Instead of seeing through dark side of the information about the unjust slavery and discrimination against otherness, I approach this these materials with focusing on the positive side of humanity within the community of the minority. That is the support and help the minority people provide for one another when they are fighting against the bullying of the dominant group.
In the movie The Brother From Another Planet, the men in the Odell’s bar generously offer helps to the protagonist, an alien slave. At the first time when the protagonist appears in the bar, the black man Sam nicely introduce him to a white lady as a boarder and later he also helps the talented protagonist find a job at a game store to repair game machine. In the scene when the two white alien slave catcher come to the bar and investigate the men in the bar for the whereabouts of the protagonist, the men intend to hide their knowledge of the protagonist. In the second scene when the two white aliens come to the bar again and encounter the protagonist, the men in the bar fight with these two white aliens without hesitating in order to keep them from catching the protagonist who is their brother with same color skin, even though they do not know who this person really is, they still voluntarily to support him. The trust in their brother accentuates the closeness and unity of the black community and this unity is even stronger when they are facing the white authority.
Similar to The Brother From Another Planet, the film West Side Story also depicts the closeness and unity of the minority. Even though the film describe the Latino as the delinquent, it balances out with highlighting their unity because they are working tightly together to protect one another and defense their right to use the basketball court and the playground. In the scene when Anita finds out that Maria are staying with Tony, Anita is angry at first, but later she agrees to help Maria tell Tony that the polices are looking for him, even though it would be risky for her to come to the jet gang alone. This suggests her care and support for her sister Maria. She does not have to it at all, but in front of the white police authority (when the police investigates Anita), she gives in and takes risk to behave against the white authority.
In Flores’s Citizens vs. Citizenry: Undocumented Immigrants and Latino Cultural Citizenship, he also elaborates the unity of Latino minority. Whether documented or undocumented, Latino immigrants are all helping each other in defensing their rights to pursuit equality and freedom, as well as protecting their family. For example, the “Comité (Committee for the Rights of Undocumented Children)” will help “alert families if INS officers were seen in the area and to provide temporary foster homes for children in case parents were arrested and deported” (Flores 269).
The unity of the minority is the only way that will threaten the authority on the legislature. Even if there are oppressions, as long as the marginal immigrants are united, the day of equality and freedom will eventually arrive.
