But deplatforming JK Rowling doesn’t show anyone that she’s wrong—the only thing it proves is that there is a group of people large enough and loud enough and threatening enough to demand that she be silenced.

I think Austen really sinks in when you become a sarcastic tween like I did. The dry humor of Austen’s narrative voice was so relatable to me!

Same with the list of authors that Matilda reads. The original list of authors indicates that Matilda enjoys thinking of herself as a hero in an adventure story, which was a transgressive way of thinking for a little girl in the society she lived in; the “updated” version basically just says “this girl likes books.”

The change to Conrad and Kipling (and the addition of Jane Austen) is particularly notable, since it slightly shifts Matilda’s characterization. The original lists of authors indicates not only an interest in adventure and in imagining herself somewhere else, but it is also transgressive for the gender norms of her…

One wonders if modern sensitivity readers would favor replacing Kipling with a modern children’s author like, I don’t know, JK Rowling? Surely that reference would resonate more with kids these days.

Nepotism literally comes from the Latin for nephew, so... there’s that.

I don’t think you can have this kind of discussing without acknowledging that an actor’s ability to embody the role isn’t the only factor when it comes to casting.

I watched this movie out of curiosity after reading two competing reviews on Tablet Magazine, neither of which was positive. My takeaway was that the movie wanted the viewer to see the parents (especially Murphy and Dreyfus’ characters) as shallow and performative in their identities, but I just didn’t get the sense…

It’s not even a lack of awards, since she literally just broke the record for number of Grammies won. It’s just this one award.

Oh yeah, the goofiest I’ve ever seen actors on stage was in-between scenes during rehearsals of a play about the Holocaust. You have to get the grimdark out somehow.

I’m just saying the case profile has changed. It is entirely dishonest to pretend this is not the case.

However, it is the case that the types of gender dysphoria that were treated for the last five decades—consistent, insistent, persistent dysphoria about one’s body, basically since birth—is markedly different from the way the overwhelming majority of people coming out as trans now have presented. The overwhelming…

There’s literally an entire period of European history—the Migration Period—about Germanic tribes (described as such) running rampant over post-Roman society.

It’s not... just a white person thing, though? I had a native Hawaiian coworker married to a white man who called her kids Ebony and Ivory (ironically) because one looked fully Hawaiian and the other looked fully white.

It’s on the heir in Iran!

I am a sucker for rom-coms, so I will definitely be watching this, but can I just say that these two people look incredible? Ashton Kutcher really didn’t do anything for me when he was at the peak of his popularity, but he has aged like a fine wine. And Reese Witherspoon clearly got in on some Dorian Gray deal.

After I came out, my mom told my aunt that I was gay, and her reaction was, “what? He’s been out for years!”

I would find his “all I wanted was to have a normal life” shtick more believable and sympathetic if he weren’t spending all his time publicly condemning his family and agreeing to every interview request specifically to blame everything that’s ever gone wrong on his brother and father.

Based on his performance in Emily in Paris, I would err on the side of saying Laviscount is not super talented as an actor. I think ATJ would do a much better job.

Imagine my face when I say that, no, you are.