Why do people scream "Feminist Agenda" when there is a female lead?

[JimB]

You mean the black humans who appeared for like five minutes near the end?

Are we limiting this discussion to the movies? I just want to be clear on the rules before I get too much further into it except to say that the amount of screen time they get doesn't matter. What matters is that literally every human we see who would have had to move to the back of the bus in Alabama is in service of evil. Further, if you want to continue the line of fantasy-races-as-metaphors-for-racial-politics comparison, the Uruk-Hai are exactly what the arguments against miscegenation proselytized against: that if you mix the advanced intellect of the superior [white man/human] with the bestial strength, animal impulses, and moral failings of the inferior [black man/orc], then what results will be an abomination with no conscience but with unmatchable strength and the intellect to overcome its limitations in pursuit of evil.

 

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Can't we just agree that if a character is well written then it ISN'T a feminist/MRA agenda trying to screw something up?

Are the two things mutually exclusive? I'm not so sure.

People have me slightly worried about the new Star Wars. I don't care if the main character is female, but I don't want it to be laden with corny girl power messages either. No choice but to reserve judgement, I suppose.

In a way, they are mutually exclusive, because an "agenda meant to screw something up" wouldn't produce stories that we could all agree are good, with well written characters.

Or maybe it's just me who connect "nefarious agenda" with "ham-fisted handling of issues".

It's kinda a weird sentence to start with, since I think ideologues who make propaganda probably assume they're doing good rather than trying to "screw something up".

I took it in more broad-strokes to mean that propaganda in film can't be "well written" (a term that's bound to mean different things to different people), and I'm not sure that's at all true. Don't get me wrong, I'm not the kind of person who would watch a couple of Bruckheimer films and then be confident in declaring him a sexist. But, I am no stranger to films trying to persuade me of things. Sometimes it's full-ham and sometimes it's well-integrated, imho.

I get what you mean, and it is hard to quantify.

The only examples I can come up with in both categories would be Furiosa (as a well written character), and Fem-Thor (piece of trash that barely qualifies as bad fanfic).

The only critisism against Furiosa seems to be that she has more screentime than Max (which is a bit cherlish if I'm honest), while Fem-Thor can be critisized on all fronts, from poor writing to just complete lack of knowledge regarding the source material.

But then, I'm from Denmark, where Thor isn't just the name of the old viking God of Thunder, but also an everyday male name. So to me, a female character called Thor, would sound like a female character called Stephen (or Richard, or Benjamin, or Arnold) to you.

I know nothing about fem-Thor, other than that it's an example that gets brought up in these kinds of conversations.

I didn't find Furiosa particularly jarring. What stood out to me most (as my memory serves) in that respect was how easily Nux broke free of his life-time of programming when the time came... Seemed a little odd to me, but whatever. I still loved the film.

To my mind, there's a spectrum that starts on one end with overt preaching (think Birth of a nation) through to 90's style cornily delivered sentiment, through to something like Top Gun intentionally/unintentionally glamourising the military, through to the other end where people are reaching to make big claims about specific creators beliefs based on not much(Joss Whedon, Jerry Bruckheimer).

 

[Something Amyss]

Green Lantern is different because its for all intents and purposes a job, not an identity. Hal Jordan has never been the only Green Lantern since the inception of his character, and multiple Green Lanterns have always existed alongside him. In universe, he is A Green Lantern, not THE one and only Green Lantern.

Kind of ironic, because you're talking about a character that in itself borrowed the whole concept from a prior character of the same name. In fact, that character was later retconned into the new Green Lantern mythos. This seems like more of an appropriation than anything that's happened with Thor here.

Don't get me wrong, I never read the old Green Lantern comics. My brother was a Hal Jordan fan, so I grew up breading a bunch of those and he is my first thought when it comes to Green Lantern. But still, this was less in line with the prior Green Lantern than what you're arguing about.

Thor is tricky because Thor isn't his superhero identity or an alternate identity, its who he is.

Well, no. It's both a title and a name. A title he's previously been deemed unworthy to use, and that has been granted to others. He didn't stop being the child of Odin or anything, but the title changed hands. This isn't tricky at all.

I'd be fine with it if he said that he is no longer worthy of being called Thor and went under a pseudonym, whilst "She" takes up the Hammer.

I'm confused then, because that's literally what happened, and how they announced and marketed it. Where's the problem?

I consider "she can do everything he can do, and also he said she's Thor now right in front of me" to be pretty compelling. They're superheroes. This shit happens all the time.

Come to think of it, I think any superhero who demanded I call them Thor would get their wish. Hulk may not have Thor's powers, but are you really going to argue with him?

 

[cthulhuspawn82]

I think I can explain why people's minds can rationalize these thoughts.

Race, sexuality, gender, etc. are not the result of choice in the real world, but in fiction they are. If someone has a particular race, gender, or sexuality it is because the the creator specifically chose to attach it too them.

It's important to note that straight white men usually get a pass here. When a character is straight/white/male, people dont see that as a choice made by the author. That's just the norm, the standard template. E.G. "The author didn't make his character heterosexual, people come that way by default"

So when people see a gay, black, or female protagonist they acknowledge that the author chose to make them that way. And since humans have a need to attach a reason to everything, their minds entertain ideas as to what that reason may be. Also, human minds being what they are, some of the reasons they come up with are quite nefarious. E.G. "They're trying to push an agenda" or "They're trying to make my son gay"

Obviously this is wrong most of the time. But I could see "Be more progressive" as being a very common agenda for entertainment creators. I dont think that's a crazy or dangerous agenda. I just think its a bit silly.

 

[JimB]

At least in the films, you can't go "there are evil black man->racism;" not to mention there are evil white people in the series. It's just cherry picking to frame the film as racist.

I think you're missing the point. No one said, "There's an evil black man, therefore racism." I said, "The only black people depicted are evil." You can infer if you like that there are non-evil black people in Middle Earth, but as of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, no evidence existed to support that inference.

Plus the orcs are corrupted elves, which are the "ubermensch" of the setting, not a completely different race that's "evil."

And black people are the same race as humans, not a completely different race that's evil, but I still live in a part of the world where I hear shit like what I said to you about miscegenation.

 

[Naraka]

You mean the black humans who appeared for like five minutes near the end?

Are we limiting this discussion to the movies? I just want to be clear on the rules before I get too much further into it except to say that the amount of screen time they get doesn't matter. What matters is that literally every human we see who would have had to move to the back of the bus in Alabama is in service of evil. Further, if you want to continue the line of fantasy-races-as-metaphors-for-racial-politics comparison, the Uruk-Hai are exactly what the arguments against miscegenation proselytized against: that if you mix the advanced intellect of the superior [white man/human] with the bestial strength, animal impulses, and moral failings of the inferior [black man/orc], then what results will be an abomination with no conscience but with unmatchable strength and the intellect to overcome its limitations in pursuit of evil.

I guess the books are okay too, but I don't remember them much. At least in the films, you can't go "there are evil black man->racism", not to mention there are evil white people in the series. It's just cherry picking to frame the film as racist.

Plus the orcs are corrupted elves, which are the "ubermensch" of the setting, not a completely different race who's "evil".

It's disturbing to see that you need racism to be explained to you, to be as obvious as something that you'd show to a child. Either you're more limited than you're letting on in the posts that I've read, or you're screwing around to make a point.

The only point coming across is that you're not interested in honest debate, and therefore are to be avoided.

 

[aba1]

-snip-

I am just going to cut straight to the point on this one. I should mention that I myself am not a MRA since I do no actual advocating I don't feel it would be right to call myself such. I more just try and put the facts out there. I am also not angry with you (I actually have a problem with not being all to emotional of a person over all honestly) I just am trying to stress my points though thats easy confused in text in hindsight.

Ok so here are some examples of cases of feminists pushing for rape laws to don't include men. Some of these I can only show articles talking about it but I mean I am not there to film it so its the best I can do.

http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Womens-groups-Cancel-law-charging-women-with-rape
https://toysoldier.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/a-sad-day-for-male-rape-victims-in-india/

Here is the rape definition they petitioned for in the US which got passed: https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/recent-program-updates/new-rape-definition-frequently-asked-questions

Pair the above up with the yes means yes laws slowly getting pushed out and has already happened in California and you got a real mess. They have been pushing yes mean yes for a long period now but the problem is it is next to impossible to constantly reaffirm every step of the way during sex successfully and I honestly don't think there is a soul out there who can honestly say they have had sex without being a rapist by the yes means yes standards. So that creates a situation where since a guy has to penetrate without consent for it to be rape and she has to give a affirmative yes to consent. So if he is drugged and she has sex with him then he can't get her consent because he is drugged and he is penetrating her without her explicitly saying yes. This creates a situation where in the US a man can be sent to prison for being raped something that is created by policies feminists are advocating for.

Same sorta thing in the UK
http://www.polity.co.uk/investigatinggender/blog/post.aspx?id=135


I should also mention no I didn't go to a random feminist meeting like a troll and just start yelling shit. This was stuff I heard while I identified as a feminist while I was younger. I also brought it up more in small groups and one on one because I was more interested in the answer than making a big stint.

You also gotta keep in mind MRA's have a extremely hard time advocating any real change since they are a grass roots movement with very little power. Feminism is largely the establishment in this situation and they are largely slandering the movement at every turn and petitioning every event.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka8AodgFcAg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx7PIIA60XQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iARHCxAMAO0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO_X4DkwA_Q

I don't think I have ever seen a MRA event without feminists trying to get it shut down as of yet unless it is done under the feminist narrative.

 

[JimB]

I should mention that I myself am not an MRA.

No, I didn't figure you are. I was just being forthright about my position as a feminist and as someone who ouright loathes those men who claim to be my champions but just want to use me as a statistic in a pissing contest. Fucking wankers.

I am also not angry with you (I actually have a problem with not being all to emotional of a person over all honestly).

Ah. Well, in the interest of clearing the air between us, I don't have much of a problem being emotional, but I do have one with being literal. If you say "angry" rather than "angry at you," I'm gonna assume you're talking about a more general emotional phenomenon.

http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Womens-groups-Cancel-law-charging-women-with-rape
https://toysoldier.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/a-sad-day-for-male-rape-victims-in-india/

Well those are pretty shitty.

Here is the rape definition they petitioned for in the US which got passed: https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/recent-program-updates/new-rape-definition-frequently-asked-questions

I'm not seeing the problem here. The multiple definitions of rape seem quite comprehensive to me. What options are being excluded?

I honestly don't think there is a soul out there who can honestly say they have had sex without being a rapist by the yes means yes standards.

I'm not sympathetic. Someone who refuses to get enthusiastic consent is someone who, whether he intends to or not, has decided the possibility of being a rapist is a price worth paying to not have to ruin the mood by asking for permission.

So if he is drugged and she has sex with him then he can't get her consent because he is drugged and he is penetrating her without her explicitly saying yes.

I do not understand what reading of the text leads you to this conclusion.

 

[aba1]

Yes they are mutually exclusive, because the "men's rights movement" is very openly an anti-feminist movement, and MRAs are very openly anti-feminists.

That's not inherently true. The MRM and anti-feminists are different groups all in of themselves just like MGTOW's and Redpillers. There is a lot of cross over though because the two aren't mutually exclusive. So a MRA can be a feminist as well theoretically but for the MRA's at least it mostly has to do with feminists showing up at just about every public event to shut it down by calling police pulling fire alarms and just general protesting. I think that would turn most people off the group though.

The problem is that MRAs, MGTOWs, Redpillers, PUAs, and the like all blare the exact same thing as anti-feminist groups. It doesn't really seem to be a loud minority any more either. It's gotten to the point where MRAs I've known, the ones who actually care about gender equality and the rights of men, have moved to working with feminist groups and can no longer identify as MRAs because of how toxic the label has become.

Also they shut down every public event? Gosh why didn't tell me they shut down all of the midnight screenings of Star Wars: The Force Awakens in my town, and that they shut down the red carpet premier in Hollywood, all by pulling fire alarms calling the police. Sure, that's a thing that happened. Oh how about how feminists shut down an event about raising awareness of male rape victims at the university in my town, by pulling fire alarms and calling police... Except that didn't happen, the awareness event went off without a hitch, and it was organized and run by *GASP!* Feminists!

Honestly I've never personally seen feminists shut down any event, I've seen news of it happening, but that's mostly done by college students, ones who are still in the "bra burning protest" stage of things.

Well ya you are allowed to talk about mens issues but only through the feminist lens where men are by default the bad guys. They won't let any other view point talk because they know that if they do then their arguments simply won't hold up to facts. Why else would you constantly shut down events unless you are afraid? If their convictions are so strong why are they afraid of having other points of views heard people should be able to make up their minds for themselves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ka8AodgFcAg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx7PIIA60XQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iARHCxAMAO0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GO_X4DkwA_Q

Also just because a group is anti feminist doesn't make them the same and it certainly doesn't invalidate their view points. Maybe there is something to be considered when literally every group fighting for equal rights hates feminists except feminists... I also wouldn't consider the PUA's in that list since they are WAYYYYY different with their own goals and have nothing to do with any equal rights group. I don't think any group agrees with the PUA's typically since they are prone to being extremely demeaning to both men and women.

 

[aba1]

I should mention that I myself am not an MRA.

No, I didn't figure you are. I was just being forthright about my position as a feminist and as someone who ouright loathes those men who claim to be my champions but just want to use me as a statistic in a pissing contest. Fucking wankers.

I am also not angry with you (I actually have a problem with not being all to emotional of a person over all honestly).

Ah. Well, in the interest of clearing the air between us, I don't have much of a problem being emotional, but I do have one with being literal. If you say "angry" rather than "angry at you," I'm gonna assume you're talking about a more general emotional phenomenon.

http://www.jpost.com/Israel/Womens-groups-Cancel-law-charging-women-with-rape
https://toysoldier.wordpress.com/2013/03/06/a-sad-day-for-male-rape-victims-in-india/

Well those are pretty shitty.

Here is the rape definition they petitioned for in the US which got passed: https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/recent-program-updates/new-rape-definition-frequently-asked-questions

I'm not seeing the problem here. The multiple definitions of rape seem quite comprehensive to me. What options are being excluded?

I honestly don't think there is a soul out there who can honestly say they have had sex without being a rapist by the yes means yes standards.

I'm not sympathetic. Someone who refuses to get enthusiastic consent is someone who, whether he intends to or not, has decided the possibility of being a rapist is a price worth paying to not have to ruin the mood by asking for permission.

So if he is drugged and she has sex with him then he can't get her consent because he is drugged and he is penetrating her without her explicitly saying yes.

I do not understand what reading of the text leads you to this conclusion.

Ok so if you have to penetrate someone for it to be rape that means without the use of a tool or fingers only men can be rapists since during intercourse men are the ones penetrating the woman not the other way around. THEN you get into the constant affirmative consent. This requires you to get a constant yes anytime you do anything during sex. I don't know if you have ever had sex but 90% of human interaction is expressed non-verbally this is especially true during sex. If you are constantly stopping to get consent every min then you won't be able to enjoy yourself. Hell here is a old video used to promote this and even during the video used to promote it the girl failed to get his consent TWICE. If they can't do it in a video promoting the concept how can the entire country be expected to maintain it every time they have any sexual encounter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVHYvUpeqKI

With the laws being that he has to get her consent to penetrate her and not the other way around as well (since she wouldn't be penetrating him) it creates a situation where if he is being raped he is not going to get her affirmative consent but is still penetrating her (against his will) so by US legal definition he is a rapist despite being a rape victim.

Stuff like this and taking away womens abilities to consent with any drugs or alcohol and various other means is how they get those rape statistics high when you see the 1/5 claims and such. They make it so a woman will have 1 beer or a glass of wine then go have sex with their boyfriend then just count that woman as a rape victim

 

[JimB]

Okay so if you have to penetrate someone for it to be rape

Who is saying that? Which specific statute says that? I don't understand which definition you're talking about. Did you only read the first couple of paragraphs and miss the part where they say the summary definition is only a summary of a lot of different definitions across a lot of different jurisdictions?

I don't know if you have ever had sex but

Okay, so that's the level we're operating at. People who disagree with your reading of the statutes are virgins who don't know what they're talking about. Fantastic. Yeah, I think I'm done with you.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

Some people's inner children are still running around being the little terror of the playground.

It's a lot of this.

There are still people out there that I've had the displeasure of talking to online who still believe "Bullying is a survival mechanism to make everyone tougher, it's basic evolution, so you're a retard if you don't agree. Natural Selection, bitches. Oh, and telling men that bullying others into shape is bad in any way, you're feminizing men which automatically leads to them committing suicide because we cannot understand it".

I wish I was fucking kidding.

Some people just never grow out of that teenage imaginary impression of masculinity and never grow into full adults.

It also has to do with the fact that on the internet, it's insanely easy for stuff to be blown out of proportion. One person says "I dunno, I think X movie is trying to shame men" and then headlines everywhere read "all men think X movie is feminazi propaganda", followed by morons saying "Yeah I agree! Fuck the feminazi bitches". Same with the other side. One person miswords a point about feminism, suddenly message boards everywhere are filled with "X just said that all masculinity is evil!!!!", and then the tumblr rats come out of their holes and go "Yeah, but all men are rapist evil pigs and need to be killed, the cismaleheterowhitescum".

I mean, look at ANY group on the internet that has any traction and you'll see the toxic minority be the loudest face of them. Everything from Sonic Fans ("ermagerd, look at my totally original furry por-I mean new main character who is just a recolored tails!!") to progressives ("Freedom of speech is too abusable, remove it"), to gamers ("Why the fuck is this chick link invading my fucking game?!") to goddamn undertale fans ("If you don't spare everything immediately on the first try and love everything about it, you are a fuckign bad person!!1" [meaning these rabid fucks missed the whole message of the game, to boot])

Why? Because the internet makes it easy for people to rally to a cause, allowing the extreme fringes to gather and be heard, and since "SAKURAI NEEDS TO DIE FUCK HIS INCEST EMBLEM FETISH PARTY" is more attention grabbing than "Huh, Bayonetta and Corrin look kinda neat, I guess", guess whose views get amplified?

Assholes are the minority in the world, but they scream louder that everyone else. In real life, they are usually drowned out by the rational people. But on the internet, all that matters is the attention you can generate, as any attention will make you stronger, whether it's positive or negative.

It's why ThatWhichShallNotBeNamed is seen as nothing but basement dwelling mysoginist virgins who are only happy if girls are in a game as a fucktoy.
It's why Feminists are seen as "kill all men" loons.
It's why Sonic fans are seen as furry perverts.
It's why there are nonstop "The smash ballot was rigged, Sakurai is a lazy fucker and I hope he dies" threads on GameFAQs
It's...
...It's...

It's why we can't have nice things.

 

[Adam Tatelman]

I may be voluntarily sticking my head into a blender here, but I've never been afraid of gruesome decapitation in the past, so why start now?

If I had to give a reason for these sentiments in regards to female leads, I would have to say that it isn't the leads or films themselves that cause the bulk of the irritation. Rather, it is the way people praise those leads and films as if they are something daringly new and original each time one gets made. Then people start to project their social and political views onto what might otherwise be a totally innocuous show, intensifying the argument. When I think back, we've had female leads for ages. Not necessarily as action heroes like Sigourney Weaver in Alien or Linda Hamilton in Terminator 2--although those are plentiful--but simply as main characters. Hell, we've got a massive library of video games that offer gender/sexuality neutral blank slates for the player to craft and inhabit, customizing their own experience to fit their tastes. I'd say the whole idea of female leads is pretty normalized, and people just get irritated at hearing how 'fresh and new' the concept supposedly is, when we practically have a pantheon by now. Of course, there will always be trolls who post extremist stuff for the purpose of starting fights, and there's no way to tell who is and isn't one. I don't think any of us has a solution for that, apart from using our individual judgment.

Or maybe someone brought this up already. I couldn't be arsed to read the entire thread.

 

[MrFalconfly]

If the need was seen to replace Thor with something, why not make a replacement that makes sense?

I'm not going to comment on the motivations of people I've never met. This is the story they wanted to tell, so they're telling it. I disagree that it makes no sense--Thor becoming unworthy of Mjolnir is definitely a repeating motif, and one they started setting up something like two years ago--so what's the problem?

The problem, at least to my Danish ears, starts with the name.

Thor's name is Thor. Unlike all the other Marvel heroes, whose superhero names are their alter egos, Thor's alter ego isn't his superhero name, but his civilian name (Donald Blake IIRC).

This might not seem like a big deal to a US American, but to any Scandinavian, Thor is a normal, everyday life male name.

So calling a female character Thor equates to calling a female character Stephen, or Jonathan, or Richard.

This wouldn't be an issue if the writers, instead of shoehorning in Thor's girlfriend into his role and sent her to a numerologist to get her name changed to Stephen (sorry, Thor), had made said girlfriend be an independent hero (say a Valkyrie), or made her an avatar of a different God (in this case, the goddess of love, magic, war and death, Freja).

 

[aba1]

Okay so if you have to penetrate someone for it to be rape

Who is saying that? Which specific statute says that? I don't understand which definition you're talking about. Did you only read the first couple of paragraphs and miss the part where they say the summary definition is only a summary of a lot of different definitions across a lot of different jurisdictions?

I don't know if you have ever had sex but

Okay, so that's the level we're operating at. People who disagree with your reading of the statutes are virgins who don't know what they're talking about. Fantastic. Yeah, I think I'm done with you.

I was talking about the core FBI definition. Yes it can change from state to state but that doesn't change the fact that the base definition is based on penetration which directly discriminates against men.

I do want to apologize here though I never said there was anything wrong with being a virgin nor did I mean anything negative by it only that it is directly related the topic at hand and the level of experience in dealing with it. I didn't really think to consider that you might have insecurities involving the subject so I apologize. That said however your offense doesn't change the validity of my points.

 

[Redryhno]

I gotta ask how people got to the Lord of the Rings is racist?

In the books--and in the movies, to be fair--the good humans are white. The "wicked men of [I forget which cardinal direction and can't be bothered to look it up]" who join with Sauron are dark-skinned.

There's also a lot of room to argue that dwarves are intended to be Jews. They're short, big-nosed, greedy for gold, and they cause wars with their refusal to share all their hidden treasures. These are traits Cartman has accused Kyle of dozens of times in the last twenty years.

There's also alot of room to argue that the dwarves are just *gasp* DWARVES. Which have existed in some form in folktale for centuries and around that time had finally sorta become just another type of fey. And are you SERIOUSLY going to go with the Cartman/Kyle relationship as justification? Because that's...probably not the best place to go for anything other than jokes. I mean, you'd think if the Dwarves were there as Jew stand-ins, that maybe they'd have more prominence than just Gimli(because he's largely the only one you meet, the rest retreated into the mountain homes since something like five of their seven clans have been wiped out or lost by Sauron and his predecessor).

If anyone's the Jew stand-in, it's the Elves, with their lost tribes of [s/]Israel[/s] Quendi and departing for the Western Shores the moment Sauron starts attacking, and even they're not really right due to the Undying Lands being protected by the Elven god of Life that threw a fit when the Numenorians tried to defy his rule of no mortals allowed.

Not to mention Aragorn is routinely mentioned as also being "dark", the Evil Men of Khand being a variation of "Vikings" who I'm pretty sure aren't known for being dark-skinned. The Haradrim being dark, but also their contribution to Sauron being a mostly slave army and alot of speculation being that outside of the people in charge, nobody really wants to fight for Sauron. The Wild Men being your basic Germanic tribes(much more complex, but that's their basic inspiration), who again aren't really known as anything other than white. The Gondorians themselves largely being based on the Byzantine empire, which had alot more dark-skinned people than light-skinned simply due to the areas it had dominion over. There is so much in the books concerning skin-tone than just being light=good guy, dark=bad guy.

This is ignoring that the Numenorians and their Dunedain descendants both have been described as being unnaturally pale, but something like four of them being the most evil of Sauron's servants in the Nazgul that fell due to their own pride.

Not to mention, this was an adaptation and way to cope with the World Wars for the guy, meaning that there were light- and dark-skinned people on BOTH sides of the wars. And that alot of the "dark" had to do with the factorization the Melkorians threw themselves into that the other clans of Men and Elves didn't.

To say that only dark-skinned people joined up with Sauron, or that only light-skinned people fought Sauron is so incredibly shallow that I can't believe anyone actually read the books these days and say that.(not that I fully blame them, they're not for everyone and unless you like history books and Genealogy they're a LONG read.) Especially with the movies going heavily with visuals with heavy inspiration that could make you believe that.

And we come around once again to the same junk.

We are coming back to the same junk, as you say, because you keep bringing up Thor's vagina, saying her vagina isn't the problem, and then changing the subject when I ask why you brought up her vagina in the first place. If you won't answer the question, then that's fine, but please quit trying to act like changing the topic is a useful response to a very simple question. It reeks of shifting the goalposts, and maybe I'm still cranky from having just woken up, but I'm not in the mood for it.

What is the simple question then? Because I don't think it can be answered anymore easily than "the writing and justification for taking over the identity of Thor was shit". I brought up the Falcon becoming Cap example but not changing his name to Steve Rogers. The past where others have taken up the hammer and solely been their own characters that just had the power of Thor, but had not become Thor as this. And you've ignored them. I really don't know what her being female has to do with it fully either beyond the "yay girl power" vibe you get from people praising the run and trying to rationalize and ignore other female heroes that are their own characters and not just a 63'd version of a male character that you can see in theaters and you don't see the others yet.

I'm not even sure what answer you're fishing for because you continually just keep asking "why is her being female a point of contention" when that's not even the point of contention with the damn comic run. Hell, maybe it's because this is the only one these people know about and people that DO know about others are sick and tired of being told she's the "first".

 

[Redryhno]

You mean the black humans who appeared for like five minutes near the end?

Are we limiting this discussion to the movies? I just want to be clear on the rules before I get too much further into it except to say that the amount of screen time they get doesn't matter. What matters is that literally every human we see who would have had to move to the back of the bus in Alabama is in service of evil. Further, if you want to continue the line of fantasy-races-as-metaphors-for-racial-politics comparison, the Uruk-Hai are exactly what the arguments against miscegenation proselytized against: that if you mix the advanced intellect of the superior [white man/human] with the bestial strength, animal impulses, and moral failings of the inferior [black man/orc], then what results will be an abomination with no conscience but with unmatchable strength and the intellect to overcome its limitations in pursuit of evil.

I guess the books are okay too, but I don't remember them much. At least in the films, you can't go "there are evil black man->racism", not to mention there are evil white people in the series. It's just cherry picking to frame the film as racist.

Plus the orcs are corrupted elves, which are the "ubermensch" of the setting, not a completely different race who's "evil".

Well, technically they aren't. I think Tolkein said in a letter to a buddy that his biggest regret with the series was calling them corrupted elves, since he gave the elves a god that could bring their race back to an uncorrupted state by creating new life. Meaning that the guy let it happen and Tolkien was never a fan of there being an ultimate evil or ultimate good without ALOT of choices on the parts of the aforementioned parties that led them to that point. Which orcs were. And even then, he said it had alot more to do with Melkor's influence that made them that way, which he didn't particularly like himself either.

There's other theories out there, but as far as Tolkien was concerned, they definitely weren't just corrupted elves.