Monday brought upon us the release of the new Star Wars VII movie trailer, plus a vicious trending hashtag, #BoycottStarWarsVII. The tweets carrying this hashtag made claims that the Star Wars franchise was promoting “white genocide” because a large percent of the cast are people of color or ethnic minorities (Jewish), as well as working behind the scenes.
The tweets came with much controversy, but also gave much support to the movie, which is due to come out December 18. The tickets went on sale during the release of the trailer and some theaters have already sold out, much to the dismay of the boycotters.
To say that the statement of promoting white genocide is ridiculous is an understatement. With two of the protagonist of the new movies being minorities in science fiction, a strong Caucasian female character and an African-American male, there have been plenty of straight, white male nerds with their panties in a bunch. This prejudice attitude was also displayed leading to the 2015 Hugo awards, which happened earlier this year. In which Hugo fought back by having an African-American woman (Tananarive Due) and a gay, Caucasian male (David Gerrold) host the award show. The majority of fans rejoiced at this choice, but some still had their options.
In the age of racial tensions and homophobia, these comments are not a surprise. Some who were/are in power feel like their positions are being threatened—I get that. But we all have to make sure that the rights that our ancestors have fought for all over the globe stay intact, or are improved upon, so that we all can begin to live in harmony and prepare a better future for our descendants to come. This includes having images in the media, especially in sci-fi, of all people who inhabit this planet, not just one type of people.
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