this post was submitted on 24 Oct 2023
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traaaaaaannnnnnnnnns

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[–] [email protected] 105 points 1 year ago (6 children)

Meanwhile, Monty Python’s Life of Brian literally had a male character who identifies as female and everybody in the movie is cool with it

[–] [email protected] 73 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And John Cleese is now a transphobe. Go figure. (Other members are cool from what I've heard)

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Terry Gilliam is also a transphobe.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Damnit, what did they do? They're my favorite director :(

[–] [email protected] 30 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

He's basically just railed against cancel culture and what he sees as forced diversity in media. In the Chappelle vein, where they've convinced themselves they're not transphobic, just against "censorship".

Now, to be fair, Gilliam was always the most defiant, aggressively anti-establishment guy of a group who are all pretty anti-establishment. He's very much made a career off of being transgressive and pushing back on those that tell him no. So this isn't exactly unusual for him. "Cancel culture", to a 70 year old man who made a name for himself by being anti-censorship at a time when you could barely curse on television, would certainly feel like a familiar type of "authority" that they've spent their whole careers defying.

That's not an excuse, but it's also why I stopped expecting better from the legacy entertainers of that time who are all pushing 80. They've progressed about as much as they're going to in their lifetime. Just take away the microphone before they hurt themselves (or anyone else) because you're not going to change them.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There's also the lumberjack song...

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

You can make the argument the joke there isn't so much that being trans is weird or wrong, it's in the juxtaposition between where it starts and where it ends up. The singer starts with a very masculine stereotype and shifts drastically into a feminine one to the point it confuses other masc stereotypes who reject him. The singer didn't read the room and went way off the rails.

Not the best justification, I know, but it doesn't feel especially hostile towards trans, just using it as an irresponsible punchline in a joke about traditional masculinity vs feminity, which was typical of the time.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago

huh, i always thought that was played for laughs, bc satire. but i may be wrong of course

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[–] [email protected] 56 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

It bothers me less depending on how old the episode is, and the overall tone of the joke. Older “let’s put this guy in a dress for cheap laughs” type stuff is lame, but not as bad as more recent attempts to make hatred more palatable by disguising it with a thin veneer of “humor”.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

One of the most egregious examples I can think of from recent media was from Kimmy Schmidt where the people that take issue with trans/enbyphobia were turned into the butt of a joke because.... they're annoying I guess?

Came out of left field in a show I thought was queer friendly but I realized later on that it tracks with the brand of feminism that Tina Fey follows. (I never watched 30 Rock and don't intend to so I had no idea she was already problematic)

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

No, that old stuff is just as bad. Go watch the end of Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. It was just simpler then because the writers considered that type of hate to be ubiquitous instead of needing nuance or explanation.

It's like saying older racism wasn't as bad as the more recent attempts to galvanize people into nazis. But I contend it was for the same reason above. You're seeing recent attempts at both towards being more palatable specifically because it's not as accepted now.

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Meanwhile Denise Bryson is on Twin Peaks being totally cool and never the butt of a joke

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I love that agents Cooper try to understand her instead of freaking out.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Agent Dale Cooper is just that cool. Also Kyle MacLachlan is a super chill guy.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

fix your hearts or die

[–] [email protected] 40 points 1 year ago (6 children)

I wanna say King of the Hill is safe.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago

I watch that show its actually pretty safe outside of that one weird episode where bill hits rock bottom and thinks he's his exwife though I don't really think of that one as transphonic per se

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There's one episode with a drag queen, not trans. It's pretty positive! She thinks Peggy is also a drag queen and they become best friends. It ends that way too.

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (10 children)

Scrubs? That sucks. No episodes come to mind, do you happen to remember which one(s)?

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago (19 children)

Issues like this make me wonder: what’s acceptable to joke about now that future generations will find shameful? Any suggestions, folks?

[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 year ago

Some people are starting to shift their opinions on it, but jokes about men being raped (especially in prison) are weirdly accepted.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'd hope it'd be things relating to our treatment of non-human animals. There's a pretty good talk making that case (not so much in terms of jokes, but in general)

https://youtu.be/N6w3A7E1Hw8

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I was thinking this binging The Boys recently. In universe apparently fish can communicate with each other and have feelings and shit, there is a dude who can talk to fish. But they also show a weird amount of casual fish abuse in relation to that character and in a way that sorta plays it for laughs. The Boys is already pretty satirical so I think the writers are doing it on purpose to satirize real life animal mistreatment but even still I'm not sure it's done that well as its still presented in a lot of scenes as a joke.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm going to hope it's about wanting to kill ourselves all the time, because if it becomes taboo I hope it's because we have actually managed to make life better and thus suicide rates drop, but I honestly don't know if we will get any better tbh

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (3 children)

“There are no taboos against taking one’s life here,’ said the Night Haunter. ‘Many do. This is not a happy world. But it can be a better one. By killing yourself, you take the easy way out, you encourage others to do the same. You might think you add yourself to a statistic, but your self-murder is much more than that. Every suicide adds to the rot weakening your culture. Every life abandoned is a signal that change can never be effected. You throw your existence away, and in doing so lessen the value of humanity.”

Proceeds to de-skin suicidal woman slowly.

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I though you said you were from Iran.

But seriously I don't think that episode was harmful.

Douglas is just a general asshole.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

The character is an asshole AND that episode is transphobic. More telling is the creator (Graham Linehan) who is a vocal TERF. I don't really want to pollute this space with his toxicity, but search if you're curious.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Can you tell me what's transphobic about it?

When I first saw it I would have thought it was trans-supporting, other than the detail that (IIRC) the trans woman was played by a cisgender woman.

The entire point of it is that the only thing that is stopping Douglas from being genuinely, incredibly happy, becoming a better person and living an actually fulfilling life in the end is his inability to accept a historical detail that had made absolutely no difference to his relationship. And, since Douglas might be the worst person in the world, we see him destroy that because of his own weird machismo values. Just when we think he's completely changed as a character, his shittiness on this one thing, emblematic of his incredibly toxic masculinity, comes crashing down on him. This is, darkly, funny. We are abruptly reminded that Douglas is an actual monster, to the point of fist-fighting with the person he loves. "Character is briefly happy but previous behaviour and/or shittiness of their character ruins it for themselves" is like at like 30% of Linehan's sitcom plotlines.

If there's something I missed - and it's been a few years, and thoroughly agree that Linehan's subsequent behaviour justifies examining his previous work for ulterior motives - I would like to know it. Genuinely.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Caitlin Jenner deserves every minute of air time in South Park though. JS

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 year ago

Twin Peaks is safe 🙏 Bless Denise

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Shout outs to Lily Simpson for showcasing just how bad these shows really are.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

getting back into arrested development and then getting to that episode

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)
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