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1yr ago
That's what grinds my gears; the smug assumption that the only reason anyone could possibly object to such race-swapping is because they're a horrible racist.
People assume that there's some sort of racial issue behind the Ariel situation because: A) the scenario is so inconsequential and B) the arguments against it are either weak or slippery-slope assumptions. This doesn't mean that anyone who is anti Ariel is racist, but it does leave the door open to wonder why anyone would be so vehemently against this move.
And would your Facebook friend who is so eager to change things up for the sake of diversity be happy to recast Mulan so that a Black woman could get the lead role? And if that's different, how is it different?
Most Disney princesses are white, including Ariel. Mulan isn't. Disney is (openly) pro-diversity, so it makes sense that Disney would want an Asian princess too.
If they're going to recast Ariel, then every cast member should be Black for internal consistency and coherence.
There aren't any rules or reasons as to why the recasting of one character should lead to the recasting of all characters.
Can your Facebook friend explain to me why new Black Ariel is still a redhead, and not having her own ordinary beautiful natural hair?
Why does Ariel's hair have anything to do with race of the character? Moreover, Ariel's red hair was one of the characters' defining features in comparison to the other princesses of the time.
Nobody is objecting to "let's do a new movie about a black mermaid" if they can write a good story and hey, maybe there are even folk tales and legends about black mermaids, who knows? But this isn't about 'let's give little Black girls a character they can identify with, so they can dress up as Ariel for Hallowe'en', it's about wringing every last penny out of their property by re-tooling it to get another extension of marketability.
The functional difference between "let's do a new movie about a black mermaid" and "let's do a remake about a black mermaid" are quite inconsequential. Both versions exist, and given that we're talking about a children's character, both characters existing has no real ramifications for practical life.
Look, I hate the shameless antics of Disney as much as anyone, but is that really what this discussion is about? What does Ariel's red hair have to do with Disney's endless greed? And did this penny-wringing really start with Ariel? More importantly, if the Ariel was white, would this still be an example of Disney's greed?
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1yr ago
I'm not sure this applies in this situation. It would be different if she had a serious bipolar swing and decided to do this on a whim - instead, we have a clear trail of where her issues began, sufficient evidence to suggest that she's indeed suffering from a severe mental illness, and plenty of time for her to change her mind. Stripping freedoms away from people with mental illness seems like a step backward regardless.
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1yr ago
I understand that. I didn't want to get down to the nitty gritty of accurately defining or sizing the reference class since it's a fairly inexact and tedious thing to do.
Let's take the example of men who commit sexual violence - obviously 'men' is a large group. But studies show that a certain population of men - ranging from 1% to 5% - have committed some sort of sexual crime (regardless of prosecution). So even at the best estimates 1/100 isn't exactly the smallest proportion. I don't know the specifics of how large Brinton's group is nor do I know the estimated number of sexual crimes they commit. But I think you're giving the OP quite a pass to use assumptions about a group that they probably couldn't name as justifications for discrimination.
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1yr ago
I used to think like you so I know that I'm not going to convince you in a comment.
This kind of thing reminds me of the kid in my class who used to make stuff up for attention constantly.
But this is still very interesting to me - one of the reasons I changed my mind on this is because I saw people in my own life (real people) come out and it made me question this reasoning. These were people that I knew for decades, people who didn't need attention, and often people who came out at a great expense (their families kicked them out, etc). I knew them well enough to know that they weren't just totally bullshitting me.
I think it's naive to think that people will go to a conversion camp for two years all for.... attention? It doesn't really follow that older LGBT people in their fifties are still doing it for the attention either. So why do you think that this is primarily attention related? If it was simply a personal choice you could turn off and on, why risk getting kicked out of your home or being discriminated against in a job interview?
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1yr ago
What kind of leftists are you hanging around? I'm not trying to no-true-scotsman this, but at its core any leftist ideology by definition is "challenging how our society is currently organized". I've seen literally thousands of posts and comments on leftist boards talking about how our current economic and social conditions have directly led to negative psychological trends. It's one of the few things that all subgroups on the left would agree with and fight for.
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1yr ago
If men are naturally stronger than women, why is female-on-male rape a problem at all?
The answers to that question should give you the answers to your question as well. Further, given that the article is talking about a competitive context and not in averages, I think it's easy to see why your question misses the point a bit.
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1yr ago
You're arguing that talking openly about the outsized Jewish influence has led to historically poor outcomes for Jews?
Are those the only options, outsized influence or death?
My point is very simple: Talking about the outsized influence of Jews has led to very bad things in the past. No, talking about it again does not mean that the holocaust will happen again. I'm not sure where you got that. All I was saying is that we ought to be more careful when talking about this issue because of the issues it has caused in the past.
Are you suggesting ethnic or gender nepotism as the reason for the white male presidents?
My point here was to simply show you that outsized influence doesn't always have a nefarious, conspiratorial narrative. Sometimes there's a clear path that shows how groups came to be.
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1yr ago
Getting wrong info often has spillover effects. Once you allow for that and start saying “only government approved sources because it is too dangerous” you have no free speech.
Right, but Twitter does things based primarily on how it will effect their specific platform. Twitter had to decide fairly quickly which information it would allow and disallow while also giving their users the most accurate info. It's easy to look back and criticize them now but that's a much more difficult decision to make in crunch time when lives are on the line. I know they also were facing concerns about legal action in regards to 'fake' covid news.
I only say this to try to remove as much of the narrative as possible. Clearly Twitter has a history of supporting one side over the other. But looking at their decision to tag (not even necessarily remove) unverified data sources can be explained without anything nefarious: They did the best they could given the time crunch, potential deadly consequences, and potential legal liability.
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1yr ago
I agree that every one of these administrators aren't vital to the school's success. However, I think Twitter is the exception rather than the rule. You also have to consider that Twitter's changes are very recent and also came with a change in direction. Among other things, old Twitter valued content moderation while new Twitter does not. This wouldn't have any effect of Twitter being operational since that division didn't affect the online availability of Twitter.
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1yr ago
Since we don't know the full story, that could be a possibility too. However, given what we know, it doesn't seem likely that this crime was committed for the adrenaline rush for the reasons mentioned earlier.
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1yr ago
I think this is a very interesting point. I'm not too familiar with Dreher but I find his article quite interesting. Under his framework, does he expand any further into where he draws the line in terms of kinks? Nazi role play of course sounds gross, but even mainstream kinks (like BDSM) also sound pretty gross too. I just don't know where to draw the line at a point where it isn't completely arbitrary.
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1yr ago
Not saying it hasn't happened, but that's also my point - We only care about Brinton because of their sexual identity and our current obsession with identity politics. Any other straight employee would never have faced this sort of spotlight.
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1yr ago
I never said that? I did say that the media blew up this story and investigated his private life far more than any government employee due to their sexual identity. That isn't a false statement and I'm not claiming anything other than that.
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1yr ago
Reads to me as a "no fuck you Dad!". I'm presuming there was already some tension there beforehand and this was the latest in a long line of actions intended to upset the parents or push back on their values or otherwise frustrate the rules of their house. That's the situation I personally see most often. "I don't like my parents so I'm going to make myself hideous and demand they respect it to get back at them/show they don't own me/whatever". It's the (de-?)evolution of bringing a black guy home, or having a fling with a same-sex partner, I guess.
That's an interesting experience of which I'm not familiar with. I'm sure this does happen but this seems to be quite a one-sided reading of these situations. As I get older I regret giving the benefit of the doubt to adults as much as I have in the past - Parents whose kids "magically, out of nowhere" became rebellious and attention seeking always had a very different story once they were able to speak freely about their situation. We can go back and forth on this of course due to our varying personal experiences.
Because the only things that happen are a person makes themselves ugly (usually, some go low effort and don't bother), and then starts demanding special treatment from everyone around them. This leads me to believe that the special treatment is the primary goal. The cheap and petty power thrill of making people stumble over their language for you. The constant reassurance to an insecure soul that people will inconvenience themselves for you. It seems parasitic, almost.
This is quite the one-sided take again. The only things that happen are people making themselves uglier? Uglier to whom? A woman might be uglier to you while becoming more appearing to a lesbian (no offense intended). Regardless, you're acting as though special treatment is the primary motivating factor here. What is your reasoning for that other than a personal assumption? I have to assume that you don't have much personal contact with these groups of people because this sort of reasoning is only something I read about in hypothetical right-wing publications. It's certainly not the norm.
Why do people get piercings or tattoos knowing they could be discriminated against in future?
This is a laughable comparison. You're talking about a group of people who think that sexuality is an innate trait and comparing it to jewelry that can be removed in a few hours.
You continue to make the assumption that that sexuality is as much of a choice as choosing to get a tatoo. Where are you getting this idea? Surely not from members of the LGBT community. I'm really curious to hear.
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1yr ago
In this case, Brinton was suicidal in these camps and was so disgusted by them that they went on a nationwide campaign to ban them. You can read more about their personal experience as well. It's pretty tough stuff and certainly something that you'd think a teenage would push through for attention. I do understand where you're coming from though.
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1yr ago
Nope, they were the one who posted tweets about, and photos of themself with the pups online (though they seem to have scrubbed their Instagram now). It wasn't the media that went out and dug up private photos.
This is exactly what I mean by private life being made public by the media. This is usually how this sort of stuff happens - the media obtains photos (publicly available photos as well as nonpublic photos), write articles based on what they found, and then publish those photos to millions of people. The media blew this story up. Brinton merely posted about these on their personal social media channels as anyone else would do. Yes, the photos were still 'public' beforehand. But they are now hugely popular talking points because of media involvement, not due to Brinton. Now of course both sides of the media are making this a huge story for obvious reasons.
Of course, anything you put online has a chance to get out into public despite your personal intention. But that's not what I'm talking about here - you and other commentators are baselessly assuming that Brinton intentionally and willingly is using these sorts of photos to create a public persona for their brand. I'm just pointing out that the media are the ones doing this, not Brinton. The media wants us to think certain things about Brinton to drive clicks on both sides.
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1yr ago
Planting a flag in something and saying "this isn't yours anymore".
Did their original race make the character more or less 'yours' ? If the answer to that is yes, then it would make sense to add more representation in media so others could experience that connection to a character. If the answer is no (as I presume), then changing their race shouldn't affect your relationship with said character.
taking more icons away from white men.
Why is James Bond an icon to you?
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1yr ago
Twitter's official blog in 2011
Not that I love defending Twitter, but a lot has changed since 2011. That was the wild west of the internet and back when people saw the internet as a fun novelty. Social media is wayyyy more than a novelty today - we've seen social media influence elections, enable terror cells to form and communicate, drive people to suicide, and worse. Given that in 2011 they also had a much smaller user base, it's not shocking to me that they would change their tune once we realized the monster that social media has become. There's definitely an argument for how Twitter has approached this, but to argue that social media sites should be a free-for-all isn't realistic at all.
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1yr ago
Why are those dudes who go naked under their trenchcoats and then flash children on the subway bad? Do you agree that they're bad? What specific harm are they causing?
I can't believe this comment has 8 upvotes - you're telling me that you can't see what's wrong with directly exposing underage, nonconsenting children to sexual body parts? Or exposing themselves to any nonconsenting adult? Reading an article online about a kink is in no way comparable.
It undermines the norms of monogamy and private sexuality. Why isn't it bad? If you're the one proposing a radical change in public norms, shouldn't you bear the burden?
Why is undermining a norm a bad thing? Isn't that what humans have done for thousands of years to get us to this point? Sure, it's different, but that doesn't immediately make it 'bad'.
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1yr ago
If I'm reading correctly, it looks like this was published in 2019. The commenter I was replying to specifically said that they were talking about this while also talking about their appointment to the DoE (which happened in 2022).
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1yr ago
Burying what exactly? You're putting the cart well before the horse here. Strip all identity politics out of this story and here's what you get: A mid-tier government official claims to have accidentally stolen luggage on a business trip.
Why is that worth reporting on? A story this small rarely makes the news. The only reason this is news is because it involves identity politics. I thought we were against identity politics here?
You should be asking the other question: Why did right ring media jump all over this minor story? It's simple, it's because they knew they'd get easy clicks by sensationalizing a story involving identity politics. Again, I'm pretty sure most of us here are opposed to media outlets doing this. But now it's somehow not only ok but appreciated? Especially when we have no proof of what happened yet and have good reason to believe this was a stupid mistake? It's ridiculous.
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1yr ago
Now we have people dragging us into their bedrooms, or rather putting their bedrooms out in the public square, in order to tell us all about what they do.
What? Where in this story is Brinton dragging you into their bedroom and forcing you to learn about what they do? Yes, there are articles that talk about Brinton's sexual kinks. Yes, you can find Brinton talking about these kinks on youtube as well.
But that is literally what people/media do: They talk about shit. If you don't like it, you don't have to click. Or read. Or listen. There is nothing being 'forced' here. Their beds aren't out in the public square - their story is in a link that you chose to click.
Since sharing your sexual kinks isn't illegal, this entire issue can be chalked up to personal preference. I read shit I don't agree with all the time and move along since it doesn't apply to me. I know you don't support this but that doesn't mean that it's automatically bad and should be done in your way. Make me an argument about why this is morally wrong and/or should be considered illegal. That's valid. But getting frustrated like this is the same thing as some Karen yelling at people blasting music in their cars. Move on.
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1yr ago
I never said they weren't an outlier? But 'freak' and 'outlier' are two completely different things with completely different social connotations, especially when talking about a person.
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1yr ago
I of course agree that using tax dollars poorly is to be avoided. But I think the OP was making a bigger point: how can you possibly quantify value in this instance? What are the requirements for a school admin to be "fiscally efficient"? Who decides that? More importantly, if we could somehow determine this, would Harvard be the worst offender?
I think this is much more complicated than it appears.
If we accept Disney's reasoning that they want more diversity in their princess lineup, it doesn't make a ton of sense to recast Mulan as non-Asian. Mulan is the only (I think?) Asian princess, recasting her would a) remove the only Asian princess and b) keep the princess lineup diversity numbers the same. Both options wouldn't make sense under Disney's explanation of wanting more diversity. Plus, you could argue that Mulan's race makes logical sense as the movie is set in Asia whereas Ariel's race doesn't have any relevance to the movie's location.
I'm not saying that I totally disagree with this but I also don't think this is a significantly better option than black Ariel. FAriel as a character (& IP) is much more culturally relevant & valuable than Tiana. The 'classic' Disney princesses are icons worldwide. In terms of 'equality', it's simply more meaningful to add diverse characters to an iconic group of characters rather than creating a brand new character without any prior history or cultural significance.
It really depends on how you define and value diversity. For me, diversity isn't about simple quotas or shoeing in as many minorities as possible. It's about true inclusion and an honest effort to make things as practically equal as possible. Making a black mermaid would be the easy way out for Disney and these corporations always choose the easiest, most performative route in terms of public acceptance. This move surprised me but I encourage it since it's a better way of doing diversity than we've done in the past.
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