You know it seems like the Republicans just can’t watch a movie without going ballistic over it, guess which movie now set them off? Hint: think pink.
Far-right politicians and pundits don't like seeing trans actress Hari Nef in the movie, and Ted Cruz thinks an image of a map is Chinese Communist Party propaganda.The AdvocateBy Trudy RingJuly 20, 2023Some right-wingers are losing it over the new and inclusive Barbie movie, critiquing its expansive view of gender and even calling it communist propaganda.The Greta Gerwig-directed film, which opens Friday, depicts a land in which various Barbies and Kens have an idyllic life. But one of them, played by Margot Robbie, decides to see what the outside world is like, and she’s in for some surprises.Another one of the Barbies is played by transgender actress Hari Nef. “As much as there’s a celebration of femininity and being a girl in this [movie], I think there’s also an encouragement of letting go of the checklist we ascribe to living and living your life and being in your body your way, on your own terms,” she recently told Out,a sister publication of The Advocate. “The best that we can do as women, as trans women, is be there for each other and take ourselves at face value, without relying on the green light from someone or anyone else.”
What the right-wingers want is a make believe land of the “Father Knows Best” era, where Blacks knew their place, Gays were in the closet and we never existed. Where the perfect family of Dick & Jane and Spot existed. Where everyone went to church on Sundays.
This was all too much for some right-wing commentators and politicians. The film “forgets its core audience of families and children while catering to nostalgic adults and pushing lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender character stories,” wrote a contributor to Movieguide,a site with a conservative Christian bent. The article was headlined “WARNING: Don’t Take Your Daughter to Barbie.” Fox News quoted and amplified the Movieguide piece.A separate Movieguidearticle quoted Nef’s Out interview again and interpreted her words to mean that Barbie “is an exploration of femininity and sexualization, with a clear, gross agenda in mind to push sexuality onto children.”
Then these conservatives started picking on Ken for his “pink” jacket… too wimpy not macho enough. We want our children to be “groomed” in the toxic male environment none of this “pink” stuff.
Then there are those who found the primary Ken character, played by Ryan Gosling, to be insufficiently masculine. Ginger Gaetz, wife of far-right Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz, wrote on Twitter that when they attended the premiere, she saw “disappointingly low T from Ken,” referring to testosterone, and she also called him a “beta” male, not an alpha. (Note: He’s a doll without genitalia.)
But you know what, the people have voted all this nonsense down,
All the fuss probably won’t cut into the film’s audience. The hashtag #BoycottBarbie hasn’t caught on widely, according to Rolling Stone, which notes, “It seems unlikely that enough momentum will build before the movie is officially released on Friday to impede its estimated $95-$105 million opening weekend gross.”
Drive a Republican bat s**t and go watch the movie!
[Chorus]Hey! Hey! Hey, hey, hey!Macho, macho man (macho man)I've got to be a macho manI've got to be a macho, macho manI've got to be a macho! Ow!Macho, macho manI've got to be a macho manMacho, macho man (yeah, yeah)I've got to be a macho!Macho Man by The Village People
Yeah, it is all about real men! Men who don't wear pink sports jackets!
Is 'Barbie' anti-man? I won't see the movie, but I will definitely yell about it!Real men devote hours of their lives bravely railing against movies about toys. Real men LOUDLY share their opinions on things they have not – and will not – see.USA TodayBy Rex HuppkeJuly 20, 2023I am mad – mad I tell you! – about the new “Barbie” movie. My anger is palpable and is deeply rooted in several specific things, like Chinese propaganda, possibly, and also maybe something called “toxic femininity.”I’m not exactly sure what these things have to do with the “Barbie” movie that premieres this weekend, but I know I will not be seeing the film because I must protect the daughter I don’t have from feminist indoctrination. DO NOT TRY TO CHANGE MY MIND!I have been told by noted cinema expert Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz that director Greta Gerwig’s new movie about the classic Mattel toy is nothing less than “Chinese communist propaganda.”How does he know that? Because there’s a cartoonish map shown in the movie, and that map has dashes on it, and then there’s something about China being on the map, and I don’t honestly understand the rest of it, but I know that’s all the information I need to be ABSOLUTELY OUTRAGED at this filth being pushed on me and the daughter I don’t have!!
With highfalutin outrage the Republicans condemned for having a wimpy man and not a MACHO MAN!
[Chorus]Hey! Hey! Hey, hey, hey!Macho, macho man (macho man)I've got to be a macho manI've got to be a macho, macho manI've got to be a macho! Ow!Macho, macho manI've got to be a macho manMacho, macho man (yeah, yeah)I've got to be a macho!
The conservatives don't let a little thing like not seeing the movie cut into their bashing the movie on Fox News’ “Outnumbered” this week
How dare the "Barbie" movie that I haven't see and won't see make Ken look weak. I don't want my boys (the ones I do have) or my daughter (the one I don’t have) thinking a REAL MAN like me isn’t the best form of real manhoodness.[…]I’ll never know the true horror of this deeply offensive and dishonest “Barbie” movie that I’m not taking the daughter I don’t have to see. But I’ll tell you this much: I’ll never stop complaining non-specifically about how much damage “Barbie” has done, for various reasons, to our beloved American society.
Their feigned indignation is just a cover for the Republicans because now they don’t have to talk about the crumbling infrastructure. They don’t have to talk about global warming while Texas sizzles. They don’t have to justify their tax breaks to the billionaires and cutting Social Security and Medicare, they can sweep it under the rug.
No… it is all about macho men and trans women. I've got to be a macho, macho man!
In the Telegraph they also commented on the movie...
The gender themes in Greta Gerwig’s blockbuster comedy are riling conservatives, with some calling for a boycottBy Helen O'Hara22 July 2023It’s a mystery. Given that Barbie dolls have long been disavowed by feminists for pushing an impossible female beauty standard, you might expect that it would be American left-wing mobilising against the Barbie movie this week. Instead, it’s the US Republican party. The film centres around Margot Robbie playing Barbie, a woman who looks like the Republican ideal of femininity, and it is set in a world with a strict gender divide, which might seem like positives to conservatives. Yet several Republican pundits and politicians called for a boycott of the as the hype built ahead of its release on Friday.So why the outrage? Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz took his fiancée Ginger Lucky Gaetz to an early screening in Washington DC on Tuesday. She tweeted a string of criticisms, singling out the film’s lack of depiction of family or faith and the “unfair” treatment of Mattel’s “pregnant Barbie”, Midge (Emerald Fennell). She thought that Ryan Gosling’s Ken displayed “disappointingly low T” [testosterone, which is not typically high in dolls] and said that the film “tries to normalize the idea that men and women can’t collaborate positively (yuck)”. Despite admiring its costumes and Margot Robbie’s leading role, she concluded, “I’d recommend sticking to getting outfit inspiration and skipping the theatre.”
The viewers are voting with their feet,
Either way, the movie is expected to make in the region of $110m at the US box office in its opening weekend, about double the predictions for its nearest rival, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer, or the total for last week’s Tom Cruise hit, Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning, Part 1. The #BoycottBarbie hashtag has not taken off, so it seems that the capitalist appetite for the world-conquering doll may overcome any qualms about its casting or elements of its plot. After seven Transformers movies and three G.I. Joe movies, there’s simply a huge appetite for girls to see their favourite toys on the big screen at last.
What a bunch of twerps these amerikkkans are. We are on the verge of a climate disaster, perhaps a chance for nuclear war and a nuclear winter for the survivors, and folks are worried about a Barbie movie or a transwoman on a beer can. My goodness can anyone get real, really real. Complied with all the other crap floating in the amerikkkan sewers whatever comes this way let it come. Something has to happen to stop this nonsense. Fingers crossed that Miami gets overly drenched. Barbie alleged communism. Amerikkkans fail history with a great big F+.
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