“Skin in the Game”

This chapter examines Lee’s filmic depiction of the White, Jewish police officer Flip Zimmerman as a co-conspirator in the struggle to erode White-supremacist ideologies and power structures. Through this supporting character, Lee especially encourages White audiences to recognize the possibility for their own racial evolution in Flip’s progression from passively maintaining a racist status quo to actively working to subvert it. At the same time, focusing primarily on his protagonist Ron Stallworth’s vantage point, BlacKkKlansman raises doubts about the potential to enact systemic change within a historically racist institution such as the police force.