Dragline is apparently part of the moronic subsection of America who believes that opposing the war in Iraq was the equivalent of moral and material support for Saddam Hussein. Despite the fact that i can’t think of a single anti-war protestor (in America at least) who opposed the war out of a love for the dictator, there are a few dribbling idiots who persist in trotting out this piece of crap to make themselves feel better about the fact that their own ass-kissing of Bush and Co. has recently started to appear rather, shall we say, unjustified.
On the issue of film boycotts, i don’t generally care too much about the politics of those who star in the movies, or who direct them, or even produce them for that matter. I think Schwarzenneger is a dick, but it’s not going to stop me watching “T2” again. The fact that i no longer go to see Mel Gibson movies has nothing to do with the fact that he’s a raving conservative idiot; it’s just because, IMO, he hasn’t made a decent film in years. But the fact that i don’t like him won’t stop me watching “Gallipoli” or “Year of Living Dangerously” again.
For those who are going to boycott the film because it has Penn and Robbins in it, i fully support your right to make such a protest. In fact, why don’t you spend the whole 137 minutes that the film runs sitting in silence in your loungeroom, just to make your point. Your absence will probably make the experience better for the rest of us, because if Dragline’s OP is indicative of his thought processes, he’s probably the sort of person who spends the whole film asking “Is that the same guy as before?” and “But isn’t she his mother?” and “What happened to the other guy? Oh, he died.”
So if I avoid movies starring Arnold Schwarzeneggar, Mel Gibson, Heather Locklear, Bruce Willis, The Rock, Bo Derek,Charlton Heston, Chuck Norris, Tom Selleck and Kevin Costner, it’s because I am boycotting politically conservative actors?
And here I thought it was simply because I have good taste.
Rhum wrt: discrimination for political belief - in seminars on proper hiring procedures, it’s generally been advised that whenever you stray away from “can this individual perform the essential job functions with or without accomodations” type of question, you could very well be on shaky ground. this links to Federal employment restrictions, which, I’ll grant does not guarentee state or local restrictions. However, this is from the California Attorney General’s office (assuming a CA jurisdiction here for the studio) stating
emphasis mine. “an employer” does not mean “only the government” I do cede, tho, that I am not a lawyer.
Now, onto the other issues you posed. Of course anyone can make whatever decision they wish wrt boycotting etc, I already stated as much. I of course, reserve the right to make fun of their decision, or to point out contradictory issues to them. So, for example, since in the movie in question, the OP only seems to object to two of the 4 stars political affiliation, I do indeed think it’s odd that if the issue is of so great of importance to him that he’s willing to base his decision on “should I go to this movie or not” solely on the (unspoken in the movie) political beliefs (or his assumption of same, based on the lack of clarity in the op), half of the main actors, I certainly should be allowed to question why he’s not verified the political beliefs/ affiliations of other people in other roles in this movie, if he does so for all movies he watches, all tv shows etc.
Does he check out the CEO’s of the studio?? the stockholders? I’d venture a guess that when one really examines the issue, it’d be pretty rare that only people of one political view or anotehr would be affiliated strongly w/a project (some exceptions, of course - I suspect one would find, PETA, for example, to be pretty much alligned)
What about the grocery store he goes to? Certainly, the effect of his own particular economic boycott of goods and services would have more effect if he selected something that was a bit bigger than his one $10 movie ticket.
wrt: your stance on Roman Polanski - knock yourself out. Are you being silly? well, I would suggest that you may be being consistent or inconsistent, depending on how you follow this. If your stance is that you don’t wish to view any works by him 'cause you think he’s a pedophile, you certainly have that right (as expressed above), and I think you’d be in a stronger position at least from a consistency POV, at least if it was your practice to refuse to view any works by any person you felt was a pedophile (and we’d allow that until accused, at least, we would assume that people were not, that is the default position would be ‘not a pedophile’). Now, if you then went on to say that although you think Michael Jackson is also a pedophile but you like his music, so you’ll listen to his stuff, I’d say you were being silly or at least inconsistent (in that you refused to ‘support’ one person you felt was a pedophile, but would support the other
I ‘generally’ boycot Jim Carrey movies, Adam Sandler movies, for example. Why? 'cause generally I find both annoying characters that seem (in cases I’ve seen them) to always transcend whatever character they’re playing so that I cannot ignore the fact they’re in the movie. I did, however, see The Truman Show, and enjoyed it, despite Mr. Carrey being the star. But you see, it’s based on what they do in their movies. Should they branch out into, say, a restaurant, I would have no opinion of their talents in that area, so would cut them slack 'cause it has no bearing on the issue.
wrt: Dennys- there, I believe, is a different issue. On the first hand you have someone wanting to boycott a product based on the politics of some of the people involved. In the dennys’ case, you have people who wish to boycott a business/corporation based on their apparent corporate stance wrt their business. And since corporations are money making enterprises, they can be persuaded by economic measures.
So, if, for example, Misters Penn and Robbins were to collaborate and go into business together to make movies with the profits of those movies going to save the whales or some other project you thought was something you didn’t want to support, or if their business practices included only hiring actors, production staff etc that were anti Bush, again, knock yourself out.
This, of course, would assume that you normally made decisions of buying based on such matters. Some people do.