Category: Pecksniffery

Disney’s Snow White story criticized for showing lack of affirmative consent

October 23, 2018 • 8:30 am

Kristen Bell is a well known American actress, and has two daughters. When she reads stories to them, she uses them to impart lessons. One of the stories is “Snow White” (it’s not an original Disney story, of course, but is derived from the Brothers Grimm collection of 1812. Parents magazine describes the lesson (click on screenshot):

The excerpt:

Kristen Bell reads every night to daughters Lincoln, 5, and Delta, 3. “It’s truly my favorite part of the day,” Bell says. “I glance away from the book and see their brains working while we’re all cuddled up like meerkats.”

But the ladies don’t just read, they discuss—especially classic Disney storylines.

“Every time we close Snow White I look at my girls and ask, ‘Don’t you think it’s weird that Snow White didn’t ask the old witch why she needed to eat the apple? Or where she got that apple?’ I say, ‘I would never take food from a stranger, would you?’ And my kids are like, ‘No!’ And I’m like, ‘Okay, I’m doing something right.'”

The apple question is not the only one that Bell—a Disney Princess herself as the voice of Anna in Frozen—has after reading the tale. “Don’t you think that it’s weird that the prince kisses Snow White without her permission?” Bell says she has asked her daughters. “Because you can not kiss someone if they’re sleeping!”

Well, there may be a point about taking food from strangers, but may I point out that Halloween is coming, and taking and eating food from strangers is one of its major features?

As for “kissing Snow White without her permission”, well, that’s bogus. Of course you shouldn’t have sex with someone without asking, or while they’re drunk or asleep, but this isn’t quite the same thing. In fact, in the Brothers Grimm version, there isn’t a kiss; the movement of her glass coffin dislodges the poison apple bite from her throat and she revives. In the Disney movie version, however, there is a kiss, to wit (my emphasis):

Snow White takes the apple and, before taking a bite, wishes for the Prince to carry her away to his castle, where they will live happily ever after. The Queen then persuades her to take a bite before the wish grows cold. Snow White does so and soon falls to the floor after feeling the poison’s effects, which causes her to fall into a Sleeping Death. As the Queen is leaving, she is seen by the dwarfs, who chase her to a cliff, where she falls to her death to be eaten by vultures. The dwarfs find Snow White and they grieve her “death” as they return home. In mourning, they hold a funeral for her at their cottage. Finding her so beautiful, even in death, they cannot find it in their hearts to bury her and instead place her in a handmade coffin carved of glass and gold.

As the time goes by, the Prince hears of this and rides to the clearing where her coffin has been placed. The dwarfs make way for the Prince to approach Snow White. He then gives the princess a kiss, a “Love’s First Kiss”, which breaks the curse, reviving Snow White. She wakes up and, upon seeing the Prince, extends her arms out to him as he scoops her up in her arms. The dwarfs rejoice, as the Prince carries Snow White to his horse. She kisses each dwarf goodbye before leaving with the Prince for his castle (the outline of which is shown in the clouds above), where they live happily ever after.

The kiss was in fact the only way in this story to wake up Snow White. I suppose that they could have done it the Brothers Grimm way, but sue me if I feel this way is more romantic. And who among us hasn’t kissed a lover while he or she was sleeping?

I feel sorry for Kristen Bell’s daughters, who are poised to grow up as scolding Pecksniffs like their mom.

And yes, I know this isn’t as important as nuclear weapons, Saudi Arabia, and Trump. But it’s a sign of the times.

Remember this? Well, remember it well, because it may not be around much longer:

Two more authors banned from Brisbane Writers Festival

July 31, 2018 • 9:15 am

Two years ago there was a big kerfuffle at the Brisbane Writers Festival (BWF) when writer Lionel Shriver gave a talk asserting the right of all authors to write about “marginalized”—or any—groups, which is a violation of many who cry “cultural appropriation” at that stuff. As I wrote at the time,

Not long ago Yasmin Abdel-Magied, a Sudanese/Australian/Muslim writer, described in the Guardian how offended she became when author Lionel Shriver, speaking at the Brisbane Writers Festival, defended the right of authors to write fiction about “marginalized” characters (i.e., people of color and others seen as oppressed). Abdel-Magied, who came off as someone unable to tolerate even the mildest contradictions of her views, stalked out of Shriver’s talk in tears, virtually accusing the speaker of perpetuating racism by appropriating other cultures in her writing.

Not long after, Shriver published her full talk online, also in the Guardian,  and it turned out to be passionate, eloquent, and thoughtful, but not at all offensive—except to the overly tender ears of someone like Abdel-Magied. Read it for yourself. But I had no idea that, as Shriver describes in a new New York Times piece, “Will the Left survive the Millennials?“, that the ostracism of Shriver extended farther than the kvetching of Abdel-Magied. It did.

The Festival authorities publicly disavowed Shriver’s speech and quickly organized a counter-conference to rebut Shriver’s assertions. That of course is fine, but was done only for Shriver’s talk, and was done post facto, as a sort of official announcement of Shriver’s demonization.  It shows that the BWF is simply caving in to those who claim that writers must not culturally appropriate.

Since then Shriver has been further demonized, and has asserted even more strongly her and others’ right to write about what they want. But now, in a further effort to censor authors, the BWF has disinvited two more writers: Germaine Greer and Bob Carr, the former premier of New South Wales.  As the Guardian reported on July 25, the issues were Carr’s views on immigration and other political issues, which apparently did not align with the BWF’s control-Leftism, and, presumably, Greer’s views on transexual women, whom she doesn’t accept as fully “woman-ish” as she does biological women. For that Greer has repeatedly been called a transphobe, and has been deplatformed several times.

Carr told Guardian Australia he was “surprised” by the festival’s response to his new political memoir, Run for Your Life.

“I thought writers’ festivals embraced controversy,” [Carr] said, adding he understood his book didn’t “accord with [the festival’s] values” particularly because it argued for lower immigration, discussed the recent “China panic” in the Australian media and “my encounters with the pro-Israel lobby”.

The festival issued a statement on Wednesday, saying: “Brisbane writers’ festival does not shy away from controversy or challenging ideas, but as all festival organisers know, it’s invariably difficult to choose between the many authors currently promoting books and the need to provide engaging choices for our audience along a curatorial theme. In trying to achieve that balance, we decided in early June not to proceed with including Bob Carr on this year’s program and MUP were advised at that time.”

Those are just disingenuous weasel words, and, in fact, lies. The Guardian‘s report continues:

The Brisbane writers’ festival acting chief executive, Ann McLean, told the Australian there were concerns Carr would not keep discussion to the topic he had been programmed to discuss.

Referring to Greer, the festival’s statement said: “Germaine had not been invited to take part in this year’s program – we’d been asked by a local bookstore to assist with the marketing of an event planned by them for within the dates of the festival. However, when the bookstore decided not to proceed we decided not to host the event alone as it was being held offsite away from the festival hub and (more importantly) it did not fit within the rest of the program.”

Referring to Greer, the festival’s statement said: “Germaine had not been invited to take part in this year’s program – we’d been asked by a local bookstore to assist with the marketing of an event planned by them for within the dates of the festival. However, when the bookstore decided not to proceed we decided not to host the event alone as it was being held offsite away from the festival hub and (more importantly) it did not fit within the rest of the program.”

Greer, who is lauded for her early feminist writing but has fallen out of favour with the left in recent years, in part for her inflammatory comments about trans women and her recent comments on rape, told the Australian: “The Brisbane writers’ festival is very hard work. So, to be uninvited to what is possibly the dreariest literary festival in the world, with zero hospitality and no fun at all, is a great relief.”

The Guardian then published a critique of the BWF’s actions written by Australian novelist Richard Flanagan, a Booker Prize winner. Click on the screenshot to read his essay:

First, Flanagan discusses the withdrawal of novelist Junot Diaz from the Sydney Writers’ festival after social media allegations that he forcibly kissed a woman “some years before” as well as that he bullied and displayed demeaning behavior towards other women. Because of these accusations on social media, MIT, where Diaz works, investigated his behavior and found no grounds to punish him. The same held true for The Boston Review, who also refrained from punishment. But the social media demonization was so loud that Diaz withdrew from both Sydney and an Australian tour. You may differ on the rightness of that, but if two investigations found him in the clear, at least the Sydney Writers’ Festival shouldn’t have issued a mealymouthed statement criticized by Flanagan:

None of this proves Diaz is a good person. But nor does it prove he is a bad one. There were allegations, and there remain allegations. Diaz may be a monster, or he may not. But the allegations remain, and they remain allegations.

So on what grounds was the Sydney Writers’ festival justified in passing judgment on a writer about things the truth of which was not established?

The festival, in its statement announcing his departure, referred to Diaz’s essay The Silence: The Legacy of Childhood Trauma published a few months earlier in which Diaz revealed that he had been raped as a child.

“In his recent New Yorker essay, Mr Diaz wrote, ‘Eventually the past finds you’. As for so many in positions of power, the moment to reckon with the consequences of past behaviour has arrived.

“Sydney Writers’ festival is a platform for the sharing of powerful stories: urgent, necessary and sometimes difficult. Such conversations have never been more timely.

“We remain committed to ensuring they occur in a supportive and safe environment for our authors and audiences alike.”

We may ask what on earth was supportive and safe for Diaz in those words? Who had the power at that moment – the writer, who had publicly confessed to being raped as a child only a few months before, or the festival?

The Wheeler Centre, meanwhile, emailed ticket holders to announce that Diaz had also cancelled a scheduled appearance in Melbourne with similarly self-serving cant:

“We always take seriously our responsibility to ensure that our platform and our spaces are safe for our guests and audiences alike,” its statement said. “The Wheeler Centre is inspired by the bravery of those sharing their stories and is committed to an accountable and responsive literary community for everyone.”

None of this is to argue for or against Junot Diaz. But is it to be the case that Australian writers’ festivals will abandon any writer once social media turns against them? And what if the mob have it wrong?

The judgments against Greer and Carr are more clearly misguided, and completely inimical to the freedom of discussion that should attend a literary festival. Flanagan is particularly acerbic in his criticism of the BWF’s disinvitation of these two. I’ll give some quotes, which I agree with completely. Note first, though, that Flanagan himself says that he “[doesn’t] overly care for the recent thoughts of either, and I am confident they would feel the same about me.” I am with Flanagan on this, too. But he adds, “And surely that is the point—that other people’s thoughts are worth listening to.”

Flanagan:

If the BWF is a writers’ festival concerned not to get publicity they are unique on this earth. And perhaps they are, because McLean, in a moment of clarifying folly, says that Bob Carr’s invitation was being withdrawn in “consideration for the brand alignment of several sponsors we are securing for the festival”.

Does this mean money chooses which writers you hear – and don’t hear – at the BWF? Exactly when did the Brisbane Writers festival become the Brisbane Corporate festival? And since when did writing in Australia answer to corporate dictate?

There are questions that should be answered by the BWF. Why were Carr and Greer blackballed? And by whom? When did the BWF stop seeing its role as supporting writers ahead of corporations? Is Greer being dropped because her views on rape are not those of the prevailing orthodoxy? Is Carr being dropped because of his views on Israel or population?

This is not an article I wanted to write. But as forums for public debate and discussion vanish throughout the country, in a week when Nine has announced the takeover of Fairfax, the importance of community events like writers’ festivals only grows in importance. They should not answer either to the mob or to corporations. They should be there for writers and writing, and all that these represent: tolerance, debate, difference.

Ponder all that we now know about how social media is manipulated by power, both national and corporate. Why, with that knowledge, would a writers’ festival ban writers because of fear of a social media backlash?

Beneath their determined, if dreary, attempts at funkiness and fashion, beyond the latest New Yorker sensation imported for our provincial enlightenment, past the wearying social media feeds with their ersatz excitement, writers’ festivals now run the risk of running with dogma, with orthodoxy, with the mob – with fear, in other words – and with money. It’s the new Victorian age wearing a hipster beard.

Indeed: I see this in my local bookstore: 57th Street Books, once a great bookstore but now largely dedicated, at least in the books they push, to Control-Leftist dogma. I of course agree largely with their position on the political spectrum, but why do they refuse to call attention to other points of view? I’ve never seen a book by a conservative advertised in their window; everything is devoted to literature by purportedly oppressed minorities. The Kingdom of Words is rapidly being balkanized. And the balkanization is largely due to social media, which functions at once to create tribalism and to demonize those whose points of view differ from yours.

I see no point in rewriting Flanagan’s eloquent words in my own style, so I’ll finish with a few other bits from his essay:

Of course, not all writers’ festivals are like this. But the large ones are increasingly becoming that way. If they were to rename themselves “Festival of Safe Ideas”, or “Celebration of Conventional Thinking”, or “Festival Approved by Twitter Bots” I wouldn’t mind. But having dropped two writers because, it would seem, of what they have written, for Brisbane to call itself a writers’ festival smacks of false advertising.

The individual examples of Shriver, Diaz, Carr and Greer, all point to a larger, more disturbing trend. Writers’ festivals, like other aspects of the literary establishment such as prizes, have in recent years become less and less about books and more and more about using their considerable institutional power to enforce the new orthodoxies, to prosecute social and political agendas through reward and punishment.

. . .McLean is quoted in the Australian as saying the BWF was “fully prepared to embrace controversy”.

What nonsense. The BWF embraces conformity, and two who threaten that conformity it punishes by banning. In doing so, it’s an enforcer, not an enabler; a punisher, and not a promoter.

. . . now, more than ever, we need places and forums where we can listen, reflect and discuss different perspectives and ideas that are not our own. This is not to suggest promoting propagandists and provocateurs to an equal footing with serious writers – but it is to argue that writing worthy of the name is not always comforting or reassuring, but that it does matter. The alternative is a Trumpian world of mindless Milo Yiannopoulos provocations on one side, and conformist clap trap on the other, both serving only to deliver power to those who would destroy us.

As this kind of banning and deplatforming spreads, nearly always promulgated by the Left, I find myself no longer surprised at the kind of censorhip and demonization practiced against those whose ideas are deemed ideologically impure. This is what religions like Islam and Catholicism do; it should not be the practice of writers and literary festivals.

Manchester University students deface mural containing Kipling poem on grounds that he was a colonialist and racist

July 21, 2018 • 10:45 am

According to several sources, including the BBC, the Manchester Evening News and The National, students at Manchester University, which is where Matthew Cobb teaches (he IS NOT TO BLAME) decided to paint over a mural that displayed a poem by Rudyard Kipling, replacing it with a poem by Maya Angelou.

The defacing was done by leaders of the student union, who apparently didn’t consult either the University or their own constituents. The BBC reports:

The protest was an attempt to reclaim history by those who have been “oppressed by the likes of Kipling for so many centuries, and continue to be to this day,” according to Sara Khan, the liberation and access officer at the student union.

In a Facebook post, the student official said Kipling’s works “sought to legitimate the British Empire’s presence in India and dehumanise people of colour”.

And here’s a statement by one of the miscreants, (a “liberation and access officer” of the student union!), explaining why they had to exercise this censorship:

Sara Khan, a liberation and access officer at the union, said students defaced Kipling’s poem as he ‘stands for the opposite of liberation, empowerment and human rights’.

“A failure to consult students during the process of adding art to the newly renovated SU building resulted in Rudyard Kipling’s work being painted on the first floor last week,” she said in a post on her Facebook profile.

“We, as an exec team, believe that Kipling stands for the opposite of liberation, empowerment, and human rights – the things that we, as an SU, stand for.

“Well-known as author of the racist poem “The White Man’s Burden”, and a plethora of other work that sought to legitimate the British Empire’s presence in India and de-humanise people of colour, it is deeply inappropriate to promote the work of Kipling in our SU, which is named after prominent South African anti-Apartheid activist, Steve Biko.

“As a statement on the reclamation of history by those who have been oppressed by the likes of Kipling for so many centuries, and continue to be to this day, we replaced his words with those of the legendary Maya Angelou, a black female poet and civil rights activist.”

A proud student showing the poster before (right) and after (left). Note the cat-ate-the-canary expression on the her face. To me it says, “Look how virtuous I am!”

Now everything is wrong about this: the tactics, the motivation, and the poem they chose to censor. Tactically, they needed permission from both the University and the Student Union members to do this. They didn’t get either, but acted on their own. The motivation is that a bunch of spoiled and entitled brats decided that any work by a long-dead person who was in favor of colonialism, and saw whites as superior (I don’t know how much of the latter is true of Kipling), deserved to have every one of his works despoiled and effaced. 

Now one would be hard pressed to find a nineteenth-century Brit who didn’t harbor some strains of colonialism and/or racism. The moral improvement of society that attenuated these beliefs started later. The same oppressive attitudes were by men towards women, and by nearly everyone toward gays. To find an author of that period who can be seen as morally pure by the lights of the Regressive Left would be nearly impossible.

Further, there was simply no debate whether artists holding views considered inappropriate today deserved to have all of their work censored and painted over. After all, the poem was not a racist one (I put it below): it’s clear it was simply posted as a kind of inspiration for students. There might have been more justification for painting over Kipling’s 1899 poem, “The White Man’s Burden“—a call for the U.S. to dominate the Philippines—but few people in their right minds would post that poem today as any form of public approbation. (It could justifiably be taught as a historical relic.)

At any rate, the poem the students painted over was “If”, and it might be familiar:

“If” by Rudyard Kipling (1895)

(‘Brother Square-Toes’—Rewards and Fairies)

If you can keep your head when all about you
    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
    But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
    And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
    And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
    To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
    If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

We should call out these students, and this behavior, for what they are: the actions of benighted social justice warriors who think that they have not only the key to the truth, but the absolute right to rewrite history. Shades of Soviet Russia! And what should be censored next: the “Just So Stories” of Kipling, the Declaration of Independence (drafted by a slaveholder), and all the speeches of Winston Churchill (a colonialist)? The view that we should write out of history anyone in the past who expressed views that we find repugnant today is one of the most odious and censorious strains of Control Leftism.

But there are those who agree with the censors; here’s one of them, Titania McGrath, who identifies herself as “Activist. Healer. Radical intersectionist poet.” (It has not escaped my notice that she might be a troll. But satire and social-justice warriorism are hard to tell apart.)

Gal Gadot demonized for her memoriam for Stephen Hawking

March 20, 2018 • 10:30 am

The outrage mob, always sniffing for ideological impurities, has struck again. When Stephen Hawking died on March 14, actor Gal Gadot—you know, the Wonder Woman phenom who is also an Israeli—issued this tweet:

Now most of you are on the Left, but look at that tweet and see what you could find objectionable if you’re a Pecksniff. You’ll spot it instantly, I bet. Yep, it was the idea that after death Hawking will be “free of any physical constraints.” Now I don’t know if that means he’ll have an afterlife where he’s not in a wheelchair (implying Gadot is religious, though most liberal Jews don’t believe in an afterlife), or that he’s simply gone and therefore not thereby constrained.

But if you’re a Pecksniff, you can also be huffy and say, “Well, this is ableism, pure and simple. It implies that Hawking was ‘constrained’ mentally as well as physically, and that he could have accomplished more had he not been afflicted with ALS (or polio).” That is arguable, because perhaps being confined to his chair enabled his mind to roam more freely. But that’s not what Gadot meant, I bet, for she pays tribute to his “brilliance and wisdom”. She was, I suspect, just paying tribute to him, and saying that he’s free from “constraints”—exactly as many people say, when someone dies, that they’re finally “at peace”, or “beyond suffering”. And that tweet, of course, got 53,469 likes when I put it up.

Yet the termites are ever dining, and so there’s a piece on Mashable called “People aren’t thrilled with Gal Gadot’s tribute to Stephen Hawking“, which presents exactly seven tweets accusing Gadot of ableism, and one supporting her. Apparently seven people is some kind of consensus.

Here are some Pecksniffs:

Yes, the last tweet is accurate: people should chill out about this, and there’s no doubt that, these days, many people are simply “looking to be offended.” I suppose there are psychological reasons for that, but this is above my pay grade.

But what was Hawking’s view? Would he have preferred to have had his ALS (with its putative benefits for his science), or to have never gotten it?

This video, which I found on YouTube, supports the latter, for it shows Hawking supporting the “ALS Ice Bucket Challenge“, in which someone challenges another to dump a bucket of ice water on their head. If they don’t do it within a stipulated amount of time, the one who forfeits donates to The ALS Association or other groups fighting motor neuron disease.  It’s estimated that the challenge not only brought awareness of this dreaded ailment, but raised over $100 million dollars for research and treatment.

And here’s Stephen Hawking participating in that challenge, urging his kids to drench themselves. They do. And Hawking adds, with his computer voice, “I urge everyone to donate to the MNDA to eliminate this terrible disease.” Yes, it’s terrible, and one has to conclude that Hawking would prefer not to have been afflicted.

That, of course, doesn’t mean that one should treat the disabled as lesser humans, or make fun of them (as Trump did during his campaign); it just means that we should keep working, raising money, and using the best science we can to get rid of those ailments that people don’t want. I suspect that most people with disabilities would just as soon not have them, though some deaf people say they wouldn’t want to hear even if that were possible.

And people should lay off Gal Gadot.

By the way, yesterday I mentioned a piece in the Torygraph intimating that Hawking’s final science paper might have shown a way for us to test the idea of the multiverse, heretofore seen as hard or impossible to test. A new article in Gizmodo by George Dvorsky, however, says that the Torygraph’s interpretation is overblown, and urges considerable caution:

The scientists say it may eventually be possible to see signs of the multiverse in the background radiation of the universe, but that has yet to be proven. If someone down the line can expand on this work, and show us what we should be looking for, then it can be said that Hawking and Loeb were truly onto something. But for now, that’s a big if.

. . . Frank Wilczek, a theoretical physicist at MIT and Nobel laureate, was less charitable about the new work.

“It’s heavy on speculative assumptions, and I don’t see any concrete predictions,” Wilczek told Gizmodo. “Very hard to understand, though, at least for me, and I may be missing something.”

The pall of intersectionality: “Must everything be everything?”

February 19, 2018 • 9:00 am

Yesterday reader Vaal asked me what I thought of the new movie “Black Panther”, which has an all-black cast and an African-American director. The film has cleaned up, nabbing a box office of $361 million worldwide in the first few days after release—nearly doubling the entire production cost! It already is a huge success. Vaal expressed a bit of concern whether this would reinforce black identity politics, but in general agreed with my response; this is what I said:

I haven’t seen the movie, nor read much about it or the Internet reaction, but if it gives black kids role models and makes them feel less marginalized, so much the better. That’s different from “identity tactics”, which are to try to censor others who aren’t in your group; it seems to be just a boost in self-esteem. I don’t see any downside of that. Everyone feels part of a group, and if you’re downtrodden and your group gets celebrated, that seems great to me.

I won’t see the movie, as I don’t like superhero or action films (or even space films). I did see “Wonder Woman”, but it was on a plane and I turned it off halfway. Nevertheless, I wish “Black Panther” well.

The movie, of course, is touted for its black director and cast, giving kids role models from their group. And, as I said, that’s great. But it wasn’t enough for some people. Grania called my attention to a pair of tweets, the first calling out the movie for its “lack of LGBT representation”:

https://twitter.com/BenjaminEnfield/status/965345080335851520

And then actress Ellen Barkin’s weary response; she’s clearly tired of ubiquitous “intersectionality”. 

But was there more than just a single tweet criticizing the movie for its lack of LGBT representation? Checking the internet, I found that indeed there was. Here’s a link to an article at i09 (Gizmodo):

The article mentions one cut scene in which two women dance around each other lasciviously, suggesting perhaps an impending sexual interaction. And that flirtation was in the comic, too, though involving different characters. (There was no explicit mention of gayness or homosexual activity in the deleted scene). The author of the io9 article beefs:

This isn’t the first time that Marvel Studios have missed a readily-available opportunity to finally bring some queer representation to the big screen, but it’s particularly odd given how right there and on the page this particular story is when you look to the comics.

Though Aneka is not Okoye, characters become remixed and reimagined all the time when they’re adapted for films. A romance between Okoye and Ayo is the sort of thing that easily could have been included in Black Panther with something as simple as a longing look and a bit of flirting kiss, but it looks like we’re going to have to wait even longer for the MCU’s films to catch up with the times.

But wait! There’s more!

I’m not sure what this would have accomplished. Would it empower gay black children? Or gay people in general?

Here’s an article (actually, a video) from The Advocate, a gay magazine (click on screenshot to see it):

They criticize the director for cutting the scene and co-writer Joe Robert Cole’s “vague answer” about why the scene was omitted (he noted that it wasn’t a major part of the story arc, and only vaguely remember the comic-book scene).

But wait! There’s more.

Ellen Barkin’s petulant comment pinpoints the problem with intersectionality. You can’t just make a movie about one oppressed minority: you have to put in other oppressed minorities so that they, too, get their day in the sun. It also bothers me that, while I like “Black Panther” and its intended empowerment of black children, we now have to scrutinize all movies for their ideological content, making sure that every group is represented positively and all groups get represented.  It’s fine to give movies political content, and yes, we need movies with gay characters, too, but not every movie has to have a message about oppression or be called out for its absence—or for “cultural appropriation”. After all, every movie that doesn’t deal with oppressed minorities is “missing an opportunity” to do that.

We now even have “sensitivity readers” for children’s books, ensuring that the correct political sheen is given to those books. If something is potentially harmful, I don’t have much of a problem with that, but it’s also led to censorship is some cases (the NYT article in the preceding link gives some, and I discuss one invidious case here).

So good for “Black Panther”, but let’s not make every movie about politics, or screen all art to make sure it conveys the right political message. That way lies the dire and deadening art of Soviet Russia, full of propaganda but lacking soul. And if a movie does tout one marginalized group, it doesn’t have to tout them all at once. The Pecksniffs need to back off.

Here’s when things get nasty—when name-calling substitutes for discussion, an unfortunate byproduct of the intersectionalist hierarchy:

https://twitter.com/lucciXamo/status/963608326402605056

 

HuffPo finds marginalization, sexism, bigotry, bullying, child abuse, and exploitation in “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”

December 25, 2017 • 1:30 pm

The Pecksniff/Grinches are busy ruining Christmas by minutely scrutinizing every favorite Christmas movie or song for signs of moral failure. Gone is the song “Baby, it’s cold outside” (sexual predation), and with it now goes the movie Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer—at least according to the HuffPo (“All the News that’s Fit to Pecksniff”) video below (click on screenshot to go there):

Here are some of the ideological crimes committed by the movie (and I’m not kidding you, nor are they!):

Child abuse:

Bullying!

Bigotry!

Marginalization!

Sexism!

And, HuffPo’s ultimate take:

This would seem like a parody of “Social Justice Warriorism” if it weren’t serious. But it is serious.

These are not college students who have yet to mature; these are graduates who publish a widely-read website. So don’t suggest that some day these people will grow out of this: it’s simply too late. They are grown, except emotionally.

In what way will this Pecksniffery help our world? Will we all realize that Rudolph is a parable of bigotry and abuse, and become more woke? I doubt it. The world these people want to create is Orwellian, and the Pecksniffs are creating it not by helping people, but by petty tests of ideological purity.

Enjoy your holiday, including watching Rudolph. And god help us, every one!

UPDATE: Reader Pliny the in Between has contributed this cartoon:

 

National Coalition Against Censorship and PEN defend Met’s showing of a “controversial” painting

December 9, 2017 • 10:30 am

Four days ago I reported about an attack of the Pecksniffs on a painting at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art: Balthus‘s Thérèse Dreaming”, created in 1938. Here it is in the gallery:

THOMAS URBAIN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

A New York Pecksniff, one Mia Merrill, launched a campaign to have the painting removed (one call was simply for a “trigger warning”, but the petition—as of this writing signed by over 11,300 Pecksniffs—was to remove the painting. Merrill’s beef, as I said in my previous post, was this (from her petition and her emphasis):

When I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art this past weekend, I was shocked to see a painting that depicts a young girl in a sexually suggestive pose. Balthus’ painting, Thérèse Dreaming, is an evocative portrait of a prepubescent girl relaxing on a chair with her legs up and underwear exposed.

It is disturbing that the Met would proudly display such an image. They are a renowned institution and one of the largest, most respected art museums in the United States. The artist of this painting, Balthus, had a noted infatuation with pubescent girls, and it can be strongly argued that this painting romanticizes the sexualization of a child.

Rather than cave to these leisure fascists, the Met refused to take it down, with Ken Weine, the Museum’s chief communications officer, saying this:

“Moments such as this provide an opportunity for conversation, and visual art is one of the most significant means we have for reflecting on both the past and the present and encouraging the continuing evolution of existing culture through informed discussion and respect for creative expression.”

So the painting stayed up, as it should have. Now two other groups have come forward to defend exhibiting the painting. As Time Magazine reports, one is the National Coalition Against Censorship (see their own article here), which said this:

“The idea that this painting suggests that the Met supports, on some institutional level, an unhealthy sexualization of young women misunderstands the role of a cultural institution,” Nora Pelizzari, a spokeswoman for the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), told Newsweek. “Attacking art is counterproductive to the open discussion necessary for us to confront the realities of sexual harassment and abuse,” the NCAC had said in an earlier statement.

The anti-censorship organization applauded the Met’s decision to keep the painting on view. To their mind, said Pelizzari, “Hiding potential sexualizaiton of young girls throughout history does not help…the current conversation around sexual harassment.”

. . . Pelizzari is disturbed by the “escalation of the culture of outrage, as well as the move towards threats of violence as a means of stifling artistic expression and artistic display.” The Whitney’s decision to keep Shutz’s painting up was, in her view, precisely right. The museum engaged in discussions with the protestors and other artists, allowing for “a wider conversation on our interaction on race and history and grappling with our history as a society.”

From the NCAC’s perspective, “the removal or silencing or erasure of art is never good.” That, she said, includes the works of individuals who have sexually harassed or assaulted others, like Louis C.K., although she emphasized that the viewers’ decisions about whose art to consume and support financially is of course up to them.

“Everyone is allowed to react to art in exactly the way they naturally do,” she said. “Where we intervene is when you try to impose your reaction to a piece on others’ ability to see it.”

The other organization was the estimable PEN, dedicated to furthering literature and free expression (do remember, though, that some of its members objected to PEN giving an award to Charlie Hebdo). In its defense of the painting, PEN said this, as quoted by Time:

PEN America, which works to protect literary and artistic expression, agreed. They see such petitions as part of a troubling trend. “We are alarmed about what seems to be a rising tendency to turn to artistic censorship as a way to express social, political, or other grievances,” PEN America said in a statement to Newsweek. “Some advocates seem to have decided that artists and art institutions represent soft targets, more vulnerable to public campaigns than are the actual power structures that perpetuate the ills these campaigners are fighting against.”

Pelizzari is exactly right in her last statement: these kinds of calls or demonstrations—like black activists blocking people’s view of a painting of Emmett Till by a white artist—do nothing to solve problems like pedophilia or racism. They are not attempts to create a dialogue, but to keep people from encountering viewpoints that the activists don’t like. Seriously, does the painting above foster pedophilia and contribute to the sexualization of young women? I don’t think so. It stimulates dialogue, like the kind we had on my post. And does a sympathetic and graphic painting of Emmett Till in his casket, body battered by white racists, somehow promote racism because it was painted by a white woman? You’d have to twist your logic pretty far to conclude that. In fact, demonstrations to prevent people from seeing or reading things just create the “Streisand effect,” making people want to see them all the more, and arouse hostility towards the censors.

I can’t think of a single instance when the censorship of literature or art that doesn’t violate the law (e.g., blatant child pornography) has helped society progress. On the other hand, I can think of plenty of cases in which attempted censorship has been an impediment, as in the unsuccessful case to ban Ulysses. And it goes on. Here’s just a small list of works of literature that schools or libraries have tried to ban in the last hundred years (see more here):

The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Beloved
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
Catch-22
The Catcher in the Rye
The Great Gatsby
The Grapes of Wrath
Invisible Man
The Jungle
Our Bodies, Ourselves
The Words of Cesar Chavez

If you know anything about these books, most of them are actually about oppressed people and explicitly sympathetic to them. It’s insane that people try to keep them out of the hands of others.

Remember three things about censorship.  First, it doesn’t work to suppress art or words that you don’t like. Second, trying to censor something just arouses interest in it, as well as resentment towards those who try to tell others what they can or cannot see. Third, exhibiting art or recommending that students read a book does not mean an endorsement of the image or contents.

But don’t expect Pecksniffery to abate any time soon, at least in America. It goes hand in hand with Authoritarian Leftism (why do you think they call it “authoritarian”?), and Authoritarian Leftism shows no signs of abating. But if we all stand up against those who try to censor things by playing on our guilt—on our liberal sympathies for underdogs—that ideology will eventually wane.

Guilt is the great weapon of the Authoritarian Left, and we must resist it when it comes to endorsing free expression.

h/t: cesar