Since it’s a day ending with, well, day, the Left are pissed off yet again, and it’s against a familiar target. Donald Trump? Nope. JD Vance? If only! Common sense? Well, that’s an ongoing situation, but not what the judges were looking for. The target of this week’s Leftist meltdown?
Sydney Sweeney.
Seems the hottest woman on the planet not named my wife did an ad for a sports betting site where she was mostly and totally nude, covering the more…intriguing parts of her body with sports equipment. Of course, feminists and Leftists (but I repeat myself) got their collectivist granny panties in a wad over it, talking about hypersexuality and other buzzwords that sound bad, but mean nothing.
But the term I’m adding to the Lexicon this week isn’t hypersexuality, but rather a phrase the Left has used in other circumstances with much less attractive women. I’m talking about female empowerment. It’s another term that means nothing, but I figured I’d bring it to the forefront this week for two reasons. One, it exposes the Left’s hypocrisy regarding the aforementioned Ms. Sweeney and feminism in general. And, two, it gave me a chance to do a lot of…research watching the ad repeatedly.
The things I do for you, dear readers…
female empowerment
What the Left thinks it means – a movement that makes women feel they can do anything
What it really means – a movement to treat ugly and incapable women better than beautiful and accomplished women
The concept of female empowerment sounds good in theory. After all, women make up nearly half of the world population, so it might be a good idea to treat them well. Especially if they know where you sleep.
Where things get fucked up is in practice. Since the Left are the ones screeching about female empowerment and the Right wondering who’s going to be empowered to make a sandwich, the Left controls the narrative. So, what have they come up with?
Let’s just say it’s not really empowering women.
Their idea of female empowerment is more about forcing society to accept every woman as powerful leaders than it is about preparing women to achieve lofty heights. The former gave us Brie Larson as Captain Marvel. The latter gave us Margaret Thatcher. There is a big, big difference between the two. For one, I would rather see Margaret Thatcher in skin-tight latex.
Wait. That was out loud, wasn’t it? Nevermind…
Anyway, the way the Left approaches female empowerment is more superficial than super. Whether it’s their support of the body positivity movement (basically, you have to accept a person no matter how thin or fat they are) or making the case getting an abortion is something to be proud of, it all comes down to whatever they think women want/need to feel empowered.
And a lot of it comes down to another favorite Leftist term: patriarchy.
See, Leftists have it in their heads everything bad in the world comes down to the existence of men. So, they think the only way to make women more power is by rubbing men’s noses in it.
Hence, Brie Larson as Captain Marvel in a series of films that would make Tommy Wiseau say “OHNOMARK.”
Here’s what I mean. I’m a comic book fan and I like most superhero movies. I gave “Captain Marvel” the benefit of the doubt and wound up tapping out after 10 minutes because Larson was insufferably off-putting. In her attempt to convey strength, she came off as an arrogant “girl boss” with no real concept of actual strength. She was a super powered “I want to speak to your manager” Karen. And I hated it.
I didn’t hate the character, though. I understood her. She was accomplished, a leader, and someone in full command of herself. Larson’s performance was devoid of everything that made the character worth following. It would be like replacing Bruce Lee in “Enter the Dragon” or Chuck Norris in, well, anything with Pee Wee Herman. No matter how good of a job he could have done, it still wouldn’t work.
Not unlike most Leftists.
A lot of the Left’s perception of female empowerment is connected to titles. Take Kathleen Kennedy (please!), for example. She became the president of Lucasfilm (i.e. Star Wars) after Disney bought it. Leftists pointed to her as an example of female empowerment because she took the existing Star Wars franchise and turned it into DEI drek. Almost every female character was a “girl boss” and didn’t need any man to help her be awesome.
Personally, I should have seen it sooner. I went into “The Force Awakens” with an open mind and left saying “They did a fucking gender swap on ‘A New Hope’ but made it suck!” And since then I’ve started walking away from the franchise I loved since I walked out of “A New Hope” (that’s Episode IV for the kids playing along at home).
And if it had stopped there, I might not have been as pissed. But Kennedy kept recycling the formula and the franchise kept getting worse and worse to the point the Star Wars Holiday Special looked like Shakespeare. Even “South Park” couldn’t avoid taking well-deserved potshots at Kennedy. And when she stepped down earlier this year, she empowered…well, no one, really, but she was a total girl boss!
And now we have a bunch of “empowered” females writing Star Wars without a fucking clue of what’s really going on, but with a mindset that every female character is powerful and demands respect even if she’s as bland as oatmeal flavored oatmeal.
Of course, there are going to be Leftists reading this saying I hate strong women. That’s going to come as a shock to my wife because she’s a strong woman and I love her with all of my heart. Where I part company with the Left (aside from having better hygiene, an actual job, and an IQ higher than that of a rotting turnip) is the definition of a strong woman. First, I know what a woman is, which puts me leagues ahead of your average Leftist. Second, I don’t think strength comes from where someone sits on the corporate ladder or who pushes the “right” ideology in a particular medium.
Everything the Left thinks makes women powerful is 180 degrees out of phase with what actually makes women powerful. Going with a personal example, one of the strongest women I’ve ever known was my mom. Not only did she have to help raise your humble correspondent as well as two older brothers, but she took care of our house, made meals, bought groceries every two weeks, got the mail from our downtown post office, and so many other things that Leftists would hate for her. My mom carried a lot of responsibility on her shoulders, but she did it with a warm smile and comforting words.
My mom’s power came not from any seat of corporate or government leadership or from beating the drum of any cause. Her power came from the way she supported her family every day. In retrospect, I wish I could have done more for her to show her how much I appreciated the gentle guiding hand she had, but in the same breath…or keyboard clacking I can say that I’m already doing it by wanting to do more. My mom’s power came from taking the gifts she had and using them to inspire others to use their gifts.
Which brings us back to Sydney Sweeney’s huge…gifts.
Remember what I said about the Left’s perception of female empowerment being driven by hatred of the patriarchy? Well, Ms. Sweeney is the epitome of the patriarchy to them because she is beautiful and confident. By appearing semi-nude or nude, she’s reducing women to sex objects, thus perpetuating the male-dominated society. She’s setting women’s rights back 100 years! She’s objectifying female athletes!
To which I say she’s pimping a sports betting site, not claiming to be an athlete or a feminist.
And the side that perpetuates “slut pride” and “my body my choice” completely missed the point in their rush to self-righteous outrage.
What Sydney Sweeney did is the definition of female empowerment. She wasn’t forced into a decision by a man as far as I know, and she brought a lot of attention to a service no one heard about before now. And she’s already been paid for her work, but will definitely get more work afterwards. That’s the power of success, and no amount of teeth gnashing from rainbow-haired Leftists will change that.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to my…research. I will take no further questions at this time.
Tag: star wars
Extremist Makeover – Disney Edition
To put it mildly, the current state of Disney is looking bleak, and this is the same company that gave us “The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes.” After getting two of the biggest intellectual properties in pop culture history in Star Wars and Marvel, it was assumed the House of Mouse would be churning out profitable movies and TV shows.
Yeah, about that…
Instead of making money, Disney started making enemies of its core audience. Sure, you had the Avengers movies which raked in tons of money, but live action versions of “The Little Mermaid” and more recently “Snow White” made less money than I did working for a fly-by-night three-day-old sushi franchise called “Still Better than Chipotle.” The fan bases that would normally flock to these movies flocked to the Interwebs to trash Disney’s offerings as “woke garbage.”
And those are the good reviews!
Granted, Disney hasn’t helped matters by putting out woke garbage under the guise of entertainment. Whether it was Kathleen Kennedy stinking up the Star Wars franchise (with the help of J.J. “I Haven’t Seen a Lens Flare I Haven’t Loved” Abrams) or the third wave of Marvel movies and TV shows that have focused more on diversity than, you know, coming up with good stories, it seems Disney has lost its way.
Well, I’m here to help in my own unique way. And considering I’m more of a Bugs Bunny than a Mickey Mouse fan, you know things are bad.
Let’s deal with the elephant in the room, and I’m not talking about Dumbo: you’re driving away potential fans with what you’re doing. I get that you want to grow your base while recognizing the diversity that’s out there, but you’re going about it all wrong. Your approach so far has been to inject the diversity you want to see in the world, wrap it in a half-baked plot, and claim whatever ism you want to blame for the inevitable poor performance. But here’s a little secret.
Not everyone who criticizes the flaming dumpster fires you call entertainment is a bigot. Yes, there are people like that in every group, but you have to try to sift through the hate and trolling to find the kernel of truth. And considering there seems to be a consistent theme of “this is bad and you should feel bad,” you might want to pay attention.
Here’s an example from my own experience. After hearing all sorts of bad things about “Captain Marvel,” I decided to give it a watch. After all, I didn’t want to judge it unfairly and I have an affinity for bad movies. I turned it off after 10 minutes because Brie Larson was so unbearable as a “girl boss” character. I didn’t get any sense of the character she was playing (and I place a good chunk of the blame for that on Larson herself) and I didn’t really care to learn anything more about her. She was just…annoying.
This is one of the things Disney capitalizes on, yet fails to understand in any discernible way: girls want to be princesses, too. Not every girl wants to be a girl boss, and not every female character has to be one to be interesting, or in Larson’s case, not be repulsive to potential fans. Even making Captain Marvel a Disney Princess in “The Marvels” falls flat because she lacks one of the major parts of being one: we like the character.
Compare this to Merida from “Brave.” Although she may be overlooked as compared to the others, she is both determined without being, well, Brie Larson-levels of annoying. And she is, now listen carefully, relatable. We can see ourselves in Merida because she goes through many of the emotions and experiences we do or have. She’s the everyman…er girl…er Princess.
Are you starting to see why “Snow White” flopped more than a drunk fat fratboy jumping into a pool during Spring Break? I’m sure Rachel Zegler is talented, but she didn’t exactly endear herself to the potential audience by putting herself over the Disney cartoon on which her role was based. Even if you wanted to do an updated version, you don’t have to dump all over the source material.
Especially when it’s one of the best animated films Disney has ever done, one that has been beloved for almost 90 flipping years!
This is Marketing 101 stuff, folks. Know your brand and protect it at all costs. In short, don’t use a major IP for an outhouse. In fact, this may be the first step towards Disney regaining its footing: require Disney execs to take a marketing class for an actual grade, minimum grade of a C+ or they get booted. I’ll even allow them to take it at an institute of higher learning suited to what appears to be their intellectual level, Greendale Community College.
By the way, #sixseasonsandamovie.
While the current execs are busy at school, find talent within the company who have an actual passion for storytelling, film-making, acting, et cetera, because these are the folks who will rebuild the foundation of the House of Mouse. Much of the pushback against Disney right now is based on the notion they’re more interested in pushing agendas than producing movies and shows people want to see. And on some level, they’re right.
You have to decide whether the agenda or the final product is more important. Look at it this way. If you want to spread an agenda, you need an audience, and nobody’s going to pay to see your agenda-driven passion project if you’re not making people want to see it. Tone down the agenda and weave it into a good story with characters we feel for. Sure, that means acting roles for the aforementioned Ms. Larson and Ms. Ziegler are going to be few and far between, but I think it will be better for everyone involved. And by everyone, I mean the audience.
Another possible option is to spin off a section of the company that will specifically work on the agenda-driven shows and movies. It will still be part of Disney, just under a different part of the company umbrella. That way you can tell the stories you want to tell without having to worry about having to make money. In short, you’re going to become the brother-in-law who moves in, sleeps on the couch, and eats all the food in the house without chipping in.
As part of this spin-off, you will need people who know about the IPs you’re bastardizing…I mean using. For that, you kinda need the fans you’ve been crapping on to help guide you. For all their faults, they care about the source material and can bring insights into the process that you might not have thought of in your dream to bring an albino quadriplegic gender-queer otherkin Jedi order into the Star Wars universe. Or at the very least, they can devise a canonical reason why such an order exists instead of relying on “muh fee-fees.”
Ditto for the Marvel IPs. Your decisions have turned a guaranteed money-making machine into a product that is lucky to recoup its money. Sure, they hit all the ideological marks you wanted, but that doesn’t mean anything if you’re not getting eyes on the product and driving away potential fans. For example, “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law” has gotten middling reviews and gotten more than its fair share of hatred, some by people who would complain about anything (basically 99% of people online), but some who have a legitimate love of the character.
Of course, when the star of said show goes out of her way to attack the fan base to this very day…yeah, not a good look.
The best way to navigate your way out of this situation is similar to that with the Star Wars franchise: come up with good stories and engaging characters and let them do the talking. And as a Marvel fan, I can tell you there are a lot of characters that haven’t been tapped, but certainly can be with the right approach and with people who actually care about them. And if you can’t find a great story during the entire history of Marvel to adapt, you’re not looking hard enough.
So, Disney, you’re not out of the woods yet, but you’re not a completely lost cause. Let me give you a piece of advice to get you back on track. Take everything you’ve done over the past few years, all the advice you’ve gotten, all the direction you’ve been given, and the like. Then, do the exact opposite. Before you know it, the House of Mouse will be back on a solid foundation.
Of a lot of money.
Is it Psionics or Magic?
Magic, in gaming and fiction, is usually defined as power from somewhere else. While Psionics is defined as power from within and no outside source at all.
For may years there have been gamers and others who state that the Force of the Jedi in Star Wars is an example of psionics. But this would be incorrect since the definition of the Force is an energy field created by life that surrounds everything and binds it all together. That is really magic.
Thus the Force of Star Wars is space-magic. And this form of magic, when practiced by the Jedi or the Sith, is done without material components. At times we do see both verbal and somatic components in the use of Force powers by the Jedi and the Sith but not always.
There are other Force traditions that do use material components that give them an edge when using their Force spells (powers). So it only reinforces the true nature of the Force.
Additionally, magic is sometimes separated into two categories. The world’s most famous role-playing game does this, and calls these categories arcane magic and divine magic.
Given that the Force has a Will of it’s own and calls to those who have a connection to it. Then the Force is of the Divine magic category. And this too falls into Star Wars canon as the Force is a religion of sorts.
Another example is the Wizarding World and what it calls magic is nothing of the kind. The source of a Wizard or Witch’s power doesn’t come from someplace else it comes from within. They are born with talent that can be trained. This is psionics by the established definition.
Their power is hidden behind magical trappings and decorations. Traditions run deep and are old. But many Wizards are capable of casting “wandless magic” and even non-verbal magic. Some traditions of the Wizarding World specialize in such types of magic. And what is a Wizard’s wand? Nothing more than a psionic amplifier or resonator. This is why it is so important.
Even in the world’s most famous role-playing game there is one arcane spellcaster that doesn’t fit the mold. The Sorcerer.
A Sorcerer’s arcane power comes from within the sorcerer himself. Long ago some outside agent caused the change in the Sorcerer’s bloodline but that outside agent doesn’t play a part now. A Sorcerer is really a Psionic user as his power is his and internal to him.