The problem is that people can map fictional resistance movements onto opposite real life parties. In my college poli Sci class, both I (a known lefty) and the most conservative guy in class excitedly supported the idea of showing V for Vendetta. I guarantee the January 6 guys thought they were in an underdog resistance movement.
One reason for this is these shows don't tend to show the morally questionable things a resistance has to do to be able to win. So it's a lot easier to side with the resistance in Star Wars when they're just fighting conventionally against the empire. I think a much better depiction of resistance can be seen in Star Trek Deep Space Nine with the Bajorans. They fought the Cardasians in a guerilla war which often led to civilians on both sides being killed. It's a lot more murky but the Bajorans are still unequivocally viewed as the good guys since it was the only way to resist and get rid of the Cardasians and stop them from killing their people.
Complicated problems do not have simple solutions.
Because this is fiction, where there is good and evil, right and wrong, the good people are rewarded and the bad people punished, successful people earned it and the poor deserve it, and complex problems have simple answers. Where every argument only has a pro and a contra.
But we are living in reality, where most things are in shades of grey, and everything is more complex than it appears. People have to make decisions based on partial knowledge, to not get stuck in indecisiveness. Where even the middle ground solution might be wrong. And with so many distractions and propaganda.
Just be kind and understanding to other people with different ideas, the real world is a complex one, and easy to get lost. Sometimes people like to flee into their simple worlds of populism, maybe through talking and listening we can help them find their way again.
Turns out siding with the resistance in a movie doesn't cost anything. It doesn't have the potential to have your family tracked and killed by the state. It doesn't have the potential for you to end up even worse off than you already are.
A lot of people side with their own resistances in the real world, but there's a reason all of the resistance fighters in the movies are beaten-down, destitute people. They've got nothing to lose. We've still got our bread and circuses, so we don't have the fight.
Imagine a movie where some random guys and a scientist need to find a cure to a zombie outbreak or some chemical attack. They did it, we saved the world, now people just have to take our medicine. Uhm, seems kinda rushed. Are zombies even real? My cousin said he knows a guy who worked with a guy who took it and now he's blind from birth.
I legit have no idea what side he's advocating for. I'm inclined to say Palatine, since that's the side that's completely out classed and is getting eradicated by the opposition. But I know Israel views them selves like this too, because it is surrounded by people that want it gone. What a conundrum, almost as if fucking star wars, a space fairy tale about literal good and evil clashing isn't a good analogy to real life.
Most if not all of these have one side that is clearly in the wrong. Real life is more complicated. Conflicts are usually gray vs. grey, with both sides having identifiable faults and justifications. But even then, if you spent all your time seeing the world from the perspective of certain designated protagonists you'll likely sympathize with them anyway.
And people do exactly what they did for those movies. Sit on the side and watch and hope...
So...
Movies are a couple hours long.
In reality we don’t have a plot line. We have millions of plot lines on repetition.
Real life morality means thinking about the really long term. And in the really long term the resistance fighters of the past are now the authoritarians you want to be a resistance fighter against.
This is why people are skeptical of resistance fighters, and demand more of them than merely being in that position on the board. They have to be the right people, fighting for the right thing. And those people aren’t always the ones who look most romantic.
In real life the "badies" think of themselves as "goodies", so what some see as "goodies" vs "badies" others will see as "badies" vs "goodies".
I mean, it would be really nice if the "badies" were going around openly admitting they're hurting other people because of the pain of others makes them feel good or that they simply want to take their shit and not to have to worry about payback "because we killed the fuckers", but that's not what they do: they give justifications like "they attacked us, we're just defending ourselves", "they're the ones who want to hurt/genocide us", or even "we have Western (i.e. good) values whilst they're human animals" (if this sounds a lot like Zionists propaganda points, that's because they are, though it's really a more general "Fascist etnostate"-speak genre).
The problem is that both sides see themselves as the resistance.
Obligatory Independent contractors working on the uncompleted death star...
And which side in the real world is the "resistance"? The one that is portrayed by state sponsored media? The one that has a president in the White House? The one that dominates modern culture? If you're a Democrat or a Republican, all of these statements apply to you, and you're not part of the resistance, you're part of the institution.
Just don't pay to much attention to Starship Troopers.
Who do we associate with the power being resisted against in reality? Governments? Politicians? Police? Corporations? The ultra wealthy? Religious institutions? One person's "bad guy" is another person's "good guy".
It's because they have happy endings. It gives the opposite effect due to that. The rebels win, everyone makes it out alive, we get to sit in the garden with our blonde children under a nice tree and never worry about saving the world again.
It's placating. Imagine going up to a Walmart and the doors are blocked with on fire cars, because the guys fighting for a union are not taking no for an answer, imagine the bosses office gets pipebombed, or moltov'd, that's what it would take, people won't go that far when they're placated emotionally. Walmart goes to some very high extremes to fight unionizing, it would be horrible, they'd have to DO hazmats right, they'd have to stop the constant psychological warfare with their workers, they'd have to actually pay out a meaningful profit share not just $300 every quarter a head for a store that makes 2mil a day on average. It would mean they'd have to bring back middle management jobs to promote people to based on senority. Can you imagine?
I did watch Dexter and sided with a psychopath, but I wouldn't in real life.... or would I???? :-D
Stupid take, I don't know this person so not even sure which side he is talking about since all the sides use this argument precisely because people are stupid enough to make political decisions based on movies.
You played Half Life 2 as a resistance leader and killed like 200 cops in the first act. But when you drive past cops in real life you do nothing. Curious.
This kind of stories rely on the same narratives that mass media : their is obvious injustice, and a way to fight it. Maybe if the first part of that stories spoke to us from the dominant side, it would be way more effective.
Andor showing us that agent from imperial political police want stability, to feed their family, and being respected. The Witcher, where a lot of people speak about Scoiatel as a racist group.
It shall not be something like "both side are equally evil" but "what make people act like that ? And Who have the choice, and who don't ?".
The brown coats!
Weird. I dont remember Neo murdering civilians and then parading their naked bodies around while pelting them stones. I also dont recall the rebel founding charta mentioning something about a holy war of eradication against all clones in the galaxy.
Maybe, just maybe, the real isnt like a neat 3 hour film with clearly established sides and maybe we could acknowledge that neither Hamas nor the fucking IDF is remotely close to being good. But nah, that would require us to not make cheap point for likes on twitter.
I'm not sure which of my endless multitude of sins or lack of action you're referring to. Can you be specific?
Despite being a Socialist sympathetic to Anarchism, I hate these fucking homilies. Movies, except for some labeled "nonfiction", are not made to represent reality as it is. They are made to express an emotion. Of course, it's important to note that good and evil do exist, and laws are not always good, but so what? This is just worthless to read! What have I really learned from this that I haven't before? How does this help people achieve good? What's new here?
On an aesthetic note, I hate this tweet, and I have always hated Twitter, especially when it shows up on other sites. It's been a problem since 2017. Putting "Wild." at the end makes this snot look even more pretentious.
Nuance
what is this some sort of district propo
Ah yeah that scene in Star Wars where the Empire was minding its own business and then a couple of rebels parachuted in to massacre, abduct and rape civilians by the hundreds.
Facts.
Well just keep voting blue and hope things change
I mean this in all good intentions but a lot of these examples don't really work.
The hunger games is a mess and I do remember the "good" side was also super not cool.
Star wars is even worse since the rebels even after winning things got much worse, so yeah now I cheer for the empire when watching the old movies.
I even back in the day thought the machines had a better point then the humans in the matrix movies.
No one watched Divergent, so who knows?
And in V for Vendetta the whole hook is the story gets you to sympathize with a literal terrorist. Like really a main point of the story is to question authority and not blindly follow like this post expects people to do.
Wild.
