So, does skin color matter or not?

 Well, there has been a constant uproar about gender and raceswaps in popular franchises -understandably so.

The response to this is always "diversity" and "representation" as if it was not the laziest, stupidest way to represent "people of color" -an easy way to pander and cause controversy which is supposed to drive interest in your product. (Aka "fan baiting").

The response is usually also: well, it is a fictional character, so what are you so upset about. (So we do not do it to historical ones? Sure about that?) Or: this was the perfect person for the role. Or: we need more representation.

(It is a long topic to discuss, but a short version - fans tend to like the stuff they like the way it is. They do not want their expectations subverted, and so on and so forth.)

The easiest response to this is obviously then, well, what about a white Black Panther? Or a white Spawn? So far I got not response to this. Usually the comeback is an accusation of racism. (For the record: I dislike the raceswaps in Ghost in a Shell, and other movies, where the characters were switched to white, but apparently that does not count.) Regardless the fall-back argument is that you should not be arguing about the skin color of a made-up character. So any non-historical character is free game to change -and only a racist would complain. OK, gotcha. (Talking about racism... there is plenty of that going around, but somehow it is normalized. Imagine a white guy saying he is not watching something because the main character is female or non-white... but I digress.)

Back to our topic: we can mention historical characters, too, who underwent raceswaps: Queen Charlotte, Anne Boylen, kinda Vikings, and now Queen Cleopatra. (And while we are at falsifying history, let's talk about the Woman King...)

So can we change those, too, or not? Can now we have finally Daniel Craig play Malcom X? 

Apparently the rule now is that any character can be switched to any race or gender, right?

Gotcha.

Enter Milo and Stitch. Read the linked article (and about the whole idiotic uproar). A bona fide Hawaiian actress is not brown enough for these people. I repeat: she is actually native to Hawaii. Her only sin is that she is too white. And NOW it is unacceptable to do a "raceswap". Which, I repeat, is NOT a raceswap. 

The mind boggles. I guess now we can come with the whole "relax, it is a fictional character, she could be a male and played by Dolph Lundgren, you are racist for making it an issue and so on and so forth".

The sheer idiocy and lack of self-awareness of these people is astonishing. 

Star Wars and racism

Well, look at the reactions to an obviously not white guy cosplaying Luke Skywalker.

Why it is important is two-fold.

1. You do not need exact representation for people to see themselves in a character. It is not to say that you should only have white men playing every single role from babies to grannies, but the current forced diversity is patently idiotic and stupid. (Not to mention divisive and counterproductive, but whatever.)

2. Star Wars fans, by large, are NOT racist or sexist. The criticism Rey, Reeva, Rose, and the rest of the newer characters get is not due to racism or sexism. That is not to say a little vocal minority does not have issues -they are shit people, and there are shit people everywhere. Ewan McGregor's rant in a car got that right -although the problem with these virtue signaling messages is that they address a truly small group of people, giving them more prominence than they actually deserve. Oooor -they are used to deflect any and all blame from a shit show and a shit character with accusing anyone who dares to criticize them as racist and sexist trolls. This is part of a well-known strategy you could see in the all-female Ghostbusters, Rings of Power, Star Wars, etc. called fan baiting. 

So, are Star Wars fans, by large, racist and sexist? 

Dunno, let's take a look.

Was Yar Yar Binks was reviled (and poor Ahmed West hated) because the actor was black or because Yar Yar was a terrible character? He did get personal attacks by those already mentioned assholes which are unacceptable -but the fandom also stood behind him and was happy for him in his return role en masse. Did people dislike Reeva's character because she was a black woman, or because it was a shit character?  How were other actors of color treated? Did Pedro Pascal, Billy Dee Williams, Samuel L. Jackson, Forest Whitaker, Carl Weathers, Ming-Na Wen, Temuera Morrison, Gina Carano, Titus Welliver, Michael Lang, Rosario Dawson, John Boyega, Donnie Yen, Jiang Wen, Giancarlo Esposito, etc. etc. needed special treatment from Disney warning them of those horrible, racist, toxic fans like Moses did? 

I guess not. Do they get massive hate on social media by those toxic fans? I guess not.

By the way, why wasn't the criticism of the Book of Boba Fett met with accusations of anti-Maori and anti-Asian racism and sexism? It does not work as well as with black actors, eh? Or maybe it was so bad even they could not bring themselves to do it... Oh, and maybe it is not the fans who are racist, but Disney itself... (Weird turn of events, ain't it?)

So what is it, dear Disney? You know, to keep a franchise alive, it is not enough to bring a crowd into the movie theater. "Casuals" will watch your show, then forget about it, and get to the next Avatar or whatever that comes after. You actually need fans. Fans that you are actively pissing off and alienating in order to please a non-existent mass of potential fans who express their opinions on Twitter quite loudly, but who are actually a minority (just like those racist assholes you use to taint the whole of fandom). They will not bring in revenue for you. They will not buy your Rose action figures, your spinoff books, your computer games, they will not subscribe to your streaming service for your shows. They will wreck this franchise and move onto the next one to destroy.

And one more thing: Star Wars was always inclusive. In fact Star Wars was always the refuge of the outcasts, who were not cool enough for the cool kids, so any and all were invited. Now you are alienating the people who buy your merchandise, your books, your DVD special editions, and the rest -and this will kill your franchise.  

The Force is Female

 So Kennedy is doubling down on the whole direction Star Wars is taking.

The problem is not that there are girls playing with our toys -Star Wars has always been inclusive, no matter what certain media organizations claim. Reeva, Rey, Rose, that purple-haired admiral, and the rest were not reviled because they were women and or black. There were plenty of women and non-white characters before and since who were absolutely adored by the very same toxic fans who hate the second-hand Inquisitor, Ms Mary Sue Skywalker and the rest. It has been talked about why the sequel trilogies were horrible, why the new series are trash (with the exception of the Mandalorian, which is mediocre, but enjoyable - although...) so that is not the point here.

The point is that falling profits from movie tickets, from merchandise, from theme parks matter not - they are pushing the same idiotic strategy to make sure Star Wars die completely. (Well, Mando, which was "the" successful show so far, is turning into a Bo-Katan show now, too, and viewership is falling...) 

Not sure what is going on, honestly. As with many things it seems like the inmates took over the asylum. The people who make decisions are absolutely distanced from the real world, they seem to have no idea about the franchise they are leading, and they do not seem to care about profits. There were so many squandered opportunities to create truly great shows, movies, whatever -and they conscientiously thrown everything into the gutter, and went with the "strong female character takes over from the incompetent original male character". Guess what. People do not like their beloved characters deconstructed, dragged into the mud so that new ones can "take over" without actually earning their place. We saw a Han Solo that reverted to his old scheningans becoming a deadbeat father, a failure in all fronts. Luke Skywalker became cynical pessimist who is ready to kill the son of his sister and his best friend because he had a bad dream, and then goes off sulking alone. (Don't worry, Rey will create that Jedi Academy for you, old man.) And so on and so forth. For some reason people do not like this, do not buy the tickets, the merchandise. Yes, a wider audience will go to the movies -but franchises are not sustained by casual viewers. They are sustained by those people Disney reviles -the fans.

This is truly puzzling because so far it seemed like these high level decision makers are perfectly fine with corrupting anything in the name of profit. But now they behave like full-blown activists - very much like the revolutionaries of old in the USSR and China who were full of great ideas and disregard of how the real world actually works. The results are usually catastrophic - in this case it merely leads to the death of a franchise and the lay-off of seven thousand (!) people. Obviously this number does not include those who are responsible for steering the ship into the rocks. Those people will not be fired; they will get a cushy bonus, and maybe a golden parachute, so they can try their hands on ruining another franchise in a different company.