i feel like this is greatly simplifying what has actually happened. james gunn made those tweets long before the first guardians movie came out and has since apologized for them and pledged to do better. disney was aware of these tweets when they hired him. james gunn has also been outspoken about his views against trump, earning him hate from the far right.
but this right wing guy named mike cernovich, who is known for creating fake outrages like pizzagate, and has made disgusting rape tweets of his own, dredged up the tweets recently to create new conservative outrage (and there was plenty of outrage when gunn was first hired for gotg because of those tweets, which iirc is when he apologized for them) with the sole purpose of hurting gunn’s career.
please can we take a step back from the knee-jerk for a second. yeah the tweets were garbage. we know it. he knows it. and he apologized for it ten years ago. like bonzai-bunny said, disney was AWARE when they hired him for it. he’d already publicly apologized for them. i could care less what happens to gunn. the issue here is that he tweeted extremely anti-trump stuff, and then vile alt-right accounts dug up old, and already addressed, garbage with the sole intent of getting him fired. they didn’t want him fired for the 10 year old tweets. they wanted him fired for being anti-trump. that’s why this is such a big issue, and that’s why the cast is speaking out.
whats the point in letting people grow if we burn them to the ground over decade old stuff that theyve apologized for? i guarantee not one single person reblogging this post has never said something vile, gross, or disrespectful. would you expect everyone to immediately delete their blog forever? i’m not defending what he did: it was gross. but he already got his punishment for it 10 years ago and he apologized. there is a bigger picture here, and its not about the 10 year old tweets.
yeah you don’t have to forgive Gunn and accept his apology but realize this entire thing was orchestrated by the online far right specifically in response to Gunn opposing trump and they specifically went looking to frame him and cause a controversy
They aren’t just looking to cause controversy – they are testing the waters for how big of a fish they can take out before they turn their forces on smaller, less supported artists and creators in media that are anti-Trump.
If Disney will knee-jerk turn around and fire the director for one of the most profitable and beloved veins of what is one of their biggest franchises at the tip of a hat, what chance do smaller, less supported people have?
On top of that, they relied VERY SPECIFICALLY on the reaction of the LIBERAL LEFT to do this. They leapt on the conditions that online call-out culture has created to take down someone who, as posted above, has already done their time. They’re literally using exactly the kind of thing this post started out as to take out anti-trump support.
Use your goddamn noggins for a second here, would ya? You don’t have to like James Gunn or the MCU or Disney, but you do need to be aware of the type of precedent this is setting.
Pass Through Fire 