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.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      32 years ago

      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

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          12 years ago

          Good behavior is about having empathy, not mocking how people view the entire universe. I don’t like how the middle east isn’t as progressive as the west, and I don’t like how they don’t have as much empathy for gay people as the west does now. But mocking an entire religious community - a community that extends far beyond the middle east - for not being peaceful, doesn’t make sense when the west succeeded in bringing imperialism to the entire world. Especially when the west hated gay people for most of that time.

          It’s easier to discuss these issues when you don’t have to worry about your school being bombed the next day. It’s easier to have empathy for the western values of diversity, while not having to worry about the west bombing you because of religion

          • @[email protected]
            link
            fedilink
            12 years ago

            Can you show me where I mocked them? Or are you too busy trying your whataboutism out there?

            The thing about acting on bigotry is it takes effort. If you secretly are homophobic no one will know or care.

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                12 years ago

                Hmm. Is there a particular reason why you would associate Islam with warfare? I am asking you because you assumed I was being sarcastic without clarifying first.

                Oh feel free to get in another whataboutism rant. You must be feeling the itch by now.

                • @[email protected]
                  link
                  fedilink
                  12 years ago

                  Lol you’re dumb, you don’t have an argument you’re just shit talking. But keep talking about what abouttism as if you know anything about logical fallacies

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      5
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      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.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        12 years ago

        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 :/

        • NoneOfUrBusiness
          link
          fedilink
          32 years ago

          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.

          True enough, but it also means “surrender”, and that’s the intended meaning: surrendering your will to Allah.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          12 years ago

          I don’t like centralized religions either, and I think I agree with your points. But I’m just saying the line “The X of peace” is either so generic that it is a bland description of any ideology. All ideology hides it’s violence behind self defense, and are therefore “peaceful”. Or it implies that they are particularly peaceful, so it’s a description of non-violent. But few ideologies would identify as non violent, and so they would not use that term to describe themselves.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    1082 years ago

    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.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      122 years ago

      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.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        112 years ago

        It’s not about the book, it’s not even about sexuality. Yes these are the justifications they use, but at the core it’s all about finding someone they can hurt, and they found you. The cruelty is the point.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          32 years ago

          This seems a bit oversimplified ? I am no scholar, but as far as I can tell it’s phobias all the way down : these islamic lawmakers (certainly not using the term muslim here as I reserve it to refer to decent religious people) don’t know shit about homosexuality, and as we know ignorance holds the door open for bigotry and hate. This quickly becomes self-perpetuating as gay folks have no way of changing that status quo without risking their lives, and become invisible in these societies. I would say it’s about difference, and difference in sexuality certainly

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      662 years ago

      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.

      • NoneOfUrBusiness
        link
        fedilink
        142 years ago

        I’ll just mention that in the middle east the vast majority of people don’t support LGBT rights. Bringing up the separation of church and state makes no sense in this context.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          152 years ago

          They don’t support those rights cause they have been brainwashed by their religion. Maybe if religion was removed from government, that wouldn’t be the case, at least not to this extent.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        2
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        So what? should you bring your “democracy” over there? It happens in Kuweit (8000km away) for a stupid american movie.

        I am rather 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

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    292 years ago

    Lmao. Just goes to show that even the most “liberal” part of the Middle East is still a shithole country.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      102 years ago

      Lebanon is not liberal, their homosexuality law is still on the books and 80% of the country is opposed to normalizing homosexuality.

  • Puppy
    link
    fedilink
    472 years ago

    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

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      62 years ago

      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.

    • Pandantic [they/them]
      link
      fedilink
      32 years ago

      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.

    • BruceTwarzen
      link
      fedilink
      132 years ago

      This is actually a good argument for these cultists. Are you playing god now? Let him punish these evil people minding their own business

      • NoneOfUrBusiness
        link
        fedilink
        32 years ago

        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.

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                22 years ago

                As long as you’re being consistent. But sadly, I don’t think that’s possible. I wish people could just use their heads instead of following some dumbshit set of rules written thousands of years ago, but unfortunately it’s not really gonna happen.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              12 years ago

              It was a factor in my leaving my birth faith. Seeing the differences between what the books said and how people acted and the how modern morality didn’t match up with the books.

              Morality, like everything else, evolves. Religions try to freeze it in a fixed place. Fetishizes the past, making the living enslaved to the dead. Mohammed and Jesus and Moses and the Buddha are to be perfect people for us.

          • NoneOfUrBusiness
            link
            fedilink
            02 years ago

            See, this is a logically consistent position. Not one that I agree with, but better than the guy I was replying to at least.

        • Puppy
          link
          fedilink
          14
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          It’s not even about “liberalism” or “conservative” mentality. It’s just common sense really. How the fuck does homosexuals hurt you in any way? Nothing. They don’t hurt anybody. They cannot magically turn you gay, you are born gay - or not. That’s all. Now this will never stop being a thing. It was a thing 25,000 years ago, it will be a thing in 25,000 years from there, it’s a thing in the animal kingdom, it’s not a disease you can transmit, nobody ever turned gay at 40 years old like “sheesh fuck vaginas, I like penis now”. Like what the fuck? If you are against homosexuals, you are pretty much against whatever god your parents told you to believe in, because it’s natural. It’s a creation of said gods.

          The more people figure that out, the faster we can actually focus on real issues that ARE actually affecting us all; economy, inflation, climate change, job crisis, pandemics, heat waves, hurricanes, healthcare, etc. THOSE ARE REAL CONCERNS IN THE REAL WORLD.

          Drop the fucking stupid bullshit with gays, lesbians, abortions and religions, those are all non-issues that doesn’t matter in the end. This isn’t 1532, we are in 2023 for fuck sake

          • NoneOfUrBusiness
            link
            fedilink
            1
            edit-2
            2 years ago

            It’s not even about “liberalism” or “conservative” mentality. It’s just common sense really. How the fuck does homosexuals hurt you in any way? Nothing. They don’t hurt anybody.

            Yes, that’s what I meant by liberalism. The idea that as long as you don’t harm people around you you should be allowed to do whatever, also called the harm principle. Anyway, I’m not here to debate moral systems; just saying that the attempt I replied to was weak even if you agree with the conclusion.

              • NoneOfUrBusiness
                link
                fedilink
                12 years ago

                Basically while I can understand arguments stemming from “they don’t hurt you”, the guy I replied to’s attempt was weak, that’s all.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    42 years ago

    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.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    342 years ago

    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.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    102 years ago

    A lot of country looks beautiful to visit, especially in middle-east, but governed by fascists or homophobes or whatever, it’s sad :-(

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      212 years ago

      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.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      12 years ago

      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.

  • pitninja
    link
    fedilink
    472 years ago

    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.

    • cookie
      link
      fedilink
      5
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      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.

      • pitninja
        link
        fedilink
        42 years ago

        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.

        • cookie
          link
          fedilink
          22 years ago

          No disagreements with you there. Just trying to play devil’s advocate to see where the reasoning could have possibly come from :\

    • Veraticus
      link
      fedilink
      262 years ago

      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.

    • kn0wmad1c
      link
      fedilink
      7
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      I also have no idea what they’re talking about with promoting body transformation

      Well, there is the

      spoiler

      last line in the movie