this post was submitted on 25 Dec 2023
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Biggest piece of shit in movie history (lemmy.world)
submitted 11 months ago by Stamets@lemmy.world to c/memes@lemmy.world
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[–] hex_m_hell@slrpnk.net 23 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago) (2 children)

Willy Wonka owned slaves.

[–] afraid_of_zombies@lemmy.world 11 points 11 months ago (1 children)

And seriously harmed children by bringing them into a workplace that he knew was not safe.

It should bother any decent person what he did. If they really did suffer from animal attacks he could have provided them with weapons. Hell, I am reasonable. He could have sold them guns and made a profit. "Ok peeps, work in my factory and I will pay you. You can use that money to buy stuff that will kill those animals"

[–] Emerald@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

There's actually an interesting deep dive into this.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0jbGyLayKjE

[–] Deiv@lemmy.ca 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Weren't they paid in chocolate, their preferred currency?

[–] meliaesc@lemmy.world 13 points 11 months ago

I have a hunch that it wasn't their preferred currency.

In the first edition of Dahl's novel, Oompa Loompas were Black pygmies Willy Wonka imported from "the deepest and darkest part of the African jungle," according to Jeremy Treglown's Roald Dahl: A Biography. In 1970, the NAACP issued a statement expressing concerns about the racist portrayal of the Oompa Loompas in light of the then-upcoming film. Dahl himself showed sympathy for their stance, and re-imagined them in the 1973 edition as having "golden-brown hair" and "rosy-white" skin.

Despite that change in description, the Oompa Loompas' exploitative origin remained. Wonka smuggled them from their home to work at his factory. They worked tirelessly in exchange for cocoa beans, even as the chocolatier earned real money for their labor. They were prisoners restricted to areas inside the factory. In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Willy Wonka learned the tribal language when negotiating a deal with the Oompa Loompas, but he was proud that "they all speak English now."