[Draft] Who Died and Made You King?

[West Barack and East Obama]

[title] Who Died and Made You King?

[desc] A @@DEMONYMADJ@@-produced historical drama based on the life of the heroic King Maxbari IV of Maxtopia, Bravemax, has just been released to rave reviews from film aficionados across @@NAME@@. However, the decision to cast @@RANDOMMALENAME_1@@@, a @@DEMONYM@@ of Bigtopian-descent, as the lead role has sparked immense backlash from the Maxtopians.

[validity] has a film industry

[option] "THIS CALLS FOR WAR!" bellows the Maxtopian ambassador as he tosses Bravemax posters into a makeshift bonfire in your waste paper basket. "King Maxbari IV valiantly defeated the Bigtopians at the Battle of Brancaloo all those years ago, yet you have the gall to suggest he was borne from those bigwig savages through this horrendous casting decision. Lying about our glorious history is one thing, but perpetuating it to millions through this soppy piece of cinema is another! Pull the film from circulation immediately and ensure that actors are only portrayed by those who physically resemble them."

[effect] döppelgangers of historical figures make up the entirety of the A-list

[option] "Oh my goodness, this is truly beautiful!" sobs @@RANDOMNAME_2@@, an executive producer of Bravemax, as he rewatches a clip from the movie's tearjerking climax for the seventh time this day. "Look at how well @@RANDOMMALENAME_1@@ is able to express his emotions on the battlefield. Yes, he may not be a spitting image of the legendary king himself, but what matters at the end of the day is that he's able to deliver a meaningful portrayal. Come on guys. It's ENTERTAINMENT. I didn't see anyone besides a couple of nerds at the premiere complain about the historically-inaccurate battle armour, and why should they? It's not a documentary or anything, and these... liberties with the truth make it a far better watch. Tell the Maxtopians to back off and give studios full control over these kinds of creative and casting decisions."

[effect] slander is okay if it is viewed in IMAX

[option] "Erm, actually, the battle armour was historically accurate, it's the way the Maxtopian army rode their horses that we take issue with." chimes in @@RANDOMNAME@@, one of the aforementioned nerds. "Anyways, these 'historical dramas' are utter tripe full of embellishments with no consideration for accuracy whatsoever, as all they want to do is sell tickets and bait the awards shows. Can you imagine how many of these vapid flicks have misled the public into believing exaggerated lies? It's about time we banned all these awful films and shows and ecnouraged everyone to watch some properly-researched documentaries on the same subject. Some of these mouth-breathing moviegoers could do with learning something useful for once."

[effect] children hoping to watch "The Lion King" have to settle for savannah documentaries instead

[Verdant Haven]

I'm struggling with this premise at the moment, because it seems to be based on the idea that the government controls casting and scriptwriting for the film industry. Option 3 is asking for certain types of government control to be introduced, which is fine, but Options 1 and 2 are completely illogical unless nearly total control already exists. Perhaps if the validity includes state-controlled media with significant censorship and restricted speech, that could serve as a starting point?

[Australian rePublic]

Option 1- If an ambassador is threatening war, then I'm pretty sure that avoiding offending over-sensative snowflakes would be the least of your problems. Also, in these situations, it's not usually the ethnic minority that cares who plays whom, it's usually oversensitive white people who have nothing better to do getting offended on our behalf. Case in point, I come from Greek ansestry and am as Greek as you can get ethnically.

Here is the Cinemasins video where the narrator, Jeremy, "sins" the movie because one of the actors is an Italian guy playing a Greek. You would hardpressed to find a single Greek who actually gives a fuck. It's white people who are bored out of their brains and have nothing better to do, like Jeremy, getting offended on our behalf when we don't want them to. In light of that, I am sure that Maxtopia couldn't give a fuck. Also, there's dozens of examples of people playing characters of ethnicites they are not. Also Jeremy is ignoring the fact that the actress who plays the main character was born in Canada and playing someone born in America.

Mike Myers a Canadian, plays a Scottish Shrek, Scotland didn't give a shit. Or, if you want examples of actors who play characters basedon real people. The USA didn't give a shit. I'm pretty sure that none of the main cast in the 300 movie are Greek, and I'm pretty sure that Greece didn't give a shit, Mel Gibson, an Australian, played a Scottish William in Braveheart, Scotland didn't give a shit. and the list goes on. Or even important religious figures. Charlton Heston, a Gentile, played a Hebrew Moses in the Ten Commandments movie, and Judao-Christians, for the most part, didn't care. What's so special about this film that makes Maxtopia actually care? Or is Maxtopia like China that doesn't actually give a shit about the cause but pretends to in order to weaponises the fake outrage against idiots in the West who are stupid enough to believe the half-arsed Chinese propoganda about how bad their own country is?

[West Barack and East Obama]

I'm struggling with this premise at the moment, because it seems to be based on the idea that the government controls casting and scriptwriting for the film industry. Option 3 is asking for certain types of government control to be introduced, which is fine, but Options 1 and 2 are completely illogical unless nearly total control already exists. Perhaps if the validity includes state-controlled media with significant censorship and restricted speech, that could serve as a starting point?

Would it be better if I clarified that Option 1 was asking the nation to implement ethnic quotas/restrictions on casting directors, and Option 2 was asking for all of that to be lifted? I could also clarify in the description and the options that the film was produced by people in @@NAME@@, and not by @@NAME@@'s government. (Although based on your comment, now I'm wondering if state media peddling disinformation would make a good issue topic itself)

Option 1- If an ambassador is threatening war, then I'm pretty sure that avoiding offending over-sensative snowflakes would be the least of your problems. Also, in these situations, it's not usually the ethnic minority that cares who plays whom, it's usually oversensitive white people who have nothing better to do getting offended on our behalf. Case in point, I come from Greek ansestry and am as Greek as you can get ethnically.

Here is the Cinemasins video where the narrator, Jeremy, "sins" the movie because one of the actors is an Italian guy playing a Greek. You would hardpressed to find a single Greek who actually gives a fuck. It's white people who are bored out of their brains and have nothing better to do, like Jeremy, getting offended on our behalf when we don't want them to. In light of that, I am sure that Maxtopia couldn't give a fuck. Also, there's dozens of examples of people playing characters of ethnicites they are not. Also Jeremy is ignoring the fact that the actress who plays the main character was born in Canada and playing someone born in America.

Mike Myers a Canadian, plays a Scottish Shrek, Scotland didn't give a shit. Or, if you want examples of actors who play characters basedon real people. The USA didn't give a shit. I'm pretty sure that none of the main cast in the 300 movie are Greek, and I'm pretty sure that Greece didn't give a shit, Mel Gibson, an Australian, played a Scottish William in Braveheart, Scotland didn't give a shit. and the list goes on. Or even important religious figures. Charlton Heston, a Gentile, played a Hebrew Moses in the Ten Commandments movie, and Judao-Christians, for the most part, didn't care. What's so special about this film that makes Maxtopia actually care? Or is Maxtopia like China that doesn't actually give a shit about the cause but pretends to in order to weaponises the fake outrage against idiots in the West who are stupid enough to believe the half-arsed Chinese propoganda about how bad their own country is?

The inspiration behind the issue is based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Queens_(TV_series) , where the Egyptian government (along with the usual Internet lynch mobs) responded negatively to the casting of Cleopatra based on the actor's ethnicity. Of course, no one exactly called for war, but that's just an exaggeration for the purposes of this issue.

[Australian rePublic]

I'm struggling with this premise at the moment, because it seems to be based on the idea that the government controls casting and scriptwriting for the film industry. Option 3 is asking for certain types of government control to be introduced, which is fine, but Options 1 and 2 are completely illogical unless nearly total control already exists. Perhaps if the validity includes state-controlled media with significant censorship and restricted speech, that could serve as a starting point?

Would it be better if I clarified that Option 1 was asking the nation to implement ethnic quotas/restrictions on casting directors, and Option 2 was asking for all of that to be lifted? I could also clarify in the description and the options that the film was produced by people in @@NAME@@, and not by @@NAME@@'s government. (Although based on your comment, now I'm wondering if state media peddling disinformation would make a good issue topic itself)

Option 1- If an ambassador is threatening war, then I'm pretty sure that avoiding offending over-sensative snowflakes would be the least of your problems. Also, in these situations, it's not usually the ethnic minority that cares who plays whom, it's usually oversensitive white people who have nothing better to do getting offended on our behalf. Case in point, I come from Greek ansestry and am as Greek as you can get ethnically.

Here is the Cinemasins video where the narrator, Jeremy, "sins" the movie because one of the actors is an Italian guy playing a Greek. You would hardpressed to find a single Greek who actually gives a fuck. It's white people who are bored out of their brains and have nothing better to do, like Jeremy, getting offended on our behalf when we don't want them to. In light of that, I am sure that Maxtopia couldn't give a fuck. Also, there's dozens of examples of people playing characters of ethnicites they are not. Also Jeremy is ignoring the fact that the actress who plays the main character was born in Canada and playing someone born in America.

Mike Myers a Canadian, plays a Scottish Shrek, Scotland didn't give a shit. Or, if you want examples of actors who play characters basedon real people. The USA didn't give a shit. I'm pretty sure that none of the main cast in the 300 movie are Greek, and I'm pretty sure that Greece didn't give a shit, Mel Gibson, an Australian, played a Scottish William in Braveheart, Scotland didn't give a shit. and the list goes on. Or even important religious figures. Charlton Heston, a Gentile, played a Hebrew Moses in the Ten Commandments movie, and Judao-Christians, for the most part, didn't care. What's so special about this film that makes Maxtopia actually care? Or is Maxtopia like China that doesn't actually give a shit about the cause but pretends to in order to weaponises the fake outrage against idiots in the West who are stupid enough to believe the half-arsed Chinese propoganda about how bad their own country is?

The inspiration behind the issue is based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African_Queens_(TV_series) , where the Egyptian government (along with the usual Internet lynch mobs) responded negatively to the casting of Cleopatra based on the actor's ethnicity. Of course, no one exactly called for war, but that's just an exaggeration for the purposes of this issue.

Ah yes, I forgot about black Cleopatra. That's a whole different level of no. I can understand casting an Italian as a Greek, but black Cleopatra is bad, mostly because they don't look anything like each other. There's really a limit here, and black Cleopatra doesn't only cross that line, it sputs on it and goes further and further and further. Still though, if someone is threatening wars, maybe the other options are rendered moot

[Verdant Haven]

I'm struggling with this premise at the moment, because it seems to be based on the idea that the government controls casting and scriptwriting for the film industry. Option 3 is asking for certain types of government control to be introduced, which is fine, but Options 1 and 2 are completely illogical unless nearly total control already exists. Perhaps if the validity includes state-controlled media with significant censorship and restricted speech, that could serve as a starting point?

Would it be better if I clarified that Option 1 was asking the nation to implement ethnic quotas/restrictions on casting directors, and Option 2 was asking for all of that to be lifted? I could also clarify in the description and the options that the film was produced by people in @@NAME@@, and not by @@NAME@@'s government. (Although based on your comment, now I'm wondering if state media peddling disinformation would make a good issue topic itself)

Having option 1 ask for some sort of quota or restriction is fine, whether its on actors, casting directors, or other aspects of film production. The bigger challenge is that the anger and threats are being directed towards @@NAME@@ rather than a film company. The government didn't "have the gall to suggest" anything. Without some kind of hyper-restrictive validity, there's no reason to believe that the government has anything whatsoever to do with the production in the first place. With African Queens, the ire was towards Netflix, and towards the general issue of Western assumptions about non-Western peoples and history. Nobody was yelling at the US Government for being the country where Netflix was founded, or at Jamaica and the UK for being the nations from which the actress' ethnic heritage derived.

Having Option 2 ask to have restrictions lifted wouldn't work in this context, because this is being premised on a lack of restrictions existing in the first place. The whole thing is coming about because of a lack of such restrictions, hence the demands in Option 1. Normal, non-oppressive nations aren't involved in casting decisions or film crew ethnicity or stuff like that. We do have a policy that checks for nations that have instituted a minority ethnicity quota for their television products, but that is numbers of parts, not actual casting choices of specific roles for specific people. That is a more real-world sort of thing, where guidelines for context exist (like "Canadian Content Laws"), but film production companies, broadcasters, etc are free to do whatever they want within those bounds.

The reason for the validity suggestion above (state-controlled media with significant censorship and restricted speech) is because that would at least provide a reason to believe this is a government matter, rather than just industry. If the industry is exclusively the domain of a highly-involved and restrictive government department, then that government department can be addressed as the source of the alleged problem.

[West Barack and East Obama]

snip

Hmm. What if it was altered to:

1. The Maxtopian Ambassador is angered that @@NAME@@ allows films that promote falsehoods about about his nation's culture and history in cinemas and demands for censorship and the prohibition of such films from being screened,
2. The producer argues for creative liberties and the right not to be censored for them,
3. Last option still says to pull all the historical dramas and make everyone watch documentaries

That way, the issue can be about censoring distribution (which is definitely a governmental matter in their role as regulators) rather than actually taking control of the specific casting and scriptwriting in the industry, which would only be relevant in strict state-controlled media, but still being able to keep core parts of the issue intact. What do you think?

[Australian rePublic]

A lot of the reason why Egypt got the shits with a black Cleopatra wasn't so much that she was portrayed by a black woman, but rather that they kept insisting that the real Cleopatra was black, and they kept refusing to listen to reason