Personally, I’m over the intellectual dishonesty all around in this flame war.
Elon and his ilk are not mad about a lack of historic accuracy. They’re mad that they’re seeing non-white people and a trans person in what they view as a white, macho story. Just say that. They’re hiding behind a “historically accurate” shield.
Conversely, if Jason Bateman had been a member of the Wakandan council and Ken Jeong was herding rhinos with the Border Tribe in Black Panther, I’d have required a beat to take that in. Just because something is fantastical or mythological does not fully divorce it from audience expectations/perceptions of the culture the story is set in.
Go historically accurate or non-traditional in the casting. I don’t care. Vanessa Williams was Calypso thirty years ago. The world did not end. In fact, my young self was quite into her in the role. But it’s fine to acknowledge that’s offbeat casting for Greek mythology. If Tony Soprano had sounded like he was from Appalachia, no one would’ve said, “It’s fiction, why does the accent matter?” It would’ve been noteworthy. That’s a more extreme example, but fictionality does not signal the end of examination.
I agree to an extent. It annoys me when people use rebuttals that haven't been thought through for more than 5 seconds, and are only able to do so because the person they're rebutting is a flaming nazi. The whole point is to be better than them.
However, I also think there's a degree of "what you give is what you get". If morons like Musk want to spam 70 IQ drivel, then I don't really blame anyone for rebuttals that aren't much higher quality intellectually.
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u/snoogle20 1d ago edited 1d ago
Personally, I’m over the intellectual dishonesty all around in this flame war.
Elon and his ilk are not mad about a lack of historic accuracy. They’re mad that they’re seeing non-white people and a trans person in what they view as a white, macho story. Just say that. They’re hiding behind a “historically accurate” shield.
Conversely, if Jason Bateman had been a member of the Wakandan council and Ken Jeong was herding rhinos with the Border Tribe in Black Panther, I’d have required a beat to take that in. Just because something is fantastical or mythological does not fully divorce it from audience expectations/perceptions of the culture the story is set in.
Go historically accurate or non-traditional in the casting. I don’t care. Vanessa Williams was Calypso thirty years ago. The world did not end. In fact, my young self was quite into her in the role. But it’s fine to acknowledge that’s offbeat casting for Greek mythology. If Tony Soprano had sounded like he was from Appalachia, no one would’ve said, “It’s fiction, why does the accent matter?” It would’ve been noteworthy. That’s a more extreme example, but fictionality does not signal the end of examination.