because people on the ‘other side’ killed their people. It’s the same reasoning – it’s emotional and has no logic.

Watch as Jon Snow and The Wildlings talk at Hardhome : “We’re Not Friends, We’ve never been Friends”

I’m not asking you to forget your dead Black America … I’m not asking you to forget yours either White America – None of us need to forget those who sacrificed for us; we DO need to band together against evil. We need to have the understanding that I shared in the article on Memorial Day (White Denial on Memorial Day) : that a few of us Can create privileges for the rest.

I’m not asking bloods and crips to forget their dead homies – but black men and women, WE are not each others enemy.

We know what’s coming.

The Dead come with it.

We can either learn from history, and swear not to repeat it’s mistakes – or fail.

The choice, is ours.

Thenns first showed up (for us show watchers) early last season and made their presence known. One of the things I love about this show is how it often does give shout outs to previous episodes; makes it all the worth watching. I also love how the show slowly tells us about all of these groups of people who, we usually first hear about through the main characters. In other words, we get a version of who the Wildlings are at first, from people living ‘south of the wall’. Their perception of Wildlings is much different from who and what this diverse group of people truly are.

Sound Familiar?

What I loved so much about Season 3; is that through the experiences of Jon Snow, we finally got to see the Wildlings from their perspective. We slowly come to see that they’re a lot like everyone else in this show; simply trying to survive. We learn, eventually from the ‘leader’ of the Wildlings, sometimes referred to as the King beyond the Wall – that this group is made up of Several ‘clans’ who cannot stand one another.

Sound Familiar??

“Somehow” Mance Rayder was able to unite these clans, and get them to head south – towards the wall; setting up so much of what we’ve seen up to this point in the story. (We learn later in Hardhome it took him 20 years to do it)

All the while the ‘rumors’ of White Walkers returning have been churning; and slowly members of the Nights Watch have been discovering these rumors are true – Jon Snow being one of them. Now that he’s Lord Commander – he is making the ‘tough decision’ that leaders have to make; of doing things others may not agree with – because it is the right thing to do.

The right thing to do – in this story; is to put aside the beef and allow these Wildlings to come into the lands they’ve been kept out of – in order to make sure they do not fall victim to ‘The Night” – to make sure they are not added to the numbers of the ‘Army of the Dead’ – who we finally see in full force; during this crazy awesome show in Episode 8.

Bringing it back to our ‘society’ and making it relatable for us all – the facts are clear; we live in a world that does have a good vs. evil theme to it; and the ultimate truth is that we spend far too much time at war with each other; when the real enemy of humanity, is the force of evil which is slowly, but surely coming for us all.

We have to stop thinking about our ancestors for a moment, and think about our children – our future – which will not happen if we don’t ‘come together’ and work as a unit against the things that threaten our very existence.

It’s true, many of us … we’re not friends. We’ve never been friends.

But it’s not even about that.

We know what’s coming.

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