Tory MP Nick Fletcher #sexist #conspiracy

Tory MP Nick Fletcher #sexist #conspiracy crooksandliars.com

A British member of Parliament claimed this week that men are being forced into committing crimes because fictional male characters like James Bond and Doctor Who are being replaced by women.

During prepared remarks on Thursday, Tory MP Nick Fletcher made the assertion that "men need to have their own identity."

"Everywhere, not least during the cultural sphere, there seems to be a call from a tiny yet very vocal minority that every male character or good role model must have a female replacement," he complained. "One only needs to look at the discussions surrounding the next James Bond."

"And it's not just James Bond," the MP continued. "In recent years, we have seen Doctor Who, Ghostbusters, Luke Skywalker, the Equalizer all replaced by women."

Fletcher went on to insist that most male role models are now villains.

"Is there any wonder we are seeing so many young men committing crime?" he asked. "These programs make crime look cool. Trust me, a lifetime in prison is not cool."

Actress Jodie Whittaker made history in 2017 as the first woman to play the iconic Doctor Who character.

21 comments

…Dafuq? So, in short, more fictional female heroes equals more RL men in prison? And this is a parliament member?

Look, first of all, James Bond becoming a woman isn’t set in stone yet, and plenty of feminists even argue against it. A female hero should stand on her own, not be a “female version of a male hero”, you know. Also, my opinions on the SW sequel trilogy aside (and Luke’s own controversial portrayal), I actually like it that the SW galaxy isn’t so much of a sausagefest anymore. Ahsoka Tano for one is an awesome & badass character!

And, let me tell you something, OP, I’m a man myself. Yet in RPG games where you can play as either gender (or even just regular games with a set MC), such as AC Odyssey & Valhalla, Dragon Age Inquisition, Mass Effect, etc., I actually like playing as a badass female just as much as a badass male. Femshep, Jill Valentine, Eivor Varinsdottir, Rivet, Lara Croft, etc. They’re all awesome and I don’t regret the medium giving us more of that. And they’re just the playable characters.

Was James Bond ever meant to be a ‘good role model’? He’s been described as an assassin, an extrajudicial executioner.

How different is he really from The Man With The Golden Gun - Francisco Scaramanga?

1. Doctor Who wasn't replaced by a woman, this regeneration turned the doctor into one. Not exactly the same thing.
2. Even if it was a male Rey in the new series, what they did to Luke was a disgrace. But Star Wars is bit and diverse enough that a female lead is just fine. Case in point Rogue One. I might have missed them, but can't say I recall any complaints about there being a female lead in that one.
3. I'm not sure an occasionally rapey serial philanderer and ruthless government black ops spy/hitman sort of character like James Bond SHOULD be a role model.
4. People rebelled against the 2016 Ghostbusters because lots of people thought it wasn't well written and the reaction by the studio was toxic. Plus, 1/4th if the original team was a bit questionable if you considered Venkman a role model and not just a fun to watch character.

How do you get from "These male characters were replaced by women" to "And therefore violent crime"? It's not like people can't watch the original stuff, they aren't scrubbing things from the records. People generally tend to view a character swap (gender, race, sexuality, etc) as an annoying gimmick, especially if they don't really do anything with it. New and original ideas coupled with well written characters is a better way to get diversity that "Well, Captain DeathPunch now is a woman. Have we told you they are a woman now?"

@Timjer #105222

Heck, I don’t think the Sequel Trilogy doesn’t deserve the hate it gets. I agree with many criticisms but I also think the general themes and what the story was trying to get at are perfectly valid…

* Like how the mess with Starkiller blowing up the Hosnian System and the denialism leading up to it reflects the lesson of never being complacent.

* Had the New Republic not ditched most of their military and kept a regular eye on the Imperial Remnant and their little government in the Unknown Regions and not be so certain that tyranny could never return. I support Two-State solutions but even then, if a state in question is repressive, an eye should be kept on them, lest they try to take over the free society. Also, bad ideas must be challenged so they become less popular.

* Ep. 8 shows the dangers of both impatience and the dangers of poor communication. What many detractors don’t realize is that Holdo was not meant to be 100% right. It also made sense to have her and not Ackbar in that role because Ackbar would’ve handled things better. The story needed a fresh face that kinda “green” and a bit loopy, personality-wise. The point was that Holdo didn’t have to reveal the plan but she should have stated that one existed but must be kept under wraps for security reasons due to spies. Had she stated there was a secret plan, perhaps Poe, Finn & Rose wouldn’t have jumped the gun and had the whole thing ruined by a goofy stuttering Hobo Hipster Hacker whose “name” is the initials of his personal credo (’Don’t Join’).

* The whole thing with Snoke being a puppet for Palpy and Palpy being Rey’s granddad may sound incredibly stupid at first but it’s not any weirder than the “Vader is Luke’s father” in the turn of the 1980s. What’s more shocking than a heroic farm boy finding out the scary black-masked villain is really his own father? A heroic scavenger girl finding out her grandpa is the ultimate Big Bad of Star Wars!

* The franchise tends to correct things after the fact and fill out plot holes. Stuff not filled out will be fleshed out in future stories. It seems Disney & Lucasfilm is taking the “symbiosis with fans” and “come up with ideas and see what works”, minor characters get future stories in comics or whatnot if the fans show and interest and other characters are forgotten or underused. The Sequel also tried to end things in a way that further stories could go in a number of directions. After seeing the “Reylos vs. Anti-Reylos” mess play out, they kinda catered to both in the end for “Pro-Reylos”, the door can still be open for Ben’s return.

* Same holds true for “Stormpilot”: They couldn’t have a blatantly gay subplot because Disney also markets to a bunch of other countries who hate LGBTQs and Disney wants to make money… so they feel they have no choice but hint that a character might be gay (LeFou from the live-action ‘BatB’, Artie from ‘Cruella’, etc.) or have something that can be edited out without affecting the plot when exported (Gay-Female Resistance Doctor / X-Wing pilot smooch). It’s cowardly but that’s “business”. Locally, however, “Stormpilot” can still be a thing.

… People are finally coming around to the Prequels for its message so the same should be the case for the Sequels, someday.

@SpukiKitty02 #105235

You have some very good points in defense of the sequels. And while I don’t disagree, I do think the themes and ideas could have been executed better and more clearly. Plus, while I have nothing against Rey being the MC (and don’t see her as a Mary Sue either), it shouldn’t have come at the cost of derailing Luke’s accomplishments and viewpoint so much. Also, Finn’s character arc was criminally underused and I wish we could have had the New Republic actually do something instead of existing just to be destroyed. Not to mention for a franchise called “Star Wars”, there was a suspicious lack of epic space battles in the sequels. I wanted at least the Battle of Exegol to be more like the Battle of Endor or the Battle of Coruscant, you know? Instead, we hardly got to see the ships fight. Was it too much to ask to see two of my favorite ships from the sequels (the MC85 and the Resurgent-class) actually duke it out?

But I actually think the whole “Sidious is still alive and behind everything” isn’t bad at all. The same happened in the Dark Empire story from Legends (including planet killers, a secret base planet, and a clone body); it’s just that it should have been foreshadowed more instead of coming out of nowhere in the end and then clumsily retconned as “it was always like that”. Still, I suppose the retconning to fill in plot holes is slowly but steadily working. But I still stand by the fact that the films themselves shouldn’t have needed Expanded Universe retcons to function.

The Thirteenth Doctor? Newsflash:

One day I shall come back, yes I shall come back, as a woman. Until then, there must be no regrets, no tears, no anxieties. Just go forward in all your beliefs and prove to me that I am not mistaken in mine

The above quote was by William Hartnell: The First Doctor.

In the 1960s.

James Bond? By buying MGM, Amazon now owns that franchise. They're as forward thinking as the BBC were decades ago: as proved by the above. I have no tears about there being female secret agents as much as a renegade Time Lord who regenerated into a Time Lady. Black Widow. Kim Possible. Najica Hiiragi.

Masculinity threatened much, Nicky-boy...?!

Then you wonder why Benedict Cumberbatch was so scathing about Toxic Masculinity nary a week ago? He doesn't feel threatened by women in any way. Nor do I.

So what's your excuse...?!

God, can you imagine female versions of superior male characters? A girl version of Batman? Or lady Superman? A she-version of the Hulk? What gender-maddened wasteland would await the poor souls damned by wokeness to live in that hellscape world?

I swear, some people are so desperate for the scantest ghost of relevancy, they'll make up any old excuse to revive the moldering corpse of Mary Whitehouse.

I just hear him say "Waaah! That woman just took a slice of my pie, and I don't get the whole pie to myself!"

Way to portray men as pathetic losers, Nicky.

So, if your theory was true then we would have seen a drop of crime among women since the recent years.

Actress Jodie Whittaker made history in 2017 as the first woman to play the iconic Doctor Who character.

Erm, that already happened in 1999 with Joanna Lumley in The Curse of Fatal Death.

Given the nature of the character of Dr. Who it was only a matter of time before a New form was female. You can complain about the quality of the new season all you wasn't but there was nothing stopping the character from resurrecting as a woman.

Wait till the OP hears about a little something called Rule 63...!

@kuyohashi #105262

I see what you did there. May I also add this gal?…
image
… Yup, it’s nothing new.

Can you imagine the reverse? WONDER MAAAAAAAN!

Funny that as a man I'm not pushed to crimes because of that. If you're pushed to be a horrible person because of women taking roles, you were always a sociopath. You just didn't want the responsibility.

@Timjer #105238

Agreed on many counts. Finn was really underused and a lot of stuff should have been done better. I’m not too bothered by Luke being a broken old man because, if you went through what he went through and felt all that guilt, that would mess you up. The point of his arc was him getting his groove back. When he force-projected himself on Crait, he was “back”! Also, the Jedi had a lot of stuff wrong with them and Luke realized that. So, in the end, a new Jedi-order would be a lot different from the old and not make the same mistakes as before and not be so rigid.

Also, Luke’s “death” was more like a transformation into an immortal being. I think Force - Ghosts are beings who’ve transcended death. Luke and Leia are still alive and well and are in a more awesome Divine state.

I also like to think there is a remnant of the Republic, Republic folks who weren’t in the Hosnian System when it got nuked. They need something to build things upon after the whole thing is said and done. Heck, perhaps a Federation would make more sense. All those planets could be sovereign nations in their own way. I think there were some places that were not part of the Republic. A Galaxy with a period of time without a Galactic Republic would likely not be a Mad Max chaos world.

@SpukiKitty02 #105345

Can you imagine the reverse? WONDER MAAAAAAAN!

There's no need to imagine. Here he is. I found that while looking for another Wonder Man I was familiar with. Apparently Marvel also has one.

Wow, you must think men are pathetic losers if you think they'll just be doomed to a life of crime if they aren't spoonfed images of men being the center of attention at all times. You can just make your own stories, too, you know.

@Spacewyrm #105367

WOW! I meant it in jest… but they exist!

Well… “YOU GO, BOY!”

“Fletcher went on to insist that most male role models are now villains.”
But if Breaking Bad starred Wilhemina White, rising to power in the male-dominated drug world, the writers would be accused of misogyny and unreal story lines.
Same if the Boys were The Gals, superpowered women who are corrupted by their power. God, imagine the Rule 34 entries if The Deep was a female character.