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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 10, 2026

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Is there any sort of objective data on this?

Which bit? That her fanbase is female? Or that she's not considered a sex symbol by men? I doubt there's much evidence, unless you get a PostTrak subscription:

Broken out, men over and under 25 showed up at 30% apiece while women under 25 were next at 21%, followed by women over 25 at 18%. Diversity demos are 36% Caucasian, 28% Hispanic and Latino, 20% Black, 10% Asian American and 6% Native American and other. The 18-34 set reps 63% of Brand New Day‘s moviegoers versus No Way Home‘s 68%. Over 35 demo grew with Brand New Day at 21% versus No Way Home‘s 15%.

Of those who went, 58% told PostTrak that it was part of a franchise they love, 47% said it looked fun and entertaining, 41% went for the cast as a whole, 39% went for Holland and 29% went for Zendaya.

Can't really drill in to see how much of the male audience came for her. Same with The Drama: much more female-led movie, lots of Gen Z, which I'd attribute to her, but Pattinson is also there and he played a heartthrob (though I think his time is past: Twilight was released in 2008)

On a forum like this, opinions are doubly suspect; people's political opinions influence their aesthetic ones more than they tend to realise,

There's obviously a political (and racial) thing. And a general contrarian thing.

But her choices also play a role. In her own generation Sydney Sweeney is way more of a male sex symbol because she caters to the male gaze much more. Zendaya legitimately looks hotter to me on the red carpet than in her main roles which makes sense given she's meant to be an awkward high schooler in one,a drug addicted high schooler in another and warrior/r/atheist mod in the third.