Do people only give bad movies the SJW label?

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Well when it comes to forced agendas one example I can think of maybe is the movie Black Panther. The movie starts off with this sci-fi fantasy superhero plot and so far so good, but once the villain reveals their true intentions, that they want to get revenge for how Africans are racially treated in other parts of the world, it felt like a forced agenda to me, in the sense, that is sort of came out of left field, and didn't feel like it went with the rest of the plot we had so far.

I never read the comics to so maybe racism is a deep theme that is often explored in the Black Panther comics, but the way the movie presented it, it felt like a forced agenda that someone felt they had to push because of the current social climate. Would I be reading it wrong though, perhaps?



Ami-Scythe's Avatar
A bucket of anxiety
Well when it comes to forced agendas one example I can think of maybe is the movie Black Panther. The movie starts off with this sci-fi fantasy superhero plot and so far so good, but once the villain reveals their true intentions, that they want to get revenge for how Africans are racially treated in other parts of the world, it felt like a forced agenda to me, in the sense, that is sort of came out of left field, and didn't feel like it went with the rest of the plot we had so far.

I never read the comics to so maybe racism is a deep theme that is often explored in the Black Panther comics, but the way the movie presented it, it felt like a forced agenda that someone felt they had to push because of the current social climate. Would I be reading it wrong though, perhaps?
I think that was just pandering
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Ami-Scythe



Welcome to the human race...
As time goes on, things change, including speech. The "SJW" term is not being used as a way to describe a person pushing for social justice. It's to describe a person who places social justice or whatever they think social justice is in places it doesn't belong...such as the film industry. As I said before, there is no problem concerning female roles. You can name countless films with likable, memorable, and strong female characters in all roles. Leads, second leads, supporting casts, villains. We're talking about the people who look at this fact and say, "Well, there's (x) or (y) film that has one lady in it and she doesn't have that many lines so that means, ALL film is flawed and ALL of it needs to be modified to be 'all inclusive.'" That is what we call the SJW.
It is also being used ironically, for the person in question is usually in a place where there is nothing to be solved such as a white man saying the word, "black," and the person in question calling them racist so in the same way someone would call a person who has done something dumb a "genius" ironically, we're calling this type of person a "warrior" ironically.
At least you can tell the difference, I guess. I still think I shouldn't have to interrogate someone in depth over what exactly they mean when they use the acronym as I tend to see it be used interchangeably (and this is only backed up by their arguments) - or maybe it's a motte-and-bailey thing. After all, I initially read part of this as "social justice doesn't belong in the film industry" and that definitely made me have to read this in depth just to be sure of what you were saying.

I put an emphasis on the Ghostbusters cast not putting an impact on the story because as MoreOrLess said, it's the marketing. The selling point was that the cast was female and in the long run, nothing else was written for them. I admittedly didn't see Widows, but what I was saying was that if the selling point is going to be that the cast is all female, then it should've been essential to the story or at the very least, it could've given us something new, even if the new material had nothing to do with the gender. As a matter of fact, in that section of the comment, I was trying to say that not all female roles automatically constitute as SJW pandering but I guess that's just the result of 9pm speech writing. It becomes pandering when the gender swap or inclusion is the selling point or is randomly in the focus of the movie but has no impact on the story. Again, the impact doesn't have to have anything to do with the gender, but they should at least be a likable character. Sure, people like who and what they like and that's completely fine, but I'm personally seeing that the characters that were promoted as double X chromosomes and muscles have no personality past those two traits. This, "strong female lead" thing has affected many characters in the past but audiences are noticing it more because of the subject's popularity.
I mean, it did give us something new? Different characters and arcs, human antagonist, change of themes, updated effects and setpieces - maybe that's not a lot, but it's more than the Psycho remake did. In any case, I didn't think there was something so essential about the Ghostbusters being male that a female-led remake would have been inappropriate (what would we miss? Ray getting a BJ from a ghost?).

This is an interesting argument. I'm guessing you're talking about the agenda of men having to be big, strong, misogynistic, emotionless, sexy, white heroes. And while this clearly isn't correct, this is also a stereotype that's been corrected. We've been getting movies with male protagonists of color, with flaws, weaknesses, emotions, charisma, development and partners they love and respect. The same progression has happened with the females characters yesterday. Instead of them being cooking, cleaning sex objects, they've been the loving, supporting, witty and charming partners or leads that keeps everyone and everything in place. And I believe that the problem with the new female agenda is that instead of pushing a positive message about the capabilities of women, it is repeating the mistakes of the past. The agenda that is being pushed is for females to be big, strong, misogynistic, emotionless, sexy, white heroes. It's moving backwards.
Guess again. I just said "white male" - while the other descriptors you brought up are definitely part of the issue, I would not necessarily say that they represent the extent of it either. That being said, I will concede that it has to take more than just giving women the same reductive roles as men and act as if that is somehow equality.

I agree with what you wrote there. In a 'perfect world' the term SJW would mean someone who tries to bring social justice through blogs, posts and tweets. In a 'perfect world' a SJW would be an intelligent, thoughtful & kind person who through their actions on the internet & social media would try to bring the world together. BUT my experience with SJW types, is that they are lonely, sad people, who use the current trends of social correctness to draw attention to themselves by being obstinate, deflective, dismissive and condescending. In other words, the typical internet SJWs are usually losers who spout off to troll people. Sadly they make more racial strife in the world with their misguided actions. If they actually believed in what they purport, they would be trying to heal the racial and gender tensions that seem to be growing in the last few years.
Maybe this "perfect world" standard for what a person should be like when arguing for social justice is a problem all on its own. At the very least, I question why the apparent standard for a perfect world is "people still argue about social justice but they are nice and inoffensive about it" instead of "people don't argue about social justice at all because they actually achieved it". As for the social justice types that actually exist, I figure that the anger is a response to injustice so I at least try to figure out if that anger is justified rather than writing them all off simply because they're not all nice and polite about it.

Nobody has a problem with female leads that actually make sense. The problem with the SJW movement is that options are made for reasons that are not artistic. And that is a corruption of what Cinema should be.
Eh, people find a way. Furiosa made perfect sense as the deuteragonist of Mad Max: Fury Road - the film is about her journey that Max just wanders into - but there were still people who complained about her turning Max into her sidekick in a movie titled Mad Max, so there's just no pleasing some people on this front. Besides, could this same logic of what's sensible/artistic not also be flipped around to the prevalence of male leads? It is a little weird how female leads get the "does this make sense" question but nobody ever asks if a male lead makes sense.

Well when it comes to forced agendas one example I can think of maybe is the movie Black Panther. The movie starts off with this sci-fi fantasy superhero plot and so far so good, but once the villain reveals their true intentions, that they want to get revenge for how Africans are racially treated in other parts of the world, it felt like a forced agenda to me, in the sense, that is sort of came out of left field, and didn't feel like it went with the rest of the plot we had so far.

I never read the comics to so maybe racism is a deep theme that is often explored in the Black Panther comics, but the way the movie presented it, it felt like a forced agenda that someone felt they had to push because of the current social climate. Would I be reading it wrong though, perhaps?
The whole concept of Wakanda is inherently political - Black Panther imagines a world where one African nation was able to resist being colonised due to its unique resources and technology. The film explores the ramifications of how such a country can continue to exist and its main method of doing so - keeping itself out of global politics for fear of endangering itself like the other countries - is what inspires the villain in the first place. You can even draw a comparison between the hero and villain being parallels for MLK and Malcolm X respectively. As far as the MCU's political agendas go, it's arguably one of the more organic ones in the series (though not without its flaws).
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Well it's just that people label movies like the Ghostbusters remake or Captain Marvel SJW movies, because they are trying to promote a strong female protagonists. .

I've not seen either but from the outside it definitely looked like the 'Ghostbusters' reboot tried to shoehorn women in for the sake of it, instead of having a good idea and building a project around it and casting on merit. It also probably happens to be a really bad movie. The original cast was male. Now suddenly they are all female. People are bound to jump to conclusions solely based on that fact.

As for' Widows', it never crossed my mind that the film centres around a group of females for the sake of it - because it is central to the plot that they are all female. It's a poor film in my opinion. But not because of any gender roles / shorhoerning. It's just not very good.

So the answer is - it depends on the film.



Ami-Scythe's Avatar
A bucket of anxiety
At least you can tell the difference, I guess. I still think I shouldn't have to interrogate someone in depth over what exactly they mean when they use the acronym as I tend to see it be used interchangeably (and this is only backed up by their arguments) - or maybe it's a motte-and-bailey thing. After all, I initially read part of this as "social justice doesn't belong in the film industry" and that definitely made me have to read this in depth just to be sure of what you were saying.


I understand what you mean. For me in particular, I'm very sarcastic so I always use "SJW ironically because what I've been seeing these days, metaphorically, is say, someone walking up to a happy married couple, assuming they're on the brink of divorce and then proceed to interfere with their relationship by trying to convince them that they're unhappy and need to see a counselor and when said person is confronted about it, they call it, "saving their relationship." I don't know how other people use the term but that's what I mean when I say SJW. It's a person (to me) who "fights for social justice" in the wrong places. I wasn't saying that social justice doesn't belong in film, I'm saying that there are probably issues in the film industry that need to be addressed other than how often this or that gender or this or that race is used. Because at this point, we're just putting people into categories and turning them into numbers instead of viewing them as individuals but then again, that's a totally different conversation.



Honestly the biggestt issue when it comes to blockbuster cinema is I'd say clearly the lack of non white male directors. Some of these films can IMHO be a bit of a two edged sword as whilst they do offer opportunities for non white male directors you could also argue the films tend to be used in a tokenistic fashion to downplay the issue as well as pushing the idea they should be confined to films based on their gender, race, etc.



Ami-Scythe's Avatar
A bucket of anxiety
Honestly the biggestt issue when it comes to blockbuster cinema is I'd say clearly the lack of non white male directors. Some of these films can IMHO be a bit of a two edged sword as whilst they do offer opportunities for non white male directors you could also argue the films tend to be used in a tokenistic fashion to downplay the issue as well as pushing the idea they should be confined to films based on their gender, race, etc.
I enjoyed Jordan Peele's Us because it was a film starring a black family simply in a horror film. I can't say there wasn't any social commentary in it concerning race but I was happy that it wasn't the focus. A problem I'd say is in the film industry is that too many films with all black casts feel the need to use their talents to discuss politics when they should star in mindless films like The Mummy (Brennan Fraser). And I do say black because usually when I see other ethnicities doing their thing on film, they tell whatever story they want to, not just a historical one or a "This Is America" one.



There's been a lot of talk about how the SJW movement has diminished movies on here, but it seems that people only assign this label to a movie if it's a bad or no more than mediocre movie. When a good movie comes out that may have a female lead or a non-white lead in it, or a non-heterosexual protagonist, than people don't give it the label.

So I was wondering, are people only assigning that label if the movie is bad, but not if it's good? Therefore, maybe the bad movies are to blame for being bad, and not any SJW movement itself?
Was it my thread about Terminator 6 that sparked this whole SJW debate?



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Was it my thread about Terminator 6 that sparked this whole SJW debate?
No I was thinking about it before actually, when I read about the new The Killer remake, and the new Cliffhanger remake, that are planned with both women leads, and I saw Black Panther, which made me think of it, cause I felt the themes may have been shoehorned in because of the SJW views.



Here's my take. The social injustice agenda is rife in Hollywood because of festering ideologies like anti-whiteism. Just look at Terminator 6...when you really think about it, you can see it's promoting the genocide of Caucasians. That's why the new terminator is Mexican, because James Cameron has been propagandized to believe white people deserve to die. Were you here to see this thread from a year back? https://www.movieforums.com/communit...ad.php?t=57618

It's precisely ideas like that which has made Hollyweird go SJW. There's also an apparent anti-male sentiment brewing in our society. You're only safe if you're a nonreligious, pansexual, poor young transgender minority.



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Here's my take. The social injustice agenda is rife in Hollywood because of festering ideologies like anti-whiteism. Just look at Terminator 6...when you really think about it, you can see it's promoting the genocide of Caucasians. That's why the new terminator is Mexican, because James Cameron has been propagandized to believe white people deserve to die. Were you here to see this thread from a year back? https://www.movieforums.com/communit...ad.php?t=57618

It's precisely ideas like that which has made Hollyweird go SJW. There's also an apparent anti-male sentiment brewing in our society. You're only safe if you're a nonreligious, pansexual, poor young transgender minority.
Let me get this straight - Dark Fate has a Mexican playing the villain (representing a group of robotic villains that have previously been played by predominantly white actors) and not one but two white heroes (in a series where the main heroes have always been white), but somehow this means that the movie itself is anti-white? Never mind the fact that his main target is also Mexican so it's not simply one race against another in this particular conflict.

It's one thing if people want to talk about representation of less-privileged groups being cynically profit-motivated or condescending in execution (e.g. "queerbaiting"), but the idea that doing this kind of representation at all automatically implies that the entire industry is laser-focused on attacking all whites and/or males is still quite a reach (never mind how it's often commenting on the toxic aspects of white/male identity, especially the Terminator series and how its white male villains reflects subjects like mass shootings, police brutality, and the dangers of unfettered artificial intelligence and nuclear armament). This is the flip side to the argument that SJW criticism is worthless because it only focuses on supposedly superficial issues of representation and whatnot - if the counterargument is that already-privileged groups should continue to enjoy the same level of unquestioned dominance, then that just implies stagnation more than anything else.



Ami-Scythe's Avatar
A bucket of anxiety
Here's my take. The social injustice agenda is rife in Hollywood because of festering ideologies like anti-whiteism. Just look at Terminator 6...when you really think about it, you can see it's promoting the genocide of Caucasians. That's why the new terminator is Mexican, because James Cameron has been propagandized to believe white people deserve to die. Were you here to see this thread from a year back? https://www.movieforums.com/communit...ad.php?t=57618

It's precisely ideas like that which has made Hollyweird go SJW. There's also an apparent anti-male sentiment brewing in our society. You're only safe if you're a nonreligious, pansexual, poor young transgender minority.
*breathes in deeply* no.



Here's my take. The social injustice agenda is rife in Hollywood because of festering ideologies like anti-whiteism. Just look at Terminator 6...when you really think about it, you can see it's promoting the genocide of Caucasians. That's why the new terminator is Mexican, because James Cameron has been propagandized to believe white people deserve to die...

Hey Roy, welcome back to MoFo, it's been long awhile.
I'd guess that Cameron made those choices that you mentioned in T6 because of either of two factors:

  • Perhaps he was aware that if he cast a predominantly white cast in T6, he'd get all kinds of criticism of racism. If I was a white director I wouldn't want to face a bunch of people bitchin about the genetic make up of my make believe film. Of course black directors routinely make all black cast films and no one gives them crap...All directors should be allowed to make their films as they choose. It be better if all the current racist trend of white bashing would go away, so we all could be just people and not be defined by the color tonality of our skin.
  • Or perhaps race and the fear of being called a racist never even figured into the casting of T6. Perhaps Cameron knew he'd been to the Terminator idea one too many times, so needed to do something fresh. And it's fresh to have a Hispanic actor play a Terminator. I mean why not? The first terminator had a heavy Austrian accent and fans bought that.
Basically none of this matters to me, as I have no plan on watching an old tired movie idea being rehashed again. Just be glad Cameron isn't making yet another of those Avatar film.



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You are aware that Cameron is only an executive producer on this new Terminator and is still primarily focused on making another, what, four Avatar films?

I mean, I'd like to think you're smart enough to understand the nuances at play here but I'm not so sure that's the case. Anyway, it's not like people complained about Terminator 2 being anti-white simply because it posited that the man responsible for inventing Skynet was black.



I mean, I'd like to think you're smart enough to understand the nuances at play here but I'm not so sure that's the case. Anyway, it's not like people complained about Terminator 2 being anti-white simply because it posited that the man responsible for inventing Skynet was black.
I think this is sort of the point, though? That people didn't automatically assume nefarious motives as often back then. If that comes out today, maybe we get a few facile attempted think pieces about it.

It's kinda hard to measure this stuff because a lot of the more egregiously aggrieved editorials are in, shall we say, sub-mainstream publications, but they can still get passed around as an example of how crazy the other side is (and this absolutely happens in both directions).



Here's my take. The social injustice agenda is rife in Hollywood because of festering ideologies like anti-whiteism. Just look at Terminator 6...when you really think about it, you can see it's promoting the genocide of Caucasians. That's why the new terminator is Mexican, because James Cameron has been propagandized to believe white people deserve to die. Were you here to see this thread from a year back? https://www.movieforums.com/communit...ad.php?t=57618
This is a pretty huge stretch. Also, if you know anything about Cameron, you know he has massive nihilistic tendencies in general. I don't see too much evidence that it's consistently directed at white people, except insofar as there's more of them and that would obviously correlate a bit for someone like him with those kinds of misanthropic tendencies.



I think this is sort of the point, though? That people didn't automatically assume nefarious motives as often back then. If that comes out today, maybe we get a few facile attempted think pieces about it.

It's kinda hard to measure this stuff because a lot of the more egregiously aggrieved editorials are in, shall we say, sub-mainstream publications, but they can still get passed around as an example of how crazy the other side is (and this absolutely happens in both directions).
It seems to be that a lot of these films end up almost actively looking to court such a reaction, basically rattling the cages of conservative/alt right types and waiting for the inevitable blacklash that this is "propaganda for the genocide of the white race/male gender" so the film can become a "political issue" rather than stand on its own quality.



It seems to be that a lot of these films end up almost actively looking to court such a reaction, basically rattling the cages of conservative/alt right types and waiting for the inevitable blacklash that this is "propaganda for the genocide of the white race/male gender" so the film can become a "political issue" rather than stand on its own quality.
That's a good point. There's nothing better for business than becoming part of a rallying cry. That seems to swamp any half-hearted boycott efforts for any business or piece of art that becomes a lightning rod.



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It seems to be that a lot of these films end up almost actively looking to court such a reaction, basically rattling the cages of conservative/alt right types and waiting for the inevitable blacklash that this is "propaganda for the genocide of the white race/male gender" so the film can become a "political issue" rather than stand on its own quality.
Yeah, sucks doesn't it? They used to make great movies, and had a little bit of faith in the people. And many of those great movies made money, a triumph for good taste. It seems like they talk about everything EXCEPT the movie.. "Did you see what _____ said on fakebook?"