A dude by the name of Ben Shapiro is all manner of upset about people being excited about Black Panther. Naturally, he misses the point, by a whole damn universe. Most of his screeth* seems to be a lament over the lack of gratefulness being displayed in this excitement. Black people should be grateful, dammit, for all the great and wonderful things white people have done for them! On your knees, slaves! Oh, er…stop being so excited! I’m not going to be able to get everything in, it’s a fairly long screeth, so full of wypipo gone wrong that it’s extremely difficult to take, and that’s a serious understatement. Shapiro is one of those fucking idiots who make you ache for the ability to reach through your screen and smack him into last Sunday. And I’ll just add that I’m over the top excited about Black Panther m’self, but I can hardly share in the excitement born of such outstanding representation, because I’m not black. That said, I don’t have any problems understanding The Excitement.
“Everyone in the media is talking about the most important thing that has ever happened in the history of humanity, or at least since Caitlyn Jenner became a woman—a transgender woman—and that, of course, is the release of ‘Black Panther’. It is so deeply important,” Shapiro said, mockingly.
No, not one single person is talking about the movie as if it were the most important thing ever in the history of humanity, you sniveling dipshit. Black Panther is deeply important – look at how damn long it’s taken to get a mainstream movie comprised of a mostly black cast, especially when no one is able to say that tokenism has gone out of Hollywood.
“We’ve heard it’s deeply important to millions of black Americans, who after all were not liberated from slavery 200 years ago and liberated by the civil rights movement with federal legislation, have not been gradually restored to what always should have been full civil rights in the United States. None of that has mattered up till they made a Marvel movie about a superhero who is black in a country filled with black people. ‘Blade’ was not enough. ‘Catwoman’ with Halle Berry, no. OK, Wakanda is where it is,” Shapiro said.
He continued sarcastically, “This is the most important moment in black American history, not Martin Luther King, not Frederick Douglass, not the Civil War, not the end of Jim Crow, none of that, not Brown vs. Board—the most important thing is that Chadwick Boseman puts claws on his hands and a mask on his face and runs around jumping off cars in CGI fashion—deeply, deeply important. Black children everywhere will now believe that they too can be superheroes who jump off cars in fictional countries.”
Oh my. Hey, sniveling dipshit! You left a little something out – all those things? They wouldn’t have been necessary if white people deciding that forcibly kidnapping people and putting them into slavery hadn’t been done in the first place. You don’t get fucking points for taking centuries to correct your massive mistakes. As for the the movies Blade and Catwoman, you wouldn’t have noticed that outside the main characters, most of the cast was comprised of white people. That’s because you expect to see white people, as far as you’re concerned, that’s only right and proper. What a fucking surprise that people of colour would like to see themselves reflected in the same way, and not always have to settle for tokenism.
“We heard this about Barack Obama when he was elected, too. ‘Now that Obama has been president, black Americans will feel like they too can be presidents. It’s a transformative moment.’ Yet, all we hear now is that America is deeply racist and that black people are still systemically discriminated against and that black people are still victims in America society. So, it turns out it didn’t mean anything,” Shapiro said.
Yes, it was a transformative moment. Just like the portraits too, because generations of children to come will be able to read about a black president, and they will see black people represented in the sea of white in the white house. (White, white everywhere.) Having such transformative moments in regard to representation and the hope of future achievement is not a magic fucking wand, you wannabe Voldemort. Whitemort? Yeah, I’ll go with that one. It does not magically erase systemic racism, localised bigotry, or victimisation. Those are still with us, and unfortunately, with the Tiny Tyrant, we’re seeing a vicious, cancerous rise in hatred. The difference such transformative moments make cannot be accurately estimated; they represent hope, strength, and change. They represent inclusion and acceptance, and you just have to try and take that away, by demeaning black people in every way your tiny, atrophied brain can come up with. You aren’t worth spitting on, Mr. Shapiro.
“Sorry to break it to you folks, Wakanda is not a real place,” Shapiro said. “It does not exist.”
Well, thank you ever so much for that whitesplaination, Mr. Shapiro. I’m ever so sure that not one black person could possibly figure that one out minus your help. What a flaming doucheweasel.
You can read the whole thing, and watch video at RWW.
*Screeth: screed + froth.
Heh. As if there had never been another movie set in a fictional country. Or even a fictional country populated by mostly black people. What was the one in Coming To America, again? IMDb says: Zamunda.
Is someone going to break the news to him, that Gotham City is fictional too?
Gotham City isn’t real? *sobs*
;D
I can’t wait. Mom and I are going tomorrow.
And just now, I was complaining about the sloppy, stereotype-ridden worldbuilding in the Elder Scrolls Online, when a member of my guild actually said that “clichés” (he wouldn’t call them stereotypes--how p.c. of him) are a necessary evil to make things accessible to Western audiences. That sounds a lot like the old Hollywood argument about how movies featuring women or black people just don’t sell. Well, that argument’s been refuted every which way, and the astronomical pre-order figures for Black Panther are just the final nail in that coffin, as far as I’m concerned. But apparently, there are a lot of people who still don’t get it, and they are making it difficult for the rest of us to enjoy ourselves.
Joseph, yep, with you every step of the way. People are so damn dependent on stereotypes. I can’t wait either! I’ve been more excited about this movie than anything else for a long time.
I’ve got no money. Literally none. Since being hospitalized a hear and a half ago, I’ve made less than CAN$2k living in the most expensive city in Canada. A good portion of my inability to earn income right now is attributed to an extreme agoraphobia which I didn’t have before the hospital and the cranial procedures. So, no money, and no ability to tolerate other people.
…Which is all to say, as a white woman *I’M* thinking about using some of the money my best friend lent me to go to this movie on opening weekend. A movie like this was WAY overdue, and I’m embarrassed at how long Marvel took to make this one. By contributing to a record breaking opening weekend for BP, there is a real chance that I will add a tiny drop to the flood that breaks through the dam that holds back theatrical imaginations, that prevents studios from even considering making many movies that happen to star people of color -- or women, or, and can I say this loud enough, *realistic characters with disabilities played by actors that actually have the same or a similar disability themselves*.
This is a movie that really has the possibility to create some needed change. Admittedly it’s change in a single niche (Hollywood moviemaking), but it’s still needed, not least because although it’s only one niche, it’s an influential one.
Anyway, thanks, Caine, for writing this. Do let us know when you see BP, whenever that is.
Monday! I’m gonna go on Monday. Very excited!
Wow, just such a terrible screed. Does Shapiro know that you let him live rent free in your head? At least you had some quotes, but otherwise worthless writing. Plus from what I gathered was that it’s not that he hates people are excited for it, but that some are taking it a bit too far (one person said demanded that no white reviewers be allowed to review it, and one person who said she wouldn’t see the movie opening weekend to “avoid accidentally offending anyone”.
Wow, what an amazing coincidence, I find your writing terrible too! Also, taking 20 odd minutes out to mock someone is letting them live in my head? I don’t think so. I have one rule, Hunt: don’t be an asshole. Guess what? You remind me of another major asshole, one Hunt Stoddard. Anyroad, Affinity isn’t for you, asshole. Bye. -- Caine.
So because two unknown individuals have said silly things, Shapiro feels it’s his duty to rain on the parade? Yeah, I doubt it. Shapiro just another conservative dickhead who instinctively sees anything that makes minorities and liberal-minded people excited as fodder for criticism. It’s all part of the antiPC nonsense going around on the right.
Ah, so finally there’s a movie, geared towards a Black audience, with an amazing cast of Black people, about a Black superhero who comes from an astonishingly advanced Black culture, with a great soundtrack by Black artists, and so much more… and somehow, people being excited about it can somehow be taken ‘too far’? How many Black reviewers are out there? Why should white reviewers have to review it? I think they can, if they want, but I think they’d miss more than the superficial significance of the movie. Why is trying to “avoid accidentally offending anyone” a bad thing? Sounds like someone has at least an inkling of what this movie means to Black audiences, and is willing to make a token gesture towards those for whom this movie has more than passing importance. The reason why people are donating money just so less privileged Black children can go see it in theatres.
You know what I gathered from your comment? That you are an idiot and the point has left you below and behind by lightyears. I’ll give you one thing Shapiro said quite accurately, though (just without his sarcasm):
I’m pretty no sure no white child ever, anywhere, has believed that they can actually be Captain America or Superman or Batman or Wonder Woman (ah yes, Wonder Woman’s movie was accepted without question or comment, wasn’t it just), or has dreamed about becoming a real superhero, knowing it is all fiction and fantasy. Why does Shapiro sounds so bitter about the fact that now Black children will have a similar fictional awesome Black role model to fantasize about? This is a wonderful and necessary movie for Black children, because they, too, need something more than real life to dream about. I hope they believe that they too can be superheroes who jump off cars in fictional countries, and I hope they believe that all their lives, ad nauseum, etc., etc.
And I think Shapiro hates that people are excited about it, because, like you, he cannot see beyond his privileged snow white Easter lily nose. And neither can you.
(Seriously. “People are getting way too excited about this, I don’t get it, why do they get to get it and I don’t? I don’t get it! Stop being so excited!!”)
re: #8
I really like the colour of the banhammer here.
:D
Well :D now I feel like I spent way too much time typing that out.
rq, no, that wasn’t too much or a waste of time, because people do read, and a good refutation is always welcome. Unfortunately for me, my tolerance for assholes, never high, has hit no tolerance whatsoever. So sad for Hunt. Heh.
I thought a screeth was a seething screed. That guy’s a waste of space.
That Shapiro fellow. To quote my favourite podcastian radio announcer, “What an asshole”!
Cherbear:
That works too. :)
A bit on the women of the movie, and yeah. One for the theatres, must bring the boys along.
Right on. That rocks so hard.
As someone who first encountered the Black Panther in FF # 52 bought fresh off the rack I’m looking forward to it.
I just saw it. My mother couldn’t make it, but my nephew and his friend came with me. More, please.
Among other things, the costume design was fantastic. I noticed the influence of distinct African cultures in the five tribes of Wakanda, such as the Tuareg and the Maasai. And can I say that Angela Bassett is fantastic? Because she totally is.
Also, Gurira’s statement reminds me of something I’ve been thinking about for a while. I’ve noticed that children’s entertainment is growing more diverse lately (Doc McStuffins being just one delightful example), but it seems that as the target demographic grows older, the diversity dries right up and the stereotypes just come flooding in. I hope this is the beginning of better things to come.