FILMMAKERS: please note that this is the best way to show character development. Need to portray a gang member’s willingness to leave behind his life of crime and make his mother proud again? Have him flush a handgun. Want to show that a newly empowered young woman has moved on from the man who controlled her and kept her from growing? Flush the ex-boyfriend. What was American History X missing? A weeping Ed Norton, trying in vain to flush a thermos with “RACISM” written on it.