26 Reply by ceastwood

  • ceastwood
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  • Registered: 2023-08-11
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Re: The "woke" discussion thread

If companies were making these decisions based purely (or even just primarily) on the question of profitability, we wouldn't be seeing companies doubling down on something that has been a proven losing strategy time and time again. I keep going back to what an abysmal job Disney has done with these golden goose franchises (largely, I keep bringing them up because I used to love several of these franchises and now I'm just 'meh' about them, so it bums me out that one company is systematically spoiling things I used to love). They have allowed profit to take a backseat to ideology too an extreme degree, even when it is clearly giving them huge losses with franchises that should be raking in the cash.

27 Reply by jays

  • jays
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  • Registered: 2025-11-30
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Re: The "woke" discussion thread

lot of people whining about white historical figures being cast as black but they don't seem to take issue with a white jesus. people have been race-swapping characters - even historical figures - for a looooooong time. maybe we should just accept that when people tell stories they adapt them to make it more salient to their audience and maybe you specifically are not always part of that intended audience and that's fine.

it only becomes an issue when there's power dynamics involved: marginalized groups are further marginalized, cultural appropriation by a dominant group erases authentic cultural expressions, identity traits are used as props or objects of ridicule, stereotypes are used to embolden xenophobia, dominant groups wield their power and connections to exclude other groups from participating fully in society or culture and thereby entrenching an unjust and unjustified social hierarchy based on inherent traits (aka "old boy's clubs"), etc. most "wokery" only seems like a double-standard if you choose to ignore material, social, or historical factors, flatten everything to it's most simplistic, and only engage in extremely superficial analysis

can it go too far? of course it can, and does sometimes. but let's save our criticism for when it actually does, rather than complaining every time a movie remake gets a black character or there's a show about a queer person. otherwise you'll have a real "girl who cries wolf" situation on your hands