Southpark – Joining the Panderverse

• to pander to sb./sth.
  • jdm./etw. nachgeben
  • jdm./etw. allzu sehr entgegenkommen [Person, Geschmack]
• to pander to sb./sth. [pej.]
  • sich (bei) jdm./etw. anbiedern [pej.]

Aus der Wikipedia:

Eric Cartman is transported to an alternate universe, designated Universe 216-B, which is populated entirely by racially diverse women, while his counterpart from that universe takes his place in his own universe. At the same time, Randy Marsh cannot find a repairman to fix his oven door. He and his neighbors learned that every handyman in town has become extremely wealthy, as the inability of people to make simple repairs has increased demand for their services, making it impossible to find such professionals. Meanwhile, Bob Iger and his board at The Walt Disney Company realize that something is „different“ about board member Kathleen Kennedy, whose practice of shoehorning diverse women into the company’s productions has been resulting in repeated failure at the box office.

In Universe 216-B the real Kathleen Kennedy finds Cartman, and tells her that she was replaced by the other Kennedy (who resembles Cartman in size and voice) after she began using an ancient piece of artificial intelligence called the Panderstone, which can repeatedly create the same rehashed film that appeals to everyone. When Disney began receiving hate mail as a result of these films, the real Kennedy began overutilizing the Panderstone as a crutch to fight bigotry, but this destabilized the device, and opened a portal that transported Kennedy to Universe 216-B, and the other Kennedy to their universe. When Cartman learns that she is the reason why „all Disney movies suck now“, and she learns Cartman was behind all of the hate mail, they each initially blame each other for the current crisis. However, they eventually realize they each created each other, and mutually apologize.

Iger and his advisers deduce the two Kennedys have been switched, and go to South Park, where they team up with Randy and his neighbors to resolve the issue. At Randy’s home, they recreate the portal in Randy’s broken oven with the Panderstone, sending Cartman’s adult black female counterpart back to her universe, and returning Cartman and his Kennedy home, where she tells her Disney colleagues that they will only make original content that does not pander. Randy also brings to his universe dozens of handymen to do the town’s repair jobs. The diminutive Cartman-like Kathleen Kennedy is also returned to her own universe.

Link auf die Folge

Doppelstandards: Frauen sind gleich, brauchen aber auch eine Sonderbehandlung

Ein Artikel behandelt die unterschiedlichen Anforderungen, die an Männer und Frauen gestellt werden:

Since Mary Wollstonecraft’s 1792 book, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, a constant rallying cry has been the demand for equal treatment. “We need to see men and women as equal partners,” 20th-century feminist writer Betty Friedan declared. “Women will only have true equality when men share with them the responsibility of bringing up the next generation,” argued Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

But do feminists actually want equality? Feminists demand that female athletes be celebrated as amazing, unprecedented superstars whether they win or lose. Advocates for gender equality in sports don’t want fair market competition based on customer preference, but to bully and coerce the sports industry to devote as much airtime as men’s sports to indifferent viewers. Male soccer fans who don’t like women’s soccer are sexist — that was the conclusion of a 2021 study at the University of Durham in the United Kingdom. Thus the demand that “change starts with more media coverage,” according to attendees at the 2022 SportsPro’s OTT Summit USA.

When male sports players make big mistakes, they are endlessly ridiculed — ever heard of Bill Buckner, Garo Yepremian, or Scott Norwood? Rapinoe, Biles, and Osaka are instead celebrated even more for underperforming, as if failure is itself a feminist victory. As Hirschauer notes, feminists inhabit an “alternative universe” of professional athletics: Rapinoe once asserted that WNBA point guard Sue Bird — who averaged 7.8 points per game in her career — had “like, arguably the best career that anyone has ever had in the history of any sport ever.”

A Controversy that Proves the Point

I once worked in a building with a large sign titled “Ten Ways to Empower Women in the Workplace” conspicuously placed directly outside the cafeteria, so that hundreds of employees would see it every day. Some of the suggestions amounted to little more than simply being respectful and professional to women (no harm in that!). But others (like encouraging women to “be themselves” or empowering them to “speak up”) implicitly communicated the need for men to exhibit deference to members of the opposite sex, as if male employees must treat their female colleagues with kid gloves in case they hurt their feelings or damage their confidence.

That sign itself was a symbol of an unspoken assumption today: Women must be recognized as the same as men, except they require special treatment that acknowledges and respects their inherent differences from men. Women are just as resilient as men, except when they need to be especially encouraged. They are just as fearless and strong as men, except they are grossly underrepresented in all the most dangerous and physically strenuous jobs. They are just as professionally flexible as men, except when they are pregnant or nursing.

My point is not that women can’t have great professional success, demonstrate remarkable resiliency, or exemplify tremendous courage. Of course, they have done, and do, all these things. Nor is it that female employees shouldn’t be given paid parental leave, nursing rooms, and other benefits to honor their role as mothers (they should be). But the louder feminists assert that they want equal treatment in all things — even in those places where their biological, psychological, and emotional differences are most saliently obvious — the more risible the argument becomes.

Das ist ja eine Beobachtung, die schon häufiger gemacht wurde. Ich greife noch mal einen Teil von oben heraus:

Frauen müssen als gleichwertig mit Männern anerkannt werden, es sei denn, sie bedürfen einer besonderen Behandlung, die ihre angeborenen Unterschiede zu Männern anerkennt und respektiert. Frauen sind genauso widerstandsfähig wie Männer, außer wenn sie besonders gefördert werden müssen. Sie sind genauso furchtlos und stark wie Männer, nur sind sie in den gefährlichsten und körperlich anstrengendsten Berufen stark unterrepräsentiert. Sie sind beruflich genauso flexibel wie Männer, außer wenn sie schwanger sind oder stillen.

Ich hatte hier ja auch schon Artikel, in denen ich das aufgegriffen habe, etwa bei der Frage, ob Frauen überhaupt auf die gleiche Weise Karriere machen wollen wie Männer. 

Und man trifft auch häufig auf Aussagen, dass man Jobs für Frauen familienfreundlicher machen muss, damit sie für Frauen interessant sind. Oder gerade gab es einen Nobelpreis für unter anderem die Aussage, dass man die Wirtschaft eben dazu bringen müsste, dass man dort nicht mehr so einen hohen Zeiteinsatz für eine Karriere braucht um mehr Frauen an der Spitze zu haben.