Lebanon, Kuwait Poised to Ban ‘Barbie’ for Promoting Homosexuality
Lebanon, Kuwait Poised to Ban ‘Barbie’ for Promoting Homosexuality
Lebanon, once thought of as among the most liberal parts of the Middle East, is poised to ban global hit movie “Barbie.” More conservative Kuwait said Wednesday that it had gone ahead with a ban du…
Lebanon, once thought of as among the most liberal parts of the Middle East, is poised to ban global hit movie “Barbie.” More conservative Kuwait said Wednesday that it had gone ahead with a ban due to its promotion of homosexuality.
It's disgusting that homosexuality is seen as such an abhorrent thing in this day and age. Are all humans not capable of love? If the answer is a resounding yes, then why are we stopping consenting adults from expressing this? Because of some archaic scripture from thousands of years ago? Excuse my French here, Lebanon, but kindly get to fuck.
This is exactly why the separation of church and state is supposed to exist in democracies. The zealots will continue to take away your rights until morale improves.
So what? should you bring your "democracy" over there? It happens in Kuweit (8000km away) for a stupid american movie.
I am more shocked by the amount of money this dump made, it gives quite an indication on the level of maturity of this f'd up society.
Yes I know, i'm uncool
As a gay man, these are my thoughts every single day. Do I not deserve love? Is some old book really more important than what's happening now? I just don't get it.
Maybe I'm desensitized, but I honestly don't remember any gay moments in this movie. There are obviously plenty of guys wearing really "flamboyant" outfits, but it was contrasted with their toxic masculinity (i.e. behavior mostly associated with the types of people who actually tend to be homophobic), which is what made it so goddamn funny.
And I also have no idea what they're talking about with promoting body transformation. Unless you know going in that the one actress is trans, you might not even guess she is. The main joke that even references genitalia is making fun of the fact that the Barbie and Ken dolls have nothing there...
And all this is beside the point anyway. Modern societies shouldn't be catering to the precious feefees of religious/conservative snowflakes. They can just choose not to see this movie instead of ruining it for everyone.
I think the argument is that allowing women agency and asking men to define themselves through something other than their relationship with women is gay. So basically, violating patriarchy is gay.
It’s a pretty stupid definition.
I also have no idea what they’re talking about with promoting body transformation
Well, there is the
spoiler
last line in the movie
They'd hate Pinocchio in that case
I saw it in the trailer too but just in case, upcoming spoiler: maybe the whole beaching each other off scene? I can't think of any others besides that, which if it is the one, then that's kind of funny in a ridiculous way.
Good point, but I feel like they could probably just translate that scene without having the innuendo (like the direct translation for "beach off" probably doesn't sound anything like the translation of "beat off", so it would become more of a whimsical non sequitur directly translated).
I think there's a fair amount in this movie that doesn't really translate well outside American/Western culture anyway. For me, that scene was funny because it's repeating a pun that points to the Ken characters' innocence when in the real world, they'd be mocked mercilessly by some people. And it forces the audience to think about their own reactions when insecure straight men sometimes follow sentences like that jokingly with, "no homo," to point out that, despite unintentionally saying something that sounded kind of gay, they are not in fact gay. At any rate, I don't see this scene as an endorsement of homosexuality, but rather a commentary on society's fixation on hypermasculine language.
Even if it was the case, what's wrong about homosexuality? Who the fuck cares who fuck who? We have one life. Let people live like they fucking want. End of the story, end of the argument. If there's a god, let that god be the judge of it. The rest is none of your god damn business
These people are happy when they make other people miserable. That’s all it ever was.
This is actually a good argument for these cultists. Are you playing god now? Let him punish these evil people minding their own business
As a Muslim I can understand arguments stemming from liberalism, but this one makes no sense. Islam is pretty clear about what should be done with known homosexuals, and leaving them alone isn't it. Again, I can understand not agreeing with the principle from the start, but the "let God deal with it" is illogical.
Religion was, and still is, about power and control over others. Observant people in the past noticed that homosexuals didn't produce as many (if any) children compared to others. Less children means less bodies for your army. A smaller army means less power. Less power means less control. Therefore religions focused on power and control hate homosexuals.
It’s the new crusades- they can’t kill you, but they can make sure you can’t do anything they don’t like because of their religion, even if it kills you.
I have seen the movie, and I am still wondering where it is supposed to promote homosexuality. Neither Barbie nor Ken give any such vibes. Only thing Ken seems to suffer is a permanent case of blue balls, even if he lacks the equipment...
You're assuming that they're honest about their reasons, which is not the case.
The main message of the film (besides being a 2h ad for Mattel) is gender equality and female empowerment.
This threatens these people more than homosexuality, but I imagine even for them saying "we don't want our women to even imagine a world where they're not subservient to men" would be a tough sell.
Far fewer people are willing to stand up to defend the LGBT community so they're a convenient scapegoat ('conservatives' will always find a group small enough to target in order to push their unpopular policies, it just works).
This is a very good point, thanks for bringing it up.
Todd bless
The beach you off joke between the Ken's could be construed as gay
That would need quite some construction.
Lmao, permanent case of blue ball is an accurate description I've never thought of
Religion is a cancer on this world.
The planet is on fucking fire and we are all heading towards the next planetary extinction event, but alah forgive we have a single homosexual reference in a fucking movie.
There isn’t even any explicit reference to homosexuality in the movie, anyway.
Whatever. I’m sure Mattel is crying on the 1billion dollars the movie made.
I don't think the news story is that Mattel is losing a little money from a small market. I think the news story is the oppression
Of course. People who want to see it will see it, even if it means piracy. And that’s why piracy is inherently good and it won’t damage the company much so it doesn’t really matter.
I'm confused. Who in Barbie is gay? Kens whole thing is he's utterly obsessed with her...
I’m guessing that it’s due to general flamboyance? Ken saying he’s going to “beach off” the other Ken and wearing pink may have triggered their 4th grade cooties sensor.
Yeah honestly as a gay woman myself I thought there wasn't enough LGBT representation. Apparently there are two barbies who kiss on a couch at one point but it was so quick I didn't see it, my friend had to tell me about it. There really wasn't a lot of any sort of sexuality in the movie. Which makes sense, they don't have genitalia.
Lmao. Just goes to show that even the most "liberal" part of the Middle East is still a shithole country.
Lebanon is not liberal, their homosexuality law is still on the books and 80% of the country is opposed to normalizing homosexuality.
Translation: Ken makes me feel funny "down there" and I don't like it.
I mean lebanon is slowly becoming more progressive if it wasn't for it's government that is corrupt as hell. Though many smart lebanese just leave for western nations because the standard of living is higher even if your broke.
abrahamic faiths fucking suck
I mean Florida probably isn't far behind....
Florida, the middle east of the US (?)
"Following Sunday prayers, Sheikh Ron al Dee'santiz issued a fatwah against the Barbie Movie, decrying it as 'against the law of Abraham' and 'promoting deviant Western concepts around women, homosexuality and the place of Yahweh in our lives.'"
Imagine getting this worked up about a movie for little girls.
You should still go watch it, it's a good movie, or so I've heard.
It is good, but it is not really for little girls.
It's a movie about toys for little girls, but the movie itself is not for little girls.
Is one of those films that little children and adults will both enjoy, for different reasons. Like The Simpsons.
Jokes aren't as funny if you explain them...
Will it be dubbed for other languages eventually? Cinemas only show the English version and my youngest who still play with Barbies doesn't understand English well enough.
It's not actually for little kids. I'd def recommend watching before bringing your little
Movies are a great way to learn a foreign language and subtitles work wonders to increase reading speed. Especially when they don't give you a choice to fall back to a dub.
Source: me, having to watch Cartoon Network as a small child with no translation at all, became proficient in English by the 5th grade in a country where English is not spoken at all, other than when being (poorly) taught at school.
So rather than seeking out dubs you should avoid them as much as possible.
A lot of country looks beautiful to visit, especially in middle-east, but governed by fascists or homophobes or whatever, it's sad :-(
Lebanon is a corrupt nation, $70 billion in funds robbed from citizens' accounts, just toady, U.S. Treasury sanctions imposed on the bank governor, Riad Corrupt Salameh, and a privileged corrupt class that appears more inclined to witness the nation's devastation than to accept responsibility. A significant portion of the population grapples with poverty, struggling to afford even basic sustenance, let alone the luxury of viewing films prohibited by a corrupt Lebanese government. Conversely, Kuwait possesses the world's most valuable currency and boasts a substantial sovereign wealth fund approaching the trillion-dollar mark. With unparalleled purchasing prowess, they could outmatch Warner Bros. effortlessly should they choose to do so.
Religion ruins everything.
Funny, I was just listening to the album this morning and was chuckling at the lyrics to one of the songs, which explicitly state no homo bro.
Religion of peace
I've never actually heard anyone use that line except people in alt-right circles, and I am around a lot of Muslims. It is not a term Muslims use to describe their religion, not that they would describe it differently, just that it is a strange description. It would be like calling Canada "the country of peace", which I guess is technically true because most countries want to avoid war and promote peace? But does not mean their military is non-violent.
The line is clearly used for the intent of creating a false contrast to make some made up point about hypocrisy.
Also as the other commenter pointed out, you are making a critique about the middle East, everyone agrees the middle East is dysfunctional.
Um, islam and peace in Arabic both come from the Arabic root س ل م, so to say that they aren't related is just wrong.
Most religions have/had a very strong violent aspect directly related to them. (Crusades, Israel's Torah "backed" colonization, India creating a hindu state, etc.).
Everyone is free to believe what they want but imposing something on others is not cool :/
Have some perspective, the middle east has been radicalized by war since the time the west hated gays and people of color. But now since the majority of Western powers has progressed past this for like 10 years out of the last 80 that we've been involved in these conflicts, they're the savages?
It would be much easier for civil discourse to mature in these countries if most of the people weren't traumatized by the predominantly Christian imperialist countries.
Unfortunately, conflict is always going to be more common in the middle east. The North American center of command [NOR-COM] barely touches the south American COM. America itself, shares borders with only two countries that it's allied with.
The middle east COM has 3 COMs around it, the most of any other. The geopolitics of this implies the other COMs are going to meddle in their affairs the most, since they're the buffer to other rival COMs
Being more liberal than the other parts doesn't mean liberal in general.
Funny name by the way (Lebanon).
The bathrobe as day clothes countries are not fans of gay people, shocking /s