Are people being double-standard-ish on the movie Cuties?

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The movie so far is getting people in an outrage on Netflix with petitions to cancel Netflix as a result. They say the movie sexually exploits children by showing them dance the way they are in a movie. I talked about the movie with a friend of mine, who is in the modeling business and knows more about this stuff. I am not denying any exploitation of children and I agree that it is, based on the trailers and clips I have seen.

However, my friend says that since the movie is about a dance competition, that these dance competitions for 11 year olds exist in real life, and that she doesn't understand why people think of the movie as exploitation, but people have been totally okay with exploiting children in these dance competitions for years, and no one has ever tried to get people to boycott and cancel the real dance competitions.

So she says that people are being double standard-ish on it as a result, since it's okay to watch in a contest, but not in a movie, if she has a point?

What people are okay with one and not the other? I avoid events that have children dancing sexually, as would my friends and family.

Well what I mean is the reaction to cancel Netflix is much stronger than any dance competition. So the reaction for it being in a movie has been much harsher.

One word right wingers, do the research and find out what the movie actually is talking about.

Oh okay. Well the strange thing is, is that even though a lot of people are complaining about this movie online to have to have Netflix shut down, it got an 89% on rottomatoes, which seems strange considering all the audience traumatization from it.

I have a friend who said it was an uncomfortable and difficult watch and is essentially about inequality and deferring to men. The shock tactic of the film should start the type of discussion parents need to have with their daughters about inequality.

According to Wikipedia:

“Prior to its release on Netflix, the film had not been deemed controversial when it was screened at Sundance and released in France. After Netflix acquired Cuties, its international promotional poster and trailer for the film were criticized for allegedly sexualising 11-year-old girls, and were different from those used to promote the film in its original release in France. The Parents Television Council (PTC) requested that Netflix remove the film entirely, and a Change.org petition calling for people to cancel their Netflix subscription gathered more than 600,000 signatures. Followers of QAnon on social media also criticized the film, and 4chan banned images pertaining to the film from being posted on the imageboard site.”

I’ve literally never heard of the film, but I’m not on Netflix.

Oh okay but there were people who said they actually watched the movie and objected to certain shots in the movie, so I thought it was more than a poster therefore.

I imagine most people on the right watch TV like Ned Flanders does.

That said, I won't watch Cuties, because I don't have Netflix. I probably wouldn't have watched it if I did.

I wouldn't watch Cuties. I don't want to watch half-dressed girls twerking for 2 hours.

I wouldn't watch it and I wouldn't watch it live in performance either. Call me old fashioned or Republican or whatever you want to call me but I think it's very dangerous for young boys or girls to dance like that. I know it shouldn't be dangerous in an ideal world but we dont live in an ideal world. The difference with Netflix vs live performance is that adults don't generally watch live performances with their pants pulled down. Not to be nasty but let's be honest about how some scumbags will watch Cuties.

I wouldn’t watch it even if I had Netflix. One reason is that I watch movies on my computer while I’m doing other things so I can’t read subtitles. Another reason is I’m not one of those entertained by watching people dance. I’d rather watch paint dry.

One name abruptly springs to mind.

JonBenét Patricia Ramsey (August 6, 1990 - December 25, 1996).

Just sayin'...

One who cares, and two stop believing everything you've read, the outrage is bull.

Yep, I love how they are angry at the movie but not at the actual shows that exploit minors like Dance Moms, or Child Beauty Pageants, or Honey Boo Boo, really?

This whole controversy shows the hypocrisy of people who complain about cancel culture, I don't even understand why the little known about the movie so strongly put into action for conservative cancel culture. It is kind of hilarious that before knowing much more than a poster that conservatives don't only want to cancel a movie, they want to cancel Netflix. A full display of the hypocrisy is delicious.

At the same time I also get behind not letting children being sexualised to sell a movie, that is gross, and if that is what it is about, then fair is fair. For me personally, I probably won't watch it until I get some confirmation that it is not problematic, but I am not canceling anything on one bad poster. If the topic is about sexuality and children as young as 11, I don't think that the subject is untouchable, there might even be a message that is in favour of not having children twerk in public.

I don't know if it is representative, but I just read a Guardian article reviewing the movie, which said that it is flawed, but not at all worthy of the controversy. Apparently the the twerking dance happens, but it is purposefully made as uncomfortable within the movie and comes out on the side against 11 year old's doing such things. The review made a connection to Mean Girls, which brings to mind a scene from the movie where the teenage characters do a "sexual dance as sexy Santa's, which I am pretty sure the movie was not condoning either, since the Plastics were not exactly meant to be likable and appropriate. Apparently the titular Cuties are actually a bully group that the main character joins to act out, the sort of thing that they are not being glamourised.

So while I think that both sides of the political aisle would be against a movie that sexualises children as young as 11, I think that the real reaction that is coming from conservatives is along the same lines as those clutch their pearls over the recent song; WAP. I am looking at Ben Shapiro. It isn't just that there is possible sexualisation of children, it is that it is women/girls controlling their own sexuality. Certain people get really bent out of shape when they are not just being objects, and themselves criticise the sexuality as them being treated as objects from being sexual, how conservatives don't understand sexual liberty of feminism.

The review that I read I think talks about a frustration from the girls feeling a lack of agency in their lives, and I think are trying to act sexual to have that control, I think that there was something written about a double standard put to girls. I do think that there is an interesting subject there, where girls are expected to act proper and comfortably for their parents and boys, while also having an inherent sexuality attached where they are expected to eventually become mothers and in some cultures be treated as objects to their future spouses. While also that sexualisation of 11 year old's is probably still wrong. Where does that maybe fit along the lines culture that slut shames girls/women for dressing too revealing?