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Sure, like cautiously removing key words from Huckleberry Finn because words matter and its more important that people consume less Xanax than accurately reflec

Sure, like cautiously removing key words from Huckleberry Finn because words matter and its more important that people consume less Xanax than accurately reflect on the contemporary nature of historical setting in its linguistic context. Really though, its sanitizing. Even sanitize is too nice a word. Why not just call it what it is: selective censorship. Its pulling a Tipper Gore so that you can pretend to be a carefully concerned liberal in full hyper conservative hypocrisy[1][2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parents_Music_Resource_Center https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parents_Music_Resource_Center [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warning:_Parental_Advisory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warning:_Parental_Advisory

janalsncm 2y ago
These are fairy tales we’re talking about. Accurately representing a historical context was never the goal. Telling a compelling story is the goal, and to do that you need to adapt to your audience. The question is whether to choose broad appeal or narrow appeal. Narrow appeal is more salient to a smaller group of people. Most narrow appeal media won’t be profitable enough. So large companies target broad appeal media. It is good, but may be altered to broaden the appeal. For example Red Dawn 2012 changed the enemies from Chinese to North Korean because China has a huge middle class (potential customers) and North Korea does not, despite the fact that a Chinese invasion might be scarier or more plausible.
- austin-cheney 2y ago
  All the more reason to take historical accuracy seriously. These stories were intentionally written to scare the shit out of little children in immediate graphic horror, to give them paralyzing nightmares. The primary reason was to teach child to stay out out of the forest, or if absolutely necessary, then at the very least stay on the damn road and listen to their parents. The forest was a scary place full of beasts and bandits. People did not have cell phones. If a child got lost and injured in the forest they would probably starve to death, or if lucky, be devoured by wolves. Let's not censor this so Disney can sell cartoons to the sad and ignorant. Instead let's enjoy it for what it was as it was written. People would lose their damn minds if you took the same actions to remove the violence and sexual fantasy out of Shakespeare, which was pale in comparison.
  - janalsncm 2y ago
    The only plausibly defensible purpose of scaring kids was to scare them into staying safe. Not for the sake of scaring them. But if you’re actually interested in scaring children to protect them you should be writing stories about guns, car accidents and drugs, not wolves and witches.
    - kridsdale3 2y ago
      AFAIK many of the tales that Grimm collected were told in the context of Germany during the 100 year's war. Due to economic and geopolitical conditions of the times, it was literally true that the woods were full of predators. They were just human veterans of a lifetime of war and deprivation, rather than wolves. It was a very good idea to instill in your farm daughter the notion that the world out there is not safe, and don't trust people.
lukas099 2y ago
The race relations part of Huck Finn still is culturally relevant. We shouldn't lump it together with changing stories that aren't.
lolinder 2y ago
I see these as two completely different topics. One is about retelling classic stories in a way that is more relevant to modern audience. "Disney's The Little Mermaid" is most definitely not "Hans Christian Anderson's The Little Mermaid" and is never really presented as such. It's just a retelling of a story that happens to have been first told in some fashion by Hans Christian Anderson As a completely separate issue we have censorship, where Mark Twain or Roald Dahl have their works republished using words that are not their own but still using their name. That's deliberately confusing and masking historical context, and that's objectionable. To object to a retelling of a Hans Christian Anderson story is basically to advocate for unlimited copyright terms.
- austin-cheney 2y ago
  On one hand there are works like Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies. Its not a whitewashing of the original and its not trying to be. Even better is that it does a moderately good job of preserving the direction of the original story while adding absurd extensions like zombies and busty breasts overflowing their blouses. On the other hand there is Disney's Aladdin. Uggghhh, yeah, its a complete whitewash. Nobody knows what Aladdin really is any more. Call that a new original story about some goofy cartoon who sings songs with some blue vapor clown thing. Don't call it a fairy tale, because its not remotely related to the fairy tale of the same name. Its no different than spinning the historical tragedy of the Trail of Tears into some positive romantic comedy cartoon fantasy to sell movie tickets. Sure, you if look hard enough you might be able to find some sliver of an encounter to support your whitewash idea, but that doesn't make it savory.

janalsncm 2y ago

These are fairy tales we’re talking about. Accurately representing a historical context was never the goal. Telling a compelling story is the goal, and to do that you need to adapt to your audience. The question is whether to choose broad appeal or narrow appeal. Narrow appeal is more salient to a smaller group of people. Most narrow appeal media won’t be profitable enough. So large companies target broad appeal media. It is good, but may be altered to broaden the appeal. For example Red Dawn 2012 changed the enemies from Chinese to North Korean because China has a huge middle class (potential customers) and North Korea does not, despite the fact that a Chinese invasion might be scarier or more plausible.

austin-cheney 2y ago
All the more reason to take historical accuracy seriously. These stories were intentionally written to scare the shit out of little children in immediate graphic horror, to give them paralyzing nightmares. The primary reason was to teach child to stay out out of the forest, or if absolutely necessary, then at the very least stay on the damn road and listen to their parents. The forest was a scary place full of beasts and bandits. People did not have cell phones. If a child got lost and injured in the forest they would probably starve to death, or if lucky, be devoured by wolves. Let's not censor this so Disney can sell cartoons to the sad and ignorant. Instead let's enjoy it for what it was as it was written. People would lose their damn minds if you took the same actions to remove the violence and sexual fantasy out of Shakespeare, which was pale in comparison.
- janalsncm 2y ago
  The only plausibly defensible purpose of scaring kids was to scare them into staying safe. Not for the sake of scaring them. But if you’re actually interested in scaring children to protect them you should be writing stories about guns, car accidents and drugs, not wolves and witches.
  - kridsdale3 2y ago
    AFAIK many of the tales that Grimm collected were told in the context of Germany during the 100 year's war. Due to economic and geopolitical conditions of the times, it was literally true that the woods were full of predators. They were just human veterans of a lifetime of war and deprivation, rather than wolves. It was a very good idea to instill in your farm daughter the notion that the world out there is not safe, and don't trust people.

lukas099 2y ago

The race relations part of Huck Finn still is culturally relevant. We shouldn't lump it together with changing stories that aren't.

lolinder 2y ago

I see these as two completely different topics. One is about retelling classic stories in a way that is more relevant to modern audience. "Disney's The Little Mermaid" is most definitely not "Hans Christian Anderson's The Little Mermaid" and is never really presented as such. It's just a retelling of a story that happens to have been first told in some fashion by Hans Christian Anderson As a completely separate issue we have censorship, where Mark Twain or Roald Dahl have their works republished using words that are not their own but still using their name. That's deliberately confusing and masking historical context, and that's objectionable. To object to a retelling of a Hans Christian Anderson story is basically to advocate for unlimited copyright terms.

austin-cheney 2y ago
On one hand there are works like Pride, Prejudice, and Zombies. Its not a whitewashing of the original and its not trying to be. Even better is that it does a moderately good job of preserving the direction of the original story while adding absurd extensions like zombies and busty breasts overflowing their blouses. On the other hand there is Disney's Aladdin. Uggghhh, yeah, its a complete whitewash. Nobody knows what Aladdin really is any more. Call that a new original story about some goofy cartoon who sings songs with some blue vapor clown thing. Don't call it a fairy tale, because its not remotely related to the fairy tale of the same name. Its no different than spinning the historical tragedy of the Trail of Tears into some positive romantic comedy cartoon fantasy to sell movie tickets. Sure, you if look hard enough you might be able to find some sliver of an encounter to support your whitewash idea, but that doesn't make it savory.