Does today's generation "see/understand" TV and movies differently?

[Cephus]

This explains it all:

 

[Picard102]

We're told constantly that our opinions are wrong or unwanted.

Agreed. Has happened in this thread and in many others.

 

[Picard102]

This explains it all:

This person also gave The Last Jedi a 9/10. So I guess we can say the writing was good?

 

[Solo4114]

As I said, I just watched through the entire Bionic Woman series. The way that a lot of women were treated in the 70s doesn't mesh well with modern views. It wasn't abusive, but it was certainly "she needs a man" and "she's going to get manhandled and treated in a sexist manner by most of the men in the show". That's just how it was back then. My wife and I recently got the first season of Charlie's Angels on DVD and that's how that show is too. You just have to deal with it and learn to look past it. You don't have to like the context but you have to accept that it was there. By the same token, I can go back and watch the 30s and 40s Charlie Chan movies, which starred white actors Warner Oland and Sidney Toler as Chan. Lots of people would consider that racist and the like today, but too bad. That's how it was done back then. You deal with it. You have to accept the context of the time in which the films were made, not the context in which they're being watched. If you can't, you've got some problems and a lot of people have problems these days.

Well, a few thoughts.

1. First, stuff like the old Charlie Chan films are absolutely racist. I mean, society at large was pretty racist back then, too, so that's not especially surprising. I don't think there's any real debate over that, or at least not any debate that's taken seriously. Yellowface is racist, just like blackface is. Again, not really up for debate.

2. One can still view something that is racist and evaluate it critically for, for example, scholarly pursuit. Let's say you want to understand how Asians have been portrayed in Hollywood throughout the ages. You're going to have to look at the old Charlie Chan films, and Christopher Lee in the Fu Manchu films, and so on, working your way along to films like Joy Luck Club and eventually Shang Chi. Or maybe you want to study filmmaking techniques, so you watch a film like Reifenstahl's Triumph des Willens, which Lucas himself referenced in Star Wars. That's all fair game.

3. I think, however, that there's a difference between doing that and watching those things for pure enjoyment, and it's not a failing on someone's part if they say "Hey, I don't really want to watch some movie that's going to demean me or my culture or my heritage or whatever, just because you say there's some entertainment to be wrung out of it. Maybe there is entertainment to be had from it, but this other stuff bugs me and it's going to get in the way of me enjoying it, and anyway, there's plenty of other stuff I can watch that I'll enjoy more." Likewise, they aren't wrong if they also point out "That film's racist." I mean, it is. The fact that being racist was ok back then doesn't change that it's still racist. >shrug<

Films aren't made "for" anyone. They are a product. You either want to consume said product or you don't. Films and TV shows are made to make money. If you're not interested, keep your money. It's not that hard to understand. There are entire genres of films, books, TV shows, etc. that I have absolutely zero interest in consuming. So what? I just don't consume them. I don't sit around and insult anyone who does or declare said genres to be evil, as we see a lot of people doing today. Live and let live. That's fine. But at least have a reason WHY you like or don't like a thing. If it's just that you don't care for it, fine. Then you're not part of the conversation any longer. Go find something else to do. There's no place for anyone who has no definable thoughts about any media property in a group set up for talking about them. "I like it" or "I don't like it" doesn't really mean anything. If you can't articulate why you like it or why you don't like it, then no conversation can take place. It's just expressing an opinion without nuance and what's the point of that?

Uh...yes, films are absolutely made "for" specific audiences. As you say, films are made to make money. Well, part of making money is targeting a film at a specific audience. Films are "available" for everyone to watch. It's not like they're saying "Sorry, you aren't allowed to see this." But they're definitely still targeted at specific audiences. Always have been, really. An octogenarian is perfectly welcome to watch Porky's, but they definitely aren't the target audience. It's not really made for them. And yeah, they don't have to watch it if they don't like it or want to, but that's entirely beside the point. The point is maybe they want to watch more films like The Lion in Winter or On Golden Pond or whatever, but if nobody's making those films because all they're marking are teen sex romps, I think it's fair for them to complain that nobody's making movies for them, targeted to them, that they want to see.

It's also really easy to say "Whatever, just go watch something else" when, at least for people like me (white straight dude) there are sooooo many movies targeted to me. For the vast bulk of the history of film, films have been targeted to people like me. If I spent the rest of my life literally doing nothing else but watching movies all day long, I'd still probably not run out of movies to watch before I died. That's not the case for, well, pretty much anyone who isn't like me if what they want to see is a film targeted towards people like them.

As for "what's the point of discussing if all you're gonna say is 'I like it' or 'I didn't like it'" I mean...come on, man. You're not new here. That's pretty much the bulk of what we do here! We may try to explain why we like it or don't like it, but mostly it's coming down to personal preference. Sometimes you get into the technical side of "I like it because of the filmmaking technique used here," but most of it is ultimately just our preferences with some window-dressing. It's just that in some cases, folks want to claim that their preference is objective fact. I'm guilty of it, too. I can remember getting into debates with folks on here about Camille Paglia's waxing rhapsodic about how amazing ROTS is while trying to argue that it's an objectively bad film when...it isn't. It has flaws, no question, and those flaws are ultimately what I suspect are objective flaws, but a whoooooole lot of the stuff I wanted to claim was objectively bad was just stuff I didn't like. I just tried to dress it up in "rational" arguments to support what's ultimately just, like, my opinion, man.

It actually is today. You get people deciding, reasonably arbitrarily, that some things are "bad" and that, because they don't personally approve, not only will they not partake, which is certainly their right, but no one has a right to partake. It's one thing to say you don't want to see it, that's up to you. You just don't have any right to tell others that they can't see it.

I suspect what you're alluding to here is the "cancel culture" thing, where people get offended by some aspect of a piece of popular media, criticize it publicly, and in some cases (but not all) try to get the media product "de-platformed." Like, people complaining that Dave Chappelle's latest standup thing on Netflix is deeply offensive and saying that Netflix should pull it.

So, first, if we're talking people's "rights," they have every right to demand that Netflix pull it, just like this or that religious organization can demand that Disney pull XYZ product because it features a happy family where the parents are gay or whatever. It's all the same thing. And ultimately, the only thing that's gonna matter to Disney or Netflix or any other platform is where the money is and whether keeping the thing up or pulling it down is gonna cost/net them more money. Period. There are probably folks within the companies that have their own personal attitudes one way or the other, but the company writ large is going to decide based on its own bottom line (which it kind of has to, if it's a publicly traded company, given the fiduciary duty to shareholders).

You don't have a right to blindly insult the audience because you don't like the property. It's bad enough when people can't even clearly communicate why they don't like a thing, but they think that gives them a right to demand that others can't like that thing either. Unless a coherent conversation can be had where each side lays out their arguments, then nothing ever gets accomplished. You don't get to declare, by fiat, that you're right, everyone else is wrong, so there. That's not how reality works.

I think we absolutely can declare something to be wrong or bad, and that an argument in favor of that position isn't always warranted or necessary. If you agree with the statement, great. If you don't, well, who cares, you're still wrong. It doesn't need to be justified or explained just because (a) you disagree with it, and/or (b) you don't understand it. But regardless, this is the internet. That's just how it goes sometimes. I try to be respectful, but not every difference merits debate.

I'm a white guy too but I don't give a crap that I'm a white guy. I don't look at anyone that way. I don't care what your race, gender, sexual orientation or anything else is and, here's the shock, I don't think anyone else should too. The only way to get rid of racism is to get rid of race. Stop caring. Don't make movies for black people or white people or green people or blue people. Just make good movies. I think Idris Elba would have made a fantastic Bond when he was younger, but that's not because he's a black actor and "we need a black Bond!" It's because he's a damn good actor with zero regard for his skin color. It shouldn't matter at all. It's like having a female Doctor. I have nothing against Jodie Whittaker. I think she's a fine actress. If they wanted to hire her, as the best available candidate for Doctor Who, more power to them. However, that's not why they did it. They did it to promote an agenda. There's no more reason for "it's time for a female Doctor" than there is "it's tine for a black Bond". Race and gender don't matter. Just hire the best people that you can! You don't need to "see yourself on screen". That's positively childish. How far does that go? Demanding only blue-eyed actors and actresses? Hire Boban Marjanović as an actor because somehow, NBA players need representation too? Where does the insanity end and people just say "who cares? Make a good movie!" Because the people who are really racist here, the people who are proudly promoting one skin color over another, those are the ones running around calling everyone else racist.

The rest of us just don't give a damn.

Well, again, that's easy to say from our position as white dudes. The vast bulk of popular entertainment has been aimed at us as an audience demographic. That's not the case for most people outside that demographic, or to the extent it is, it's a question of degrees. For most of Hollywood's history, we've been the "default," the primary target demo. This is especially true in genre films like the kind we tend to develop props or costumes around. Sci-fi, action, fantasy, noir, espionage, thrillers, etc., it's often a white dude at the center of that story.

Now you can say that representation doesn't matter, but (a) you're wrong, and (b) you're saying that from a comfortable position of already being very well (some might even say over-) represented. It matters especially to people who aren't really represented as much in popular culture the way guys like us are. And besides, if representation doesn't matter, then it shouldn't matter that Doctor Who is casting a new actor who's black. The only question will be whether he turns out to be good in the role and whether the stories are good and entertaining. I mean, I'll say that representation doesn't automatically turn a poorly told story into a well told story. But I don't think anyone's making that argument. What they're arguing is that we should pay attention to representation because it matters. Also, while we're doing it, we should be telling good stories (I'd argue it's doubly important to tell good stories when you're breaking representation barriers).

If that's an "agenda," well...cool. It's an agenda. Doesn't make it wrong. I don't need to look any further than my own home to know that representation matters. My 6-year-old gets way more engaged with a story when it's about a woman, and especially when it's about a little girl. She still likes stories that are about other folks, too, but she wants to play out the story herself and explore it in her own made up adventures and such when it's about someone who's more like her. I think pretty much everyone is like that. For a story to be effective, the characters need to be relatable to the audience. That's a lot easier to do when those characters look, behave, and experience their world the way the audience does. The more you remove those characters from the experience of the audience, the harder it becomes to get the audience to connect with and relate to them. The fact that guys like us can relate so easily to so many different films and stuff is precisely because so much stuff is oriented around guys like us. And that, in turn, makes it easier for us to watch things that aren't oriented towards us because, so what? There's a gazillion things that are. It makes no difference. And it still will make no difference as more stuff becomes more representative of people who aren't guys like us.

I think we're in the midst of a massive demographic and socio-cultural shift on this planet, and in the U.S. especially. There's a "changing of the guard" happening right now, and a shift between an old world and an as-yet-not-fully-formed new one. Unsurprisingly, that's leading to power struggles as the change occurs. I see a lot of the stuff about "woke media" and "cancel culture" and the like as just part of that overall struggle. It'll sort itself out eventually, but in the meantime, there will be debates about things like this. So it goes.

 

[Psab keel]

Just tell great stories. I don't care who's in them as long as they're talented and can play the part.

 

[Cephus]

Well, a few thoughts.

1. First, stuff like the old Charlie Chan films are absolutely racist. I mean, society at large was pretty racist back then, too, so that's not especially surprising. I don't think there's any real debate over that, or at least not any debate that's taken seriously. Yellowface is racist, just like blackface is. Again, not really up for debate.

Only in your view. It was perfectly acceptable at the time in which the movies were made. That's the thing, you're desperately trying to impose modern values on non-modern things. You're not looking at things in the context of which they were made. Whether you agree with it now is irrelevant to how it was then. Nobody is trying to justify it, we're just pointing out that it's just the way that it was. You have to deal with that. If you can't, then it's a problem with you, not with the movie.

2. One can still view something that is racist and evaluate it critically for, for example, scholarly pursuit. Let's say you want to understand how Asians have been portrayed in Hollywood throughout the ages. You're going to have to look at the old Charlie Chan films, and Christopher Lee in the Fu Manchu films, and so on, working your way along to films like Joy Luck Club and eventually Shang Chi. Or maybe you want to study filmmaking techniques, so you watch a film like Reifenstahl's Triumph des Willens, which Lucas himself referenced in Star Wars. That's all fair game.

But if you're consuming media, you can't just declare that anything that doesn't conform to your modern sensibilities is automatically wrong because, on some level, it makes you feel bad. This is the thing that keeps coming up, that all of these arguments rely on emotions, not intellect. Far too many people are unable to intellectually understand that said era was a certain way, you have to set aside your feelings on that and view the media through that lens. This is something that rational, mature adults ought to be able to do. Unfortunately, far too many are incapable.

3. I think, however, that there's a difference between doing that and watching those things for pure enjoyment, and it's not a failing on someone's part if they say "Hey, I don't really want to watch some movie that's going to demean me or my culture or my heritage or whatever, just because you say there's some entertainment to be wrung out of it. Maybe there is entertainment to be had from it, but this other stuff bugs me and it's going to get in the way of me enjoying it, and anyway, there's plenty of other stuff I can watch that I'll enjoy more." Likewise, they aren't wrong if they also point out "That film's racist." I mean, it is. The fact that being racist was ok back then doesn't change that it's still racist. >shrug<

Nobody is holding a gun to anyone and forcing them to watch anything. People need to learn to differentiate between "this is objectively bad for these reasons that I'll detail" and "I don't like it." Far too many can only do the latter. That's fine, nobody has to like everything and everyone has a choice what media they consume, right up until they assume that they're really doing the former. Their personal value judgements don't become objective problems, just because they wish they were. That's where the problems come in. It's where people say "this is bad because I don't like it, therefore nobody should be able to see it" or "this is good because I like it, therefore nobody should be able to criticize it". Both of those positions are completely irrational. It's why we try to have conversations with people who say they like a show or dislike a movie but can offer no reason beyond "because!" Because isn't an answer. It's not a justification. It's not an adult response to a pointed question. It's what little children do.

Uh...yes, films are absolutely made "for" specific audiences. As you say, films are made to make money. Well, part of making money is targeting a film at a specific audience. Films are "available" for everyone to watch. It's not like they're saying "Sorry, you aren't allowed to see this." But they're definitely still targeted at specific audiences. Always have been, really. An octogenarian is perfectly welcome to watch Porky's, but they definitely aren't the target audience. It's not really made for them. And yeah, they don't have to watch it if they don't like it or want to, but that's entirely beside the point. The point is maybe they want to watch more films like The Lion in Winter or On Golden Pond or whatever, but if nobody's making those films because all they're marking are teen sex romps, I think it's fair for them to complain that nobody's making movies for them, targeted to them, that they want to see.

Films are made for anyone who is willing to plop down their money. Nobody is going to turn a white guy down at the door who wants to see a Spike Lee or a Jordan Peele movie. They just want your money and if they want anything else, guess what? They're being racist!

It's also really easy to say "Whatever, just go watch something else" when, at least for people like me (white straight dude) there are sooooo many movies targeted to me. For the vast bulk of the history of film, films have been targeted to people like me. If I spent the rest of my life literally doing nothing else but watching movies all day long, I'd still probably not run out of movies to watch before I died. That's not the case for, well, pretty much anyone who isn't like me if what they want to see is a film targeted towards people like them.

But they're not. They're movies you feel comfortable seeing. I feel comfortable seeing any movie that I want to sit through. I don't care who it's "intended for" if it's a good movie, nor do I have any interest in seeing anything, even if it's "intended for me" if it's not. It's the quality of the movie that matters, not the racial.gender/sexual orientation pandering that goes on in Hollywood these days.

As for "what's the point of discussing if all you're gonna say is 'I like it' or 'I didn't like it'" I mean...come on, man. You're not new here. That's pretty much the bulk of what we do here! We may try to explain why we like it or don't like it, but mostly it's coming down to personal preference. Sometimes you get into the technical side of "I like it because of the filmmaking technique used here," but most of it is ultimately just our preferences with some window-dressing. It's just that in some cases, folks want to claim that their preference is objective fact. I'm guilty of it, too. I can remember getting into debates with folks on here about Camille Paglia's waxing rhapsodic about how amazing ROTS is while trying to argue that it's an objectively bad film when...it isn't. It has flaws, no question, and those flaws are ultimately what I suspect are objective flaws, but a whoooooole lot of the stuff I wanted to claim was objectively bad was just stuff I didn't like. I just tried to dress it up in "rational" arguments to support what's ultimately just, like, my opinion, man.

But more recently, there's a host of younger members who can't have that discussion because they don't have reasons. "Because I do!" isn't a reason. That's what this entire thread is about. We've gone from having indepth, well-formed discussions to "because!" What we are seeing is a failure of certain individuals, often in certain demographics, to even be able to evaluate things critically. "Because" will never be an adequate answer. If you go into a courtroom where someone is on trial for murder, "why did you kill that guy?" "Because!" You need to be able to provide more than that and the fact that these people can't is downright pathetic.

 

[Cephus]

Just tell great stories. I don't care who's in them as long as they're talented and can play the part.

Exactly. It shouldn't matter. That it does, to anyone, is ridiculous.

 

[Picard102]

It was perfectly acceptable at the time in which the movies were made.

That doesn't make it not racist. How are you even arguing that because racism was accepted, that it's not racism?

This is the thing that keeps coming up, that all of these arguments rely on emotions, not intellect.

This is something you've repeatedly said but have continuously done yourself. You just argued that a movie that featured racist themes was okay because people felt it was okay at the time.

Films are made for anyone who is willing to plop down their money. Nobody is going to turn a white guy down at the door who wants to see a Spike Lee or a Jordan Peele movie. They just want your money and if they want anything else, guess what?

A film being made for a specific audience doesn't preclude others from seeing it. No one is even trying to claim that.

It's the quality of the movie that matters, not the racial.gender/sexual orientation pandering that goes on in Hollywood these days.

Except that's one of things you're specifically complaining about here. "Agendas".

If you go into a courtroom where someone is on trial for murder, "why did you kill that guy?" "Because!" You need to be able to provide more than that a

No, you don't. That's called a guilty plea and you don't need to explain your motivations at all for it to be accepted.

 

[Psab keel]

I love how you keep making this about morals. That's hilarious.

 

[Picard102]

I love how you keep making this about morals. That's hilarious.

Where?

 

[batguy]

I'm disappointed in the path this thread took. I didn't expect this when it started.

 

[Solo4114]

Only in your view. It was perfectly acceptable at the time in which the movies were made. That's the thing, you're desperately trying to impose modern values on non-modern things. You're not looking at things in the context of which they were made. Whether you agree with it now is irrelevant to how it was then. Nobody is trying to justify it, we're just pointing out that it's just the way that it was. You have to deal with that. If you can't, then it's a problem with you, not with the movie.

Ok, I'm going to try to explain this. Yes, Charlie Chan is racist. It's a white guy putting on yellowface to play a caricature of Asian people. You want to say "But it was acceptable in its time." Yes, it was. It was absolutely a product of its time. It was entirely acceptable and not remotely seen as racist (which, I'd argue, in the 1930s was barely a concept to begin with) in its day. None of that changes the fact that it's racist. It can be two things: (1) a product of its time, and (2) racist. I'm not disagreeing with you that, in its context, it was what it was, and that's just how the world was. That's all true. And that was racist. I mean, it doesn't actually seem like you're disputing me on this. It seems like we actually agree with each other that (a) it was acceptable in its day and it's a product of its time, and (b) it's racist.

But if you're consuming media, you can't just declare that anything that doesn't conform to your modern sensibilities is automatically wrong because, on some level, it makes you feel bad. This is the thing that keeps coming up, that all of these arguments rely on emotions, not intellect. Far too many people are unable to intellectually understand that said era was a certain way, you have to set aside your feelings on that and view the media through that lens. This is something that rational, mature adults ought to be able to do. Unfortunately, far too many are incapable.

Again, this isn't just "because it makes you feel bad." And you can try to dismiss this as all being about "emotion" and not "intellect," but intellectually, it's still racist, man. I'd say that the detached, intellectual point of view is to look at the material, acknowledge the society that produced it and recognize that it was entirely within the normal bounds of good and polite taste within that era, and still be able to say "And it's racist." The emotional position is to try to argue that it's somehow not racist merely because it's a product of its time. It can still be a product of its time and be racist or otherwise objectionable. Are you trying to argue that position? You may want to reevaluate it, if you are.

I'll give you an example. Agatha Christie's novel "And Then There Were None" didn't originally have that title. I won't post here what the title was; it can be looked up online. But the original title is absolutely, 100% racist. Was it a product of its time? Sure. Back then, it was -- evidently -- perfectly acceptable to include that specific racial slur in the title of your book. That doesn't magically cloak it in some shield that makes it not racist. The fact that we view things differently now doesn't make the original title ok. It makes it a product of its time, sure, but that doesn't change what it is.

Nobody is holding a gun to anyone and forcing them to watch anything. People need to learn to differentiate between "this is objectively bad for these reasons that I'll detail" and "I don't like it." Far too many can only do the latter. That's fine, nobody has to like everything and everyone has a choice what media they consume, right up until they assume that they're really doing the former. Their personal value judgements don't become objective problems, just because they wish they were. That's where the problems come in. It's where people say "this is bad because I don't like it, therefore nobody should be able to see it" or "this is good because I like it, therefore nobody should be able to criticize it". Both of those positions are completely irrational. It's why we try to have conversations with people who say they like a show or dislike a movie but can offer no reason beyond "because!" Because isn't an answer. It's not a justification. It's not an adult response to a pointed question. It's what little children do.

I wasn't arguing that anyone was forcing anyone else to watch anything? I'm explaining why someone might choose not to watch something, and you're immediately jumping to "Nobody's forcing you to watch it." I know. I'm telling you why they don't want to watch it, and pointing out that that's not some personal failing on their part.

Films are made for anyone who is willing to plop down their money. Nobody is going to turn a white guy down at the door who wants to see a Spike Lee or a Jordan Peele movie. They just want your money and if they want anything else, guess what? They're being racist!

Yes, and they're targeted towards specific demographics towards that end. This is not news, and I'm not saying that white people are getting turned away at the door of a Spike Lee joint. I'm not even coming close to that argument, actually. Not sure why you're bringing that up?

But they're not. They're movies you feel comfortable seeing. I feel comfortable seeing any movie that I want to sit through. I don't care who it's "intended for" if it's a good movie, nor do I have any interest in seeing anything, even if it's "intended for me" if it's not. It's the quality of the movie that matters, not the racial.gender/sexual orientation pandering that goes on in Hollywood these days.

Again, you say this from a particular perspective: that of someone for whom most content is already made. It's easy to say "Whatever. I don't care. I just go watch what's good and what entertains me." ("What entertains me," by the way, is still how you feel, just for the record.) That's at least in part because so much already is and always has been oriented towards you (and me).

I don't think either of us can ever truly understand what it's like to live in a world where the vast bulk of entertainment media depicts people who aren't like us, and when it does depict us, it's very clearly as "the other" or as "not the default" at the very least. Even if either of us moved overseas somewhere and lived as a racial minority, we'd still have had that core experience of growing up within an environment where our experience is "the default." We've not lived our lives from the start as "other" or "different" or "not default" or whathaveyou, so we don't have the experience of it being a big deal to suddenly see someone like us in the position where it's usually the "default" character type.

But more recently, there's a host of younger members who can't have that discussion because they don't have reasons. "Because I do!" isn't a reason. That's what this entire thread is about. We've gone from having indepth, well-formed discussions to "because!" What we are seeing is a failure of certain individuals, often in certain demographics, to even be able to evaluate things critically. "Because" will never be an adequate answer. If you go into a courtroom where someone is on trial for murder, "why did you kill that guy?" "Because!" You need to be able to provide more than that and the fact that these people can't is downright pathetic.

I dunno. Admittedly, I'm less active on these boards than I used to be, so maybe I just don't see it, but...I don't really see a ton of it. I think tastes are changing, broadly speaking. And as the demographics of this country change, so do the attitudes and preferences people have towards film and television entertainment. I don't think that's a bad thing, and I don't think it's headed in a bad direction or at least any worse of a direction than it's always been.

 

[Solo4114]

I'm disappointed in the path this thread took. I didn't expect this when it started.

Alright, well, to get things perhaps closer to "on track" I'll say that, yes, I think that younger generations see TV and Movies differently, because they view them from their own framework which is, itself, different from that of generations past. But that's neither good nor bad. It's just...you know...the way of the world.

 

[Psab keel]

You just argued that a movie that featured racist themes was okay because people felt it was okay at the time.

In his example he said no one is justifying it. Just that it was important to take it in the context (era) in which it was made which is not the same thing as condoning the attitudes in the fictional story being told. One acknowledges the reality of the past, the other conflates it to the point where watching a movie of questionable taste is tantamount to racism. If you can't tell the difference then that's on you.

I'm disappointed in the path this thread took. I didn't expect this when it started.

I'm not surprised in the least. I'm not happy about it, but I'm not shocked at all. It's clear there are some here who need to constantly make these topics an issue of ethics. They can't just leave well enough alone but need to try and shame someone for having an opinion they don't like and try to use people not even involved in the discussion as human shields to defend their sense of moral superiority. All in the guise of being inclusive when in reality they merely want to silence opposition at the expense of decency towards their peers.

Do young people view content differently? Yes. Are some of them good at critical thinking. Yes. Are some awful at it? Yes.

 

[Paul Andrew]

Only in your view. It was perfectly acceptable at the time in which the movies were made. That's the thing, you're desperately trying to impose modern values on non-modern things. You're not looking at things in the context of which they were made. Whether you agree with it now is irrelevant to how it was then. Nobody is trying to justify it, we're just pointing out that it's just the way that it was. You have to deal with that. If you can't, then it's a problem with you, not with the movie.

I see your point, but I have to disagree with it on a fundamental level.

Yes those things were acceptable back in the day, but any number of things that are unacceptable now didn't used to be. That doesn't make them OK then, it only explains the context in which they occurred. And to be frank, the context is $&#@ed up.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding you, but what I'm reading is that old racist stuff is OK because society didn't recognize it as racist at the time it was made, and I don't even know what to say to that concept.

 

[Psab keel]

Re read the part were he says no one is trying to justify it.

 

[Picard102]

In his example he said no one is justifying it. Just that it was important to take it in the context (era) in which it was made which is not the same thing as condoning the attitudes in the fictional story being told. One acknowledges the reality of the past, the other conflates it to the point where watching a movie of questionable taste is tantamount to racism. If you can't tell the difference then that's on you.

Pointing out a flaw in their reasoning isn't making it about morals.
If someone points out something is racist (and there is no argument that blackface and yellowface it isn't) then the reply is "Only in your view", that's an emotional response and not factually correct.

They can't just leave well enough alone but need to try and shame someone for having an opinion they don't like and try to use people not even involved in the discussion as human shields to defend their sense of moral superiority.

As opposed to the insults that started on the very first page of this thread and the continued attacks on members to defend their sense of intellectual superiority? Explicitly stated sense of intellectual superiority?

 

[Psab keel]

 

[Picard102]

View attachment 1599808

For someone who laments the lack of decency towards each other here...

 

[Paul Andrew]

Re read the part were he says no one is trying to justify it.

Justification is different from ignoring the fact that it was bad, regardless of whether it was thought to be so at the time, which is a position that can really only be taken by someone who wouldn't have felt the negative effects of the thing when it occurred.

No one here is advocating that old racist media be obliterated from history, but neither should we give it a pass because of when it came out. We should absolutely recognize it for what it was, and call it out when necessary.