I’ve heard a lot of talk lately since Trump was elected about how ‘We’ve won the war against the regressive left!’ How their party, the democrats, are now in shambles as the republicans now dominate the senate, house, White House, soon the Supreme Court… and the majority of the elected governors. In addition, the mainstream media has been ripped to shreds in many ways. CNN has been exposed for its bias and has almost completely fallen while the other networks are doing everything they can to remain relevant… and its not working.
This isn’t just a U.S. phenomenon either in Britain, Brexit turned out to be a major upset and a severe blow to the globalist movement, and their conservative party is looking pretty good from an outsider’s standpoint. Theresa May is becoming hugely popular and ‘in touch with ordinary people.
In France, Francois Fillon won his primary by a landslide and speculation is that a far-left candidate wouldn’t make it past the first round of elections.
In Holland, a similar revolt is taking place as the Party for Freedom is now leading in the polls.
So now what are the left doing?
Stewing…
At this point… at least from looking at Michael Moore’s video, the only arguments the left has are falsehoods (Brexit regret, which is pure fantasy), shame and guilt. No facts, and he’s even talking out of both sides of his mouth. He says that this is the end of American while saying that Trump isn’t going to do a damn thing… well if he’s not going to do a damn thing, how is that any different from the last 16 years?
Anyway, not important right now…
So as you can imagine, this is a pretty good time for the right, the anti-establishment, and moderates on both sides of the isle who were sick and tired of the extremes on their party.
I’ve even heard many out there tout this move as a major victory against the regressive left, the SJWs, and the extremists… and for some, maybe it is…
… but for all?
As most of you know, geek culture is something that is very near and dear to me. Having grown up a gamer/comic and action figure collector/Sci-Fi & Fantasy reader, seeing geek culture enter the mainstream is uplifting on many levels.
Today, people no longer have to be ashamed of reading comics or collecting toys as adults. We don’t have to hide in the back of super hero movie theaters, our stores aren’t relegated to hidden, crumbling strip malls in the middle of nowhere, and our conventions get national media attention, which is great!
Yeah we’ve been riding high now for a decade or so… but something loomed on the horizon that I don’t think any of us expected.
Within a few years, our outlets came under fire. A virtual crusade appeared to have been launched by the social justice crowd against pretty much all things geek… and it seems very little was spared from these attacks by identity politics…
Let’s go through them one by one shall we?
Comic Books:
Marvel: Yes, yes we all already know my opinion on the Marvel Universe. Ever since the creation of the multiverse, Marvel has been upping the ante on changing the identities/sexual preferences/races of time-honored characters with little to no explanation, rhyme, or reason. Usually they just wind up throwing up their hands and say, “It’s in an alternate universe, so we can do whatever we want.”
The result has been a noticeable decline in the quality of their stories and a decline in people buying their books as they slowly crawl to the point where they are unreadable and DC is not far behind.
Originally Marvel dealt with social issues in a very scholarly and appropriate way. Using facsimile, alliteration, and metaphorical approaches to their narrative. This made for excellent stories while giving a very underplayed and passive statement that was effective without being preachy.
Storytellers like Stan Lee and Chris Claremont had it in their mind to make their cast more diverse in a very sensible and appropriate way… by retiring old characters as time went on and bringing in new ones to take up their mantles. However by the mid-80s, this was thrown out the window and some rather poor story lines and plot devices were thrown together that landed us in the mess we’re in today where now instead of doing things the way they were originally intended, we now have identity politics, social issues, and extreme left views literally being preached to the readers at the expense of good storytelling.
Even Stan Lee had something to say about it…
“I wouldn’t mind, if Peter Parker had originally been black, a Latino, an Indian or anything else, that he stay that way. But we originally made him white. I don’t see any reason to change that… It has nothing to do with being anti-gay, or anti-black, or anti-Latino, or anything like that. I say create new characters the way you want to… I don’t see any reason to change the sexual proclivities of a character once they’ve already been established.”
Sadly, it doesn’t appear that Marvel or DC ever got the message. The result is many of us who don’t like being treated as stupid, bigoted, or just don’t like being preached at have since retreated to the indie comic realm… unfortunately for us, many of our favorite titles are in short supply and somewhat difficult to find on shelves.
Also… Wonder Woman was removed as the UN Ambassador because of whining.
TV & Movies
Ghostbusters: Yeah, we’ve all heard my thoughts on this one. No one like the condescension, forced girl-power message, hypocritical treatment of male characters, hypocritical treatment of the movies detractors, or the way the movie was greenlit in the first place.
When the trailer’s got a critical response, Sony manipulated the comments and ran with a narrative of hate, saying that all the movies detractors were white, trump-supporting man-babies… and the mainstream ate it up.
Comments included immaturity from one of the producers:
“I would assume there’s a very large crossover of people who are doubtful ‘Ghostbusters’ will be great and people excited about the Donald Trump candidacy… I would assume they are the exact same people. That movie is made by the great Paul Feig and stars the funniest people on Earth, so I couldn’t be more excited.”
Similar comments from the perpetually unfunny, one-note actress who starred in it:
“what these guys don’t say when they’re typing is that their moms are like ‘get upstairs and take out the garbage! You’re forty five years old’”
But perhaps the worst came from the… in my opinion, emotionally stunted director:
“Geek culture is home to some of the biggest assholes I’ve ever met in my life,”
Unfortunately NONE of these people have faced consequences or have even been served a piece of humble pie. The media has never called them out for their unprofessional behavior or unwarranted attacks on the fanbase. The end result to this being detractors wrongfully having to deal with public shaming for their opinions… these people include Richard Roeper and James Rolfe.
Sony apparently hasn’t gotten the message yet as Amy Pascale not only still has a job at Sony, but she is now trying to create… a Barbie movie starring, Amy Schumer , and supposedly written by Lena Dunham… though I couldn’t find a source for this.
Star Trek: If you hated the JJ Abrams movies (I didn’t by the way) you’ll really hate what’s up next. The inkling of what was to come was a ‘bold’ move in making Sulu’s character gay, despite there being no evidence of it anywhere else in the Universe. Presumably this was done in honor of George Takei, known same-sex and civil rights activist, and the actor who played him on the original show and moves.
He apparently didn’t see it that way…
“I’m delighted that there’s a gay character. Unfortunately, it’s a twisting of Gene’s creation, to which he put in so much thought. I think it’s really unfortunate.”
He later clarified his comments, but usually back-peddling comes as pressure from the community these people are activists for. So take that at face value.
That wasn’t the end of it for Star Trek either. The 2016 San Diego panel was ruined by producer Brian Fuller who essentially turned it into an hour-long social justice rant:
I know people who went to this panel and said it was boring, preachy, and they wound up leaving out of disgust and disappointment, having looked forward to this for months…
This was almost as bad as the ‘Trek Against Trump’ campaign that was basically a group of… almost everyone who worked on Star Trek coming together to shill for Clinton while detracting all those who not only voted for Trump, but refused to vote or voted 3rd Party. (No I will not be linking to their page. They don’t need more exposure.)
But they’re not done… no no no, now they have a new show coming out that will surround a female non-white officer, but also an LGBT character. Okay, I don’t have an issue with that, it’s fine, but do they really need to continuously tout it? We’ve heard more about these two characters than we have anything about the plot. The way it keeps coming up in every article about the show like it’s some huge phenomenon, makes me worry that they’re going to pull a Marvel and sacrifice story for preaching. I could be wrong and if I am, please let me know… because I don’t intend on watching it. After all of this, I have been completely disillusioned with Star Trek as it stands.
Star Wars: Thankfully this one hasn’t been hit as bad. Despite detractors who say that they’ve gone into identity politics with Rey, Jyn, and Fin, I don’t agree. One, Han Solo got a ton of air time, you’re forgetting Poe Dameron, and the story didn’t take a hit because the movies weren’t preachy!
… Unlike their writers!
“Please note that the Empire is a white supremacist (human) organization. Opposed by a multi-cultural group led by brave women.”
-Chris Weitz
Thankfully said tweet was deleted and it looks like his entire account is gone now, but the internet never forgets!
MTV: Okay, I know I’m probably dating myself here a bit, but there was a time way back when MTV was considered part of Geek Culture… today though… it’s a hot bed of racial guilty, bigotry, and complete regressive ideology as evidenced by several of their videos…
Um… we really don’t want Kanye either… we don’t. No, he’s yours. You can’t get rid of him.
Thankfully, it does appear that they’re getting called out on it, but again the internet never forgets…
The ugliness of the regressive left has never looked so bad…
Video Games:
Anita Sarkeesian: This is just one example of many… This woman has become a spokesperson of the 3rd wave feminist community and has taken it upon herself to attack games and other geek outlets for their lack of diversity and what she views as a negative portrayal of women. She sees fit to criticize games even though she herself admits that she doesn’t play nor like games. This rings pretty hollow as she strikes me as the type who stuck her nose up at video gamers as a child, labeling them like everyone else did as unclean, unpopular, shut-ins living in a fantasy world… yet suddenly she can cash in on them since they’re now in the mainstream…
Okay, if that’s not bad enough, we also have companies like Nintendo blatantly editing dialogue in video games that they deep too extreme for Western Audiences. This is nothing new and has been going on since video games started getting made, but it doesn’t make it right.
Conventions:
This is far more minor and is usually restricted to the bigger cons… so being from Boston, we haven’t seen this happen yet. Suddenly feminist groups, many of whom have no background in anything geek, don’t read comics (Not all but many), and really have no stake in the geek community see fit to show up and tell the geeks how awful they really are. As if said opinion is welcome.
Synopsis:
So yes, perhaps in some peoples’ views, a great victory against overbearing identity politics, regression, extremism, hyperbole, and SJWs… maybe… but to those of us who are more center of the isle or just don’t conform to any of the political norms… in that we can actually think for ourselves, don’t see it that way. We more see the election as selling our soul to one devil to rid us of another.
Sadly, geek culture was a casualty here. We’ve seen a lot of what we hold dear drastically altered to the point where we don’t recognize it any more and when we complain, we’re abused and accused of all sorts of horrible things. The main problem is that comic collectors, geeks, nerds, and video gamers for many many years have been considered rejects and outcasts. We weren’t welcomed by what society considered ‘normal’ for the longest time. Now though as our numbers have group, mainstream society has noticed us, and as our numbers grew even larger, we became a big part of the societal norm.
Sadly as a result of this, those very people who told us to go back to our hole in the ground, are now trying to tell us how our hole in the ground should look and operate, and if we disagree, we’re misogynist, hateful, bigoted, etc. etc. and I’m not saying that in some cases, those labels aren’t warranted, but in most?
Geek culture essentially just wants to be left alone. If the mainstream wants in, that’s fine, but it’s the mainstream’s job to conform to our standards if they want to be a part of our movement, not the other way around.
Unfortunately, that’s not what happened… and as in every case when one culture impedes on another and imposes its views, a lot is lost on the way. That is the casualty of the social justice crusade that has ended in the political right taking over on an almost global scale. To quote too many villains…
“You may have won, but every victory has its price.”
Ours I fear, was far too high.
So Jim, you’re saying that you have an issue with minorities and women being portrayed in your medium?
No, of course not! As a rule, geek culture dating back to the 60s has been known for being extremely progressive and I find no issue with that! Having different cultures, skin colors, etc. is what made a lot of geek culture awesome in the first place. However there are ways of doing it without throwing it in people’s faces.
My issue comes in with the level of appropriateness. When story lines are sacrificed for the sake tokenism and preaching ideologies because they’re either too lazy or not savvy enough to work them into the writing/video/etc, when suddenly EVERYTHING has to become political and there is no refuge from it, and when suddenly one group of people think they can dictate societal norms and views on other people without any concern or regard for that groups fears, beliefs, feelings, or behaviors, and that group justifies said intrusion with the unqualified belief that they are the moral right, this is where my issue comes into play.
I’ve said it before and will say it again;
PEOPLE DO NOT LIKE BEING PREACHED AT! They don’t like being called racist/hateful/misogynist/bigoted without any justifiable cause.
And essentially that’s what’s being going on in geek culture for the past 5 years or so.
Take that as you will.
Readers,
Do you have a question about writing, publishing, my stories, etc? Please feel free to post a comment or email me.
jimthewritingwizard@gmail.com
I’ll use those comments to select my next blog post.
I have been writing for several years, have 4 published works, experience with publishing and independent work, so I can hopefully be of assistance.
Please note, I only do one of these a day and will do my best to respond to everyone, but it may take some time.
You can also add me on Twitter!
Also, feel free to check out my works of Fantasy and Historical Fiction, Available on Amazon and where ever books are sold. See the link below:
http://www.amazon.com/James-Harrington/e/B00P7FBXTU
Thanks friends!
Catch you on the flip side!
-Jim
James Harringtons Creative Work 