Harrison Danneskjold

We've got people from South Africa (I think?) and India all arguing pretty fiercely about what happens in Hollywood right in this very thread, don't we?

Oh, sorry! I assumed you were an American too! XD My bad! I am trying to be careful of that; thank you. But in this particular case I don't think I'm in much danger of it. The skin color and genitalia of actors in movies should not matter in the slightest to anybody, except in the case of porn. It doesn't matter whether you wish there were more White Male heroes or more disabled trans black lesbian heroes; neither desire makes any sense, because neither really has anything to do with the quality of the stories themselves (which is the only thing that really should matter in cinema). If that's what you're paying attention to while watching these things then you're simply doing it wrong.

Yeah; sorry about that. You asked whether lesbian Mal would crack the same kinds of jokes and have the same mannerisms as the old Mal and yes; if she was Mal then she would. Not simply because they're both human (although I probably should've brought up the issue of free will the other night) but because that is the identity of Mal. If she was a more timid and feminine sort of person then she would be a different person. Which is not to deny the statistical differences between male and female personality traits. But since they are statistical differences they tell us very little about the character of any individual man or woman. And then there is the obvious issue of free will and the fact that since men and women are beings of self made souls they are fully capable of shaping their own character in defiance of any and a statistics, which is another reason why they're probably not as relevant to this as you seem to think they are. Yeah. The one on the right is a cartoon caricature of two ridiculous faces while the one on the left is photorealistic. Sorry if that's not quite the answer you were looking for but I am colorblind. Perhaps, but that again falls into the legitimate differences of interactions between the sexes (which I spent a bit too much time on the other night); not the identities of the characters in question, as such. It sounds like you're trying to say that there could not be a female Mal, really. If having an innie rather than an outie would make him a totally different character then this new character would not be Mal.

I won't be able to carry this on tonight because of the sleeping pills I took about an hour and a half ago, because I work tomorrow morning. Sorry to everyone unnamed who's probably waiting on a response from me. I can ensure the same state of intellectual impairment when I respond tomorrow if you ask for it (but unless you do I'm gonna assume you don't care). Until then - here's something exceedingly relevant to remember me by!

No; neither to his soul mate nor to himself. And if his sex mattered to anyone other than his soul mate or him self then I'd immediately suggest they fuck off and mind their own business - precisely as he would! Would he not say precisely the same thing if he had an innie rather than an outie, by definition? If not then I'll need to hear a few of your definitions because they cannot be aligned with my own.

Yes. Because women can have basically the same personalities as men. I know that they usually don't (statistically speaking) but when I said "X character only a black lesbian" I thought it was obvious that I meant the same PERSON with the same sort of MIND, only in a slightly different sort of body. Have you actually seen Firefly? The only two episodes that might need some adjustments are the ones involving that saboteur woman Mal accidentally married, and only then because she used most peoples' usual assumptions about women as her own weapon against them. Have you seen Firefly???

I'm sorry. I've never personally seen any of the Godfather movies, and when you said "let's make him a lesbian, too!" it sounded like the non-answer of someone who has no real answer, to me. But since I've never actually seen those movies for myself I assumed I was just missing some critical plot point and tried coming up with something I know off the back of my hand. I really should've asked if you've ever seen Firefly, too, and I am sorry about that. Have you?

I am. Sorry, but most Americans only really care about America, and that actually seems to be true of most non-Americans as well. Since Hollywood is in America I would naturally assume that the racial, sexual and whatever else makeup of its actors (along with everything else) to reflect the proportions of those people in our wider culture. Which is not to say it'd necessarily be bad if Hollywood violated that expectation now and then. I'd expect a few violations, too, if all they were worried about was the quality of their finished product. But that's not really what this thread is about. Precisely. Draw me a picture of the racial stereotype that white people cannot dance. Seriously; just try it. That's not how pictures work. If you were to make a video of the genocide of all White Males I think it'd be easier (you could look at the camera inbetween pleas for mercy and say "and after this we'll get the rest of them") but if that were put into a movie it'd be very obvious that it was there. I do not believe a picture of such a thing can ever be drawn. You can even photograph a bunch of Jews being led into the gas chambers, but even then you haven't photographed "all Jews"; just a certain tragic group who're about to die. Without some sort of words beneath your picture there simply is no way to express that concept.

Alright. Let's REALLY concretize it. Let's replace Mal (the Captain of Serenity in the TV show Firefly) with a black lesbian. Most of her story would revolve around the oppressive government she lives under, despises and finds every opportunity she can to undermine. She "wouldn't even get along with normal criminals" because in a certain sense she still felt like she was a rebel soldier fighting a war that she'd already lost. This would not change her relationship with Simon (the doctor), his sister River, the mechanic Kaylee or the preacher Shepherd Book, since the act of sex (or its possibility) simply isn't a part of those relationships ... like the vast majority of normal human interactions. It might change her relationship with her black female war buddy Zoe but probably not much, since Zoe is quite clearly straight. It would change her relationship with her soul mate and the resident prostitute Inara but not by much, since Inara was always clearly bisexual. If anything it might improve their dynamic. Ironically, the only person who would definitely treat her any differently would be the ship's pilot (Wash) and only because he has an openly-stated preference for strong black women like his wife, Zoe. But if this female captain Mal was anything like the male one then that would be subdued and forgotten very quickly. So all things considered it really wouldn't change her interactions with any of her crew by much. Now, you might ask if having black skin and a different set of genitalia would change who she was as a character, but that actually would be the racist/sexist thing to ask. Neither of those things dictate who anyone is as a person. And if we take that out of it and look at what the only logical changes would be (the things that'd actually make sense to change if we actually changed Mal's race and sex) then all that's left are whether the other characters would treat people differently based on such superficial characteristics. In Tsarist Russia this would've been significant. I can't quite see that society just accepting a black-skinned person as just another person, because that is literally not what that society actually did in history. In modern America (where such things mean very little to most people) it would make total sense. Now, if someone were to reboot Firefly I would expect some new and exciting ideas to get into that reboot. If all they did was change the race and gender of the captain then I'd be pretty pissed off about it - BECAUSE it would basically be precisely the same story, retold for extra cash! But your position implies both racism and sexism and whatever ism there is for heterosexuality (because I do not permit myself to think in the SJW's terms) and the sooner you see that and reject it, the better it'll be for you. 75% drunk and a little bit high now. Get wrecked son.

To be fair, the converse is the general thrust of basically every intellectual thing in modern America. It seems like he's just picking up on the general trends. It's a bad thing for anyone (of any race or either gender) to pick up and run with, but I think it is understandable. Which is why I simply pointed out that he's been thinking in the racist and sexist terminology of such intellectuals and invited him to stop. There is a unique kind of ideological barrage about such things going on here and now.

Still waiting for a response with 60% of my brain impaired ...

No; I'm only slightly tipsy for now, and what I was listening to a minute ago is in my last post. The Polka version of WAP is hilarious, though. I think that's actually better than Ben Shapiro reading out the lyrics deadpan; "I told you n-words there's some wet-ass-p-words in this house". That's awesome. I haven't read the rest of the thread yet (as I just said above) so I'm sorry if you've answered this already, but the statement that 'whether the lead actor is a White Male or not would change the entire story' confuses me greatly. I had a similar issue when it came to the Hulu show The Great (about Catherine the Great of Russia) since several of its main characters were black, and in that place and that time if they had been then nobody around them would've been calmly discussing Russian politics; they would've been screaming "OH, SHIT! WHAT ARE YOU?" When in the show it wasn't even mentioned. I'm still fuzzy on exactly what the right take on that point is. It's certainly historically inaccurate. You didn't mention historical accuracy or even historical stories in your post, though. You just said that a story would be totally different if the main character was played by a white male. And although that would be true of historical fiction I really don't think it would affect anything set in the modern day at all (really, think about it; what would it change?) and if we're talking about science fiction then it'd really depend on what sort of future we're trying to project. You fundamentally seem to be implying that the race and sex of a person dictates what sort of character they are, which would be both racist and sexist if you meant it and just stupid if you said it without ever considering its implications. Finally, you'd better own me in this, because by the time I've gotten to the bottom of this post I have become considerably drunker and since you wanted to be a dick about it I'll return the favor if I end up owning you with half of my brain tied behind my back. The Polka WAP will always be hilarious no matter what, though.

True that! Actually, I think you're right about that. This whole thread is and should be about artistic integrity. Anyway. Talk to you later!

This is as far into the thread as I'll read for tonight (for various reasons, including both my blood pressure and the fact that I'd like to have a drink soon) but I just wanted to mention a few very general points before I go. Firstly, Cultural Parasitism definitely is a thing which Ayn Rand described way back in the 60's (although it's gotten much more intense since then) and which is demonstrably both real and bad. I think we should try to make a clear distinction between that and genuinely creative efforts to adapt old stories into new forms, which often leads to very good places. Firefly (which is by far my favorite TV show; it's not even a contest) includes elements of several dozen ancient stories that I know of, but blended together in a brand-new way which I personally find quite delightful. Actually, on second thought, that's not a personal matter; I will fight any one of you over Firefly. It is objectively amazing. And although I don't agree that all the examples mentioned in the OP should be in that category (primarily the Viking shield-maidens) there really is something to it. And it's not the same thing as simply adapting an old story in a newer and edgier way because (as in the archetypical case of the New GhostBusters) there is no creative flair or original elements that an outside observer could ever discern. The new and unique twists might exist within the minds of their creators but since nobody else could possibly identify them I suspect they were never even there. It's really only an attempt to repackage an old story with a black queer midget trans woman as the main character in the hopes that everybody will treat it like a legitimately new thing. Zero effort and zero risk and hopefully millions of people will be tricked into spending actual money to see it. However, the second point I'd like to make is that the great thing about Hollywood (ESPECIALLY now that we're in the digital age) is volume. They've been cranking out far more movies and TV shows than any one person could ever watch, and although many of them have been soulless cash-grabs the sheer quantities involved almost guarantee that there will always be at least a few new greats made every year. How many works have been torturously replaced in an Alien-esque fashion? As long as we've still got more good ones coming out consistently, I don't think we have to care. Let the soulless cash grabs be relegated to the much-deserved trash bin of history. Finally, music!

He specifically said that he doesn't see this as a racial thing; in India (where he said he lives) they don't care about race nearly as much as Americans do. I see that as a good thing: in America we truly do have a racial problem nowadays, and the problem is that nobody will ever shut up about it. You actually sound like the White Male stereotype that the SJW's are always screaming about, there. You need to stop thinking in the SJW's terminology. I'm not trying to be an asshole (for some of us it just comes naturally ) but it shows that you have been doing that, and it's not good for you. It's not good for the rest of America either but what you should really care about is that it's not good for you. I'm not gonna reply to anything else you said yesterday; partially because of my blood pressure (which is something I need to start paying attention to) and partially in the hopes that your next post might be better. IDK; maybe yesterday was a particularly rough day for you, and if when tomorrow came you felt like renouncing a few of the things you'd said then I'd do my best to forget about them. Good luck!

What?????

That bit literally made me laugh out loud. The vast majority of people in America are white and the vast majority of people on this planet are straight. So if the people involved in these decisions were actually aliens from another world who had no idea what race or gender or anything like that meant, and were casting exclusively for the purpose of who can play the part best, I would expect most of their picks to be straight white people. It would be weird if they were the only kind of people cast, or if they were less represented than some other group, but as long as the end product was still good I personally would not give a damn. I do not think that "representation of my approximate skin color or genitalia in cinema" is a rational thing for any truly selfish person to worry about. That goes for both sexes (note: TWO of those) and every conceivable race. I also disagree with that but suspect there'll be ample opportunity to come back to it later. I'm sorry. This obsession with race and racism does seem to be a uniquely American thing (probably because of the contrast between our founding documents and our actual history) and it's one of our only exports that we cannot actually brag about. But I, for one, am sorry that even in India you have to deal with this retarded thing. Hopefully we'll be able to get our shit together sooner rather than later.

Weirdly enough, despite agreeing with the OP that cultural parasitism is a real and bad thing I also have to take issue with this. Unless you're watching something about actual genocide, watching individual bad guys die is not the same thing as witnessing the destruction of "white men" (unless you literally meant that you disapprove of the death of any white male character, but since that would be ridiculous I'm going to assume it's not what you meant). Doctor Seuss is actually a great example of what I mean. One of the primary things he created which is currently being called out as an example of white supremacy was this illustration: Depicting "A Chinese Boy who eats with Sticks". Many people are calling that image racist because not all Chinese boys eat with chopsticks. And although it is true that not all Chinese people eat that way (even though the vast majority in point of fact do, I'm sure there are at least a few exceptions) this is not a picture of "all Chinese people"; it's a picture of an individual Chinese boy who happens to eat this way. I have yet to think of a way to visually depict "all Chinese people" in such an illustration. I don't think it's possible without at least some sort of caption to explain that this image includes the entirety of that racial group. It would be possible to depict such a thing in a film, but if there is such a thing as "white male genocide: the movie" I have yet to hear about it. It would be a disgusting and evil thing if it was created (and I wouldn't put it past certain members of our intelligentsia to try it) but if you mean that certain villains are white and male then that's not the same thing; that just means that these particular villains happen to have light skin and penises. And just as there are, in fact, Chinese people who eat with chopsticks, there are also white males who are villainous and fully deserve a good trouncing. Many of them are the ones screaming the loudest about Doctor Seuss. And there's something really artistic to watching a small, virtuous woman beat up a big bad dude. The fact that we'd expect her to lose raises our tension, as audience members, while we're watching it; it's really not different from how the climax always has to involve a small team of heroes against the endless hordes of the bad guys. Here is not a music video (believe it or not) but an example of what I mean that's actually done very well. Since the character in question is a slim little cyborg whose body is packed full of god-only-knows-what it manages to get the best of both worlds: our perceptual-level gut reaction that she's going to get pulverized without any disbelief that she actually doesn't. Now, you would be totally right to point out that Hollywood has been stretching that well beyond the point of believability lately, which ultimately makes the end product less fun to watch. But I don't know of any reason why that can't just be chalked up to lazy and sloppy writing. So in short although there obviously is something to this "Cultural Parasitism" thing (and I'm sure I'll have a chance to elaborate on that momentarily) I also think that specific post was taking it a bit too far. Don't use their dumbass terminology within your own private thoughts.

Just that she's a fan, she's referred to Atlas Shrugged as "life-changing" and had been trying to play the role of Dagny Taggart in it. I don't know why they turned her down (nor Kevin Sorbo when he wanted to play John Galt). It might just be a literary appreciation.

Thank you!!! I was about to come back here and declare it a false memory. Sorry about all the music videos, too. I was so sure of myself that I started drinking and listening to music while waiting for a response, and after the first few shots I decided my music was so good that everyone else needed to hear it, too. It is all excellent music. But I'm sorry for making a bit of a mess in the middle of this thread with it. If any moderators felt like retroactively chopping a few songs out (or even just replacing the embedded videos with hyperlinks) my sober self would actually appreciate it. Actually, for future reference, if you ever see me posting more than one song on a single page or posting any depressing or upsetting music, it's probably because I've had a bit too much already and you have explicit permission to clean the results up in whatever way you like, if you feel like fixing it at all. Also @MisterSwig how on Earth did you get a functional timestamp in there? That it was basic economic common sense and that if it sounds shocking then that's a measure of the dishonesty of the dominant culture. Absolutely. Actual racism is evil and annoying but not life-altering. As long as it remains the exception and not the rule (which is demonstrably true in America) all one has to do about it is not deal with the racists. Which is precisely what I'm currently struggling to do about Coca-Cola (even though nothing else goes quite so well with rum). Cheers!

Earlier today I started going through all the entries on the Ayn Rand Lexicon alphabetically, because I'm sure the thing I'm thinking of is there. If it's a false memory then I swear I will return to this thread and say so. I probably won't change my mind about corporate ethics but I will at least mention whether Ayn Rand actually said anything in support of it or not.

That it was great and she wished more companies could operate the way Indian Head was at the time of the lecture in question. I'm pretty sure it's one of the speeches on the Ayn Rand Lexicon and I'll have to get back to you when I figure out which part of which one I'm thinking of. Yes, but the primary goal of the company itself must be to maximize profits, or else it would be a bad company. I know how weird it is to discuss something like a corporation having goals at all (since it is such an abstract way of organizing human efforts) but I really do think it's a meaningful kind of thing to discuss. So do Google and Amazon, for what it's worth; even though the gist of my argument is that both are doing it very wrongly. Not for the company itself, no. There really ought to be a higher goal than money for every single employee working there. I know that's not a straightforward thing to conceptualize (since a "company" is not a person but a certain team of people which changes from one day to the next) but if you could make that cognitive stretch with me, everything else I've been saying about it is right on the other side. What? To where? When I play BattleStar Galactica: Deadlock (as I have been far too much of late) I focus on killing as many Cylons as I can while minimizing the risks to the life of every human involved. If I were to train somebody else to play it (or a team) that is precisely what I'd tell them to focus on, and if it were a basketball team I'd tell them to focus on maximizing their own points. What else should they be paying attention to when they're on the court and in the game? Damn. I'll probably remember where exactly it was eventually, but I was really hoping your memory would've been able to do what mine currently can't. That is a great movie, though. I really can't blame your unconscious mind for trying to pull that up instead of the lecture I was talking about; it is worth pulling up. I STILL CAN'T BELIEVE ANGELINA JOLIE IS ONE OF US!!!!!

Either that or they bought into a lie they heard themselves, yeah; that'd be my guess. You have to know that this is not just a scientific issue. It SHOULD just be a scientific issue (and people should be free to follow or disregard the science at their own peril) but since they're not you have to know it's not. And it's not just that one side is taking a reasonable look at the data and forming measured conclusions while the other is just screaming "but my freedom!!!" In the wider culture around us one side of this debate is Hell-bent on putting everyone in little plastic bubbles so that nobody will ever die again while the other is Hell-bent on (to be fair) coughing directly onto old people because they don't believe the disease even exists. And here you and I are, trying to figure out what the actual truth is. I think you're right to be looking at what the scientists think (that's precisely where I looked way back when this disease was first discovered) and maybe that will be the way we can settle this issue. Have I mentioned that the CDC itself originally predicted that almost everyone will catch this extremely-infectious disease and that maybe a handful of us would actually die from it? But what many scientists are saying right now contradicts everything they've been saying for many years now about the human immunological system. I think you'll grant me that point, too (although it'd be much funnier if you didn't). And because of that I'm not going to just accept that they're telling the truth NOW without having a chance to dive into the numbers for myself. If you find some specific thing that you think will change my mind then you have my word I will take the time to read and reread and really chew on it properly. Until then I am not going to scrap everything I currently know about human immunology, nor will I promise to scrap it after reading whatever you find; only to consider it. But if your question is whether I'd be willing to call all those "scientists" liars; every medical expert that's currently weighing in publicly on the disease - yes. We've got liars on both sides of this debate within the medical community. You did hear about the Chinese "scientist" who very publicly announced that she'd been helping to develop the Wuhan Flu in a lab as a bioweapon, right? The same disease with the mortality rate I've been mocking this whole time; it's such a miniscule thing to worry about. That same thing - a WEAPON! 🤣 "Give me your wallet or I will make the next week slightly unpleasant for you and perhaps very unpleasant for your grandparents (although you'll all be fine again within a month)! Mwahahahaha!!!" So yeah; there are lying "scientists" all over all sides of this issue.