I'm sorry a lot of other people are yelling at you. They shouldn't do that.
I think there is a problem with this, though, and it basically goes like this:
The particular subset of the population who wants to de-fang, censor, and bowdlerize everything to fit their own ethos cannot say, "Get rid of James Bond. We don't like him. He's misogynistic, and we don't like his pro-British Crown ideas, either." They can't do that because everybody would say, "No." Bluntly, plainly, definitively.
So, they don't say that. They say, "Add a warning to the movies, take out a few words from the books. What's a few words? What's a warning? Is that a big deal?" And a lot of people say, "Oh, is that all you want? Sure."
But later - maybe a little later or a long time later - they'll be back. "Hey, take out some more words. Hey, we see sales are evenly split between the originals and the expurgated versions. Maybe we just ramp up production on the censored copies and see what happens?" And because people don't necessarily look that closely, they buy the version with the shiny, new dust jacket. "NEW EDITION!" say the books' covers and people buy them until the publisher quietly stops publishing the originals.
Next it's using AI to digitally remove the sexist parts of old Bond. Pussy Galore becomes something like "Angel Wings," and Bond's "I must be dreaming" line *sorta* makes sense and after a big "How could you!?" from all of us long-time fans, the next generation either forgets Bond entirely or just takes in the "improved" version who champions only the ideals of the protestors.
Now, if people want to drop a story or not engage with a piece of media, that's fine. But why take it away from others?
Basically, I think it's one of the times applying "slippery slope" is not a fallacy. It's catering to a small sub-culture at the expense of the people who actually want these stories. Remember: Bond fans don't like this. It isn't the people who like Bond who have a problem with him, it's people who don't. Why are they trying to take it over?
Not to mention the fact that Ian Fleming is dead and cannot weigh in. This is all done without the permission of the author (or the original films' directors, writers, and stars).
Or, far put with more elegance, insight, and vitriol, here is the Coda from Fahrenheit 451 - both by Ray Bradbury:
https://katherinesmithth.weebly.com/uploads/9/7/1/7/9717809/coda_from_ray_bradbury_for_fahrenheit_451.pdf
He ably and dare-I-say poetically puts forward the case for not catering to special interest groups at all.
PS
Now, with all that said, I do think that the existence of warnings, along with other content warnings, can be okay. I am more worried about what is done to the books. However, I do wonder if we are heading towards censored versions of films now that we have deepfake technology and AI and so forth. But I'm not vehemently against warnings. I will say this, however, allowing warnings for viewpoints (sexism, e.g.) instead of for content (violence, e.g.) might wind up with some odd, laughable, cringe-worthy warnings. "Rated R for violence, strong language, and Republicanism," or "PG-13 some crude humour, drug references, and arguments for open borders."
reply
share