Why is toxic fandom destroying everything?
- Thread starter Sgt. Sacrament
- Start date
There was a time not too long ago when conservative meant something different than being Republican. That started to change in Reagan's era when the ultra-Christian right started taking a larger role in politics. Obama would have been a Republican in the 80s and Harris would have been leaning more toward the Republican philosophy even twenty five years ago. I'm not sure when the Right began identifying with "ethical" values that used to be extremist right. Al Gore was the guy in the 90s that fought to have warning labels put on material such as records and videos that some people might have a moral issue with. I still remember the U2 album Acthung Baby! had Adam Clayton's penis crossed out on American copies because Gore, a Democrat, pushed that law through.
I'm saying this because I've always been a socially liberal/economically and politically right person--however, somehow being Republican has become a label that is synonymous with being a racist--and Democrats are now defenders of the ultra left.
The purpose of Western Democracies is to defend the rights of everyone, particularly those who have a lesser voice in society. The role of laws is to determine where one person's rights end and another's begin.
All these issues were discussed in the 70s, in movies and television comedies like All in the Family. The difference between then and now is that politicians and political parties today identify on one side or the other on issues that they really have no business taking part in. Their responsibility is to create laws and promote a society that is tolerant of people living in the same country who have different values and ethics and ways of living--and this is a responsibility that any political party should uphold in the U.S., Canada, Europe, or other countries proposing to be democratic societies.
Not upholding those values is the antithesis of a Democratic Republic.
So, my response is that you don't really need to say you are a conservative or a liberal to defend a response--or at least you shouldn't have to--because what we are really talking about it racism and bigotry rather than politics.
Saying you enjoy Ms. Marvel simply means you enjoy the show--and perhaps that you are not a racist. Fiction is one of the best ways to learn about other's cultures and attitudes. People who are Marvel fans but refuse to watch Ms. Marvel because the character is Muslim are either outright racist or ignorant--and my personal opinion is that it is really a civic duty of a citizen of a democratic republic to challenge people who express that opinion.
I will give a Canadian "I'm sorry" for this long, preachy post but I'm glad you liked the series. It was so much fun to watch, although I wish it hadn't brought in all the potentially "world ending" subplot and remained a grounded series.
The point was that in the grand scheme of things, there's no evidence the propagandists had influence over millions of moviegoers--enough to lead to the box office failure of the film. The responsibility for that film's failure rests with its creators and they alone decided was worth putting in front of a camera. Entertainers taking responsibility for their own actions / choices is a lost, positive character trait in this era. If a creative effort is a disaster, surely its the fault of the (fill in the enemy of choice), and not those in the entertainment business at all.
Well said. I also think of myself as "a socially liberal/economically and politically right person," or "slightly right of center," which somehow gets me continually called a racist or a Trumpist in political discussions. I'm neither. It's just that we seem to live in a world of binary choices now.
Even among some of my friends, there was a mistaken line of thinking that "Captain Marvel" had been gender-swapped by the woke Disney folks for these films. They were of course thinking of the ol' DC Shazam Capt Marvel, or maybe even the earlier Marvel male one. I had to keep informing them it's been Carol Danvers for, like DECADES now.
I hate the whining of anti-woke types. There's plenty of shows with bland White male leads out there for them to live out their unrealistic action fantasies. No need to complain about the handful of genre shows with a Brown female lead, for example
too much of the fandoms are brainwashed by nostalgia, leading them to misremember how 'good' stuff was back then, and misattribute how 'bad' stuff is now. It's annoying, and even film discussions in general suffer from this.
even the Star Trek fandom sadly has this problem. I too dislike several aspects of NuTrek but it doesn't lead me to pretend old Trek did everything correclty. Heck, before I came here I didn't even know TOS supremacists still existed!
too much of the fandoms are brainwashed by nostalgia, leading them to misremember how 'good' stuff was back then, and misattribute how 'bad' stuff is now. It's annoying, and even film discussions in general suffer from this.
even the Star Trek fandom sadly has this problem. I too dislike several aspects of NuTrek but it doesn't lead me to pretend old Trek did everything correclty. Heck, before I came here I didn't even know TOS supremacists still existed!
The folks angry at a sympathetic muslim character DO have that kind of influence though, especially these days.
Yeah the toxic YouTubers and review bombers. Idk how many they are but bigots and reactionaries still are a not insignificant portion of the moviegoing population
heck, the MCU and superhero stories as a whole still mostly have 'status quo' is God and vigilante fiction still tends to be a middle class, White male fantasy. Change is slow yet these regressive whiners act like Marvel is replacing every White male hero with woke or whatever other buzzword they use to act like victims
It's not "somehow." Republicans have self-selected for it.
Nobody's saying it didn't. But it's the blanket statements that I feel end up hurting them in the end. It's all ugliness. Nobody wins in the end.
Exactly. Somehow this generation, there's been an inability to own up to mistakes. Because somehow, fans are privy to their production and are sitting on meetings and it's their fault for the quality of a show... Good grief!
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Wdym by blanket statements?
Is this your first time on a discussion board?
If I'm an actor at this point and I receive an offer to audition for something in Star Wars, a franchise that, in the last decade, has either had to tell fans publicly to chill the hell out with the harassment (e.g. Moses Ingram) or turn a blind eye to the toxicity entirely (Kelly Marie Tran) - not once, but multiple times - I'd avoid that shit like the plague.
All that grief and anguish just ain't worth it when you're trying to build a career. And now that these studios who stand by and do nothing are aligning themselves with these toxic "fans" just compounds the problem and makes the future landscape rather fucking bleak. The absolute last opinion any creator should care about when creating something is what the die-hards are gonna think.
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But... why did non-American copies have Adam Clayton's penis in the first place?
Where else was that done?
Not really a big deal any way. It was a very small photo.
English please?
What do you mean by blanket statements?
Oh, it's the shorthand that threw me.
Basically, comments that seek to generalize, paint with broad strokes, etc . In this case, lumping together toxic criticism and constructive criticism together under one banner of toxic criticism. At this point, no criticism at all can be had as the door is closed to criticism of any kind, even if it may be helpful. And as mentioned, it doesn't help when producers are partaking in that toxicism by lashing out. Not listening to the toxic criticism is one thing, and nor should they. In the past, when the internet was not a thing, they weren't getting vitriol and were able to just do their thing. Now that's a bit more difficult as they're more exposed, but all the same, they should be able to control themselves better. The problem with this era of productions is that by shutting themselves out of any form of constructive criticism, both positive and negative, they aren't effectively learning about what's working and what isn't. It then starts to feel like any production is adverse to criticism, and no discussion can be had at that point. By that notion, they would be isolated within their own echo chamber, only getting reinforced by their own ideas that might sound great on paper but in fact be terrible in execution with nobody to tell them so until they air. And fans are supposedly to blame?
Star Wars suffers from how incompetently it's been handled thanks to Lucas since 1983 and what a restrictive setting it really was because of that incompetence.
Star Wars' setting does not allow for or excuse the rampant and uncontrolled bigotry and hatred amongst the online fandom. Nothing excuses that kind of behavior.
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