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Sean Penn Blasts Woke/Cancel Culture: “you wonder at some point if only Danish princes can play Hamlet”

Sean Penn Blasts Woke/Cancel Culture: “you wonder at some point if only Danish princes can play Hamlet”

Conan O’Brien: “This whole concept of cancel culture is, ‘we’ve found that someone did something in 1979 that is now not appropriate, they’re dead to us.’”

Hollywood has lunged into a suicidal downward spiral from which it likely cannot recover. From mandating “diversity” for its “best picture” Academy Awards selections to requiring a “sensitivity counselor” on movie sets, the motion picture industry is a big pile of wokeness on steroids.

It’s so bad that rather than accept that their tortured preachy product is neither entertaining nor escapist (what typical theater-goers seek in a movie), they blame the audience for being too misogynist to go see an all-female Ghostbusters or too racist to embrace the latest new black superhero film.  The audience is the problem! These holier-than-thou Hollywood heavies are churning out woke pearls, but the unwashed swine just snort and turn away.

Not content to moan and whine about “diversity,” the more rabid leftists are now insisting that only fat women play fat women, that only trans actors portray trans people, and etc. And few actors are speaking out about this because they have to worry about ever working in the industry again (particularly if they happen to be white . . . and male).

Sean Penn is one actor, however, who is saying what everyone is probably thinking: this “ludicrous,” “Soviet”-style nonsense is “too restrictive.”  He muses that one of his two Oscar-winning performances, that of gay politician Harvey Milk in Milk, would not be possible today because he’d never get the role in the first place.

The Federalist reports:

Speaking on comedian Conan O’Brien’s podcast, Academy Award-winning actor Sean Penn said he thinks he would not be permitted today, by Hollywood’s woke standards, to play Harvey Milk in the 2008 film “Milk,” since Penn is a straight man. The real Milk was one of the first openly gay lawmakers.

“Today, almost certainly, I would not be permitted to be cast in that role [of Harvey Milk],” Penn said. “We’re living in a time where if you’re playing a gay lead character, you would have to be a gay man. And there have been these casting issues. In terms of finding the balance — you have a period of evolution that certainly has an opportunity for people who have had less opportunities to move forward, that has to be supported.”

“Milk” was a box office success, winning dozens of national film festival awards. For his role as the protagonist, Penn nabbed an Academy Award for best actor. Nonetheless, he described why Hollywood has fostered a culture that is problematic insofar as limiting who can play what role.

“And yet, in this pendulum-swinging society that we’re in, you wonder at some point if only Danish princes can play Hamlet. It is, I believe, too restrictive. People are looking for ‘gotcha’ moments and to criticize,” Penn said.

In addition to questioning the standards of who gets to be cast in a given role, O’Brien and Penn discussed cancel culture. Penn went so far as to call it “ludicrous” and “Soviet”-like.

On the podcast, Conan O’Brien also had some insightful things to say about our Woke New World.

Fox News reports:

O’Brien, who recently wrapped up his time as a late-night talk show host after almost three decades on two networks, had Penn on his podcast, “Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend,” where the duo’s chat led them to discuss cancel culture and the public’s somewhat new tendency to write off potentially promising people over past comments.

“I’ve always described myself, I think I’m a 52% optimist,” O’Brien explained. “I do believe that everything that’s happened in the last year is going to inform us in the best way and is going to have a very valuable impact on the arts and is going to make things better and more inclusive. I believe in all that.”

He continued: “This whole concept of cancel culture is, ‘we’ve found that someone did something in 1979 that is now not appropriate, they’re dead to us.’”

. . . . O’Brien then noted that he feels “uncomfortable” when he believes that people like them in the public eye are being put into boxes by people telling them to have a certain viewpoint or promote a certain cause at a certain time or risk being on the wrong side of history.

“I always find it confusing because if I do something performative that everyone else is doing, it looks almost like I’m trying to get praise for having just a moral belief, which really makes me uncomfortable,” he explained.

O’Brien concluded: “The nuance can get bled out of things. I get uncomfortable when I think that everyone is getting an email that says ‘this is the thing that everyone should say today, especially if you’re in the public eye.’”

We’re all uncomfortable being told what is acceptable to say, even to feel and think in the privacy of our own hearts and minds, and if Hollywood doesn’t catch on to that very simple fact, they are going to find an ever-shrinking audience for their tedious, joyless, humorless, woke-soaked, and self-righteous visual manifestos.

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Comments

When you’ve lost Castro-fellating Sean Penn…..

    I wouldn’t have put it quite like that (out loud, anyway, heh), but yeah, I was kind of floored that someone as leftist and commie-loving as PENN is saying, “woah!” to the woke madness.

      Conservative Beaner in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 10, 2021 at 8:48 pm

      Because the smart ones know that the cancel culture will come for them even eventually if it is not stopped.

        I suspect that Penn was the typical commie-in-name-only Hollyweirdo. He loved communism when it was “over there,” in Cuba or wherever and didn’t actually affect him . . . or America.

        It’s an elitist worldview that is all-too-common among the left who decry America, but would never ever move to an actual communist country because abject poverty for the masses is such a buzz kill, who decry capitalism but would never ever give up their own iPhone, laptop, car, home, etc. These are stupid people who are played as useful idiots (and are, historically, the first put against a wall and shot).

          I disagree. Penn fancies himself as part of the Communist Party elite. Like the Soviet nomenklatura of old, Penn believes the only way to achieve true Communism is for the Communist Party elites to get the best food, housing, medical treatment, and every sort of opportunity imaginable (that includes choice acting roles). If others suffer because of the Party’s incompetence and greed, it is the fault of “racists” and not his precious Communism.

          Hmmm, super interesting! And you may be right. I’m not sure what Penn believes, but his statements in this podcast do suggest he’s
          getting a clue.

          henrybowman in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 11, 2021 at 1:37 am

          I thin Penn had a come-to-Jesus moment when he realized that his fawning in-person interview of a major cartel jefe was the direct cause of the DEA zeroing in on the location of that jefe (by following Penn) and arresting him… and that the jefe Was Not Pleased.

          Arminius in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 12, 2021 at 6:08 pm

          I agree with Jordan Peterson. If there’s an unforgiveable secular sin akin to blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, it’s saying that true communism has never been tried. Of course, in the Soviet Union, in China and North Korea today, we had true communism. It’s in fact socialism practiced by experts. But the implications of course is that if only they were in charge then they’d achieve true communism and everyone would worship them.

          And of course they’d get the chauffeured Zhil limos, the multiple country dachas, and the luxurious perks that go along with bringing about the workers paradise. And the workers damn well be grateful or else off to the gulag!

          That’s the only reason these commie bastards don’t move to a communist country. Don’t kid yourself, Fuzzy. The only reason they’re won’t move to a communist country like Cuba is because they’re hellholes, but only hellholes because the wrong people were in charge. They’re the right people. It’s because they’re not in charge.

          I don’t know in what order they’d be shot. They may not be the first ones. But eventually they’d be put against a wall by more ruthless competitors, wondering how things worked out so differently from how things were supposed to be.

          The useful idiots will never learn; things are working out exactly how communism is supposed to work out. It’s a monstrously cruel, inhumane, inhuman ideology. It promises to rain skittles and the rivers will flow with beer. Lenin sounded a lot like AOC when he was enticing people to join the revolution. Then it turns out it’s going to hurt a little. But just a little, and only for some people. After all, you have to break a few eggs to make an omelet. That’s the thing about socialism; the commies keep breaking eggs but you never get the omelet. What you do get sooner than you think are bayonets, gulags, and mass graves.

          Finally, hopefully, after a few decades of dictatorship and massive human misery the last leader and his wife end up like the Ceausescus.

          You just know, don’t you, that the surviving Tsarnaev brother is getting love letters and marriage proposals in prison. Like all wannabe/actual mass murderers. How much does any of you want to bet some of them are coming from Sean Penn. Like all Western commies he’s just that stupid.

      He helped create the hell we’re in, and now he’s complaining about it?

    maxmillion in reply to Paddy M. | July 10, 2021 at 10:55 pm

    Only because they gored his own ox and he’s personally affected.

I know there is only one actor that can play Spicoli.

SeymourButz | July 10, 2021 at 8:27 pm

My favorite example of this woke behavior was last year, fresh off of the
renewed interest in BLM, when Jenny Slate stepped down from her voice acting role for her character on Big Mouth. She reasoned that she couldn’t portray a biracial (black-white) Jewish character as a white Jewish woman, and was summarily replaced by a non-Jewish non-mixed black comedian.

I love it because it reveals a certain truth about this kind of virtue signaling in Hollywood. It’s not actually about accurate interpretations of individuals. It’s only really about actors getting good boy points in the industry and on social media and participating in white guilt.

    Don’t forget as well that Conan O’Brien was a writer on The Simpsons back in the earlier days, and in the past few years that show has also recast voice actors or gotten rid of characters completely (Hank Azaria lost several roles for both of those reasons).

Look up “Useful Idiot” in the dictionary and you’ll see a picture of this jerk off. After blowing Castro, Maduro and every other Marxist tool he could knee-walk up to, now this tool sounds the alarm? You helped bring this shit about, you stupid motherfucker. Now shut shut your cocksucking mouth and shut the fuck up, permanently.

In addition to questioning the standards of who gets to be cast in a given role, O’Brien and Penn discussed cancel culture. Penn went so far as to call it “ludicrous” and “Soviet”-like.

Penn’s lack of self-awareness is …….. astounding.

Personally I think Penn deserved his Academy Award for his portrayal of Harvey Milk. Milk was a loud-and-proud pederast who drove at least one of the underage boys he regularly raped to suicide. Milk was also a friend of Rev. Jim Jones, helped raise funds for Jones’ infamous People’s Temple, and even sought Jones’ support when Milk first started running for office.

After the Castro-admiring Jones convinced his followers to commit mass suicide (and killed anyone who balked) the San Francisco Democrat establishment – which had been enthusiastic supporters of Jones, since he would deliver voters and poll workers for Democrats – did an airbrushing worthy of the Soviet Union. In the blink of an eye Rev. Jim Jones (who mocked believers in God and ordered his flock to use pages torn from the Bible as toilet paper) became a card-carrying Republican Right Christian fundamentalist – a lie that persists to this day.

Sean Penn. Harvey Milk. Two Communists who deserve each other.

    I never saw Milk, not my kind of movie (I like rom-coms, sci-fi stuff, shark movies, thoughtful horror-thrillers, mysteries), but I remember always liking Sean Penn (he’s not on my own personal “No Buy List”). A leftie, omg, horrifyingly so. But back in the day, I still thought actors could be separated from their work. His crazy commie crap didn’t bother me, though I see now that it should have.

    I won’t watch a single film, even ones I enjoyed back in the day (like Thelma and Louise) now because I will not give one cent, one click, to the people who have said they hate me and my kind. I really wanted to rewatch one of my fave movies, but it featured Morgan Freeman (who has repeatedly insisted that he hate me, my kind, anyone with my skin color–white). I will never ever watch any movie that features him, ever. He’s near the top of my “No Buy List” because he is a rampant anti-white, neo-racist, and he was long before we had leftist terms to describe it.

    Anyway, Penn was a has-been by the time I started making my list, and he was just a leftie, he never attacked me or my beliefs or my American-ness. He just hugged commies and thought they were cool . . . as long as they stayed over there.

    That didn’t put him on my list because he’s free to think that, to feel that. Who cares? Start saying America is racist and that the reason we went to war with Japan was that “they were yellow,” and I will never ever watch another thing with you in it. That’s been tough because Tom Hanks was in some good movies, movies I’d like to see again, but I will never ever put a penny in his pocket. He lied. He use his platform to denigrate our country, our Republic.

    By contrast, Penn . . . has done what?

      Personally I wouldn’t recommend anyone watch Milk. There is such a thing as cruel and unusual punishment!

      Milk was a hagiography of a vile San Francisco politician. The movie whitewashed not only Milk’s close connections with Rev. Jim Jones, but Milk’s raping of runaway teen boys. Like the rest of Hollywood Penn obviously considers Milk a saint and a martyr, which is why I think Penn deserves his Academy Award. The movie Milk is on the same moral and intellectual level as Triumph des Willens or Birth of a Nation: rancid, ugly propaganda. Hollywood and Penn deserve each other like Milk and the rest of the San Francisco Democrat establishment of the late 1970s deserve the Rev. Jim Jones.

      I would recommend Cult City (by Daniel Flynn) to anyone who wants to understand the real story of how Harvey Milk and Rev. Jim Jones were close political allies. If Penn were truly honest he would do another cinema hagiography – about Rev. Jones this time.

      The Friendly Grizzly in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 11, 2021 at 5:58 am

      I keep seeing “neo-racist” in comments from several people.

      What is “neo-racist”? How does it differ from plain old racism?

      Thank you.

        It doesn’t. It’s the term used for the anti-white racism that is beginning to permeate everything.

        The term is meant to indicate that this “new” racism (anti-white as opposed to anti-black) is not only acceptable but, according to the CRT/leftists who have hijacked our education system and all of our institutions, necessary. As CRT high priest Kendi says, “The only remedy to racist discrimination is antiracist discrimination. The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”

        Discrimination against white people based on the color of their skin is the only “remedy” to past discrimination–not ending all discrimination, but actually, actively, purposefully discriminating against and harming white people to (somehow?) make “white America” pay for slavery. Or some such nonsense. It’s all still racism.

          JusticeDelivered in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 11, 2021 at 12:05 pm

          It is racism, bald faced racism. There should have been pushback a long time ago. Think about what was done to Zimmerman and Wilson. Those people should have been run down and brought to justice then, if they had been we probably would not be in the current situation.

          My experience is that when dealing with people who play dirty, one needs to use whatever means are necessary to defeat them.

          Ben Kent in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 11, 2021 at 5:00 pm

          Fuzzy summed it up perfectly. Bravo.

          Ben Kent in reply to Fuzzy Slippers. | July 11, 2021 at 5:12 pm

          I would add that neo-racism is to not necessarily “anti-white” discrimination – but the general belief that you can use racism to fight racism. It is just applied now to whites (and “whiteness” a term which enables the woke to attack other groups they may dislike). This is the view that 2-wrong will somehow make it all right. It can be used to attack any group that is currently out-of-favor. It is the same logic as used to instill hysteria in people against perceived “witches” in Salem.

          In reality – more hate just perpetuates the animosity. That’s why Martin Luther King Jr rejected this line of thinking – because he saw that it just leads to a dead-end like a race war.

          It is so clear to any rational person that more racism is not the answer. Which begs the question – why would anyone promote this crap? Obviously it is promoted by people who benefit from racial animosity. That means te people behind this are:
          >> (1) race-baiters; and
          >> (2) marxists who want to spread chaos and disorder to undermine society.

        I take it as a feeble attempt to tie another “neo” in where no actual connection exists. A workaround to Godwin’s law, perhaps?

          henrybowman in reply to UJ. | July 12, 2021 at 7:47 pm

          It’s just taking the language back from the leftists. You use their language, you concede the argument before you start. You don’t use their term equity, you say neo-racism (because it’s just repackaged racism). It’s not anti-choice, it’s pro-life. It’s not anti-safety, it’s pro-rights. And so on.

Penn thinks he’s untouchable. He has all the money he could ever possibly need. And he thinks the current Regime won’t come after his wealth in any significant way.

The unwashed masses, on the other hand, are increasingly fearful of criticizing the government Penn helped create.

Penn is ignorant of history. Among other things.

This is significantly better news than it seems because celebrities carry a lot more prestige and influence than almost anyone covered here. Unfortunately I don’t remember the last thing he has actually been in but he carries a lot more influence on this than any senator so thank you Sean Penn.

    DaveGinOly in reply to Danny. | July 11, 2021 at 12:50 am

    “…I don’t remember the last thing he has actually been in…”
    This is exactly why he feels empowered to speak out now – he has no career to worry about. He’s not getting roles already, no need to fear not getting roles. Who knows, he may have effectively retired from film long ago. This may just be his own way of making sure he’s never tempted to go back, because that would likely be impossible now, he has burned that bridge.

      Danny in reply to DaveGinOly. | July 11, 2021 at 2:36 am

      I’m afraid Hollywood does blacklist (despite hypocritically pretending to care about people blacklisted 60+ years ago) but could he instead be looking beyond Hollywood? How many woke Japanese people do you know?

        randian in reply to Danny. | July 11, 2021 at 11:14 pm

        Hollywood only cares about people blacklisted 60 years ago because actual Communists were being blacklisted. If Eisenhower Republicans were being blacklisted Hollywood wouldn’t give a damn.

      The Friendly Grizzly in reply to DaveGinOly. | July 11, 2021 at 6:04 am

      I believe he’s been doing a lot of directing.

Spicoli proves the saying that even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while.

I was happy not hearing from Penn for years. I thought he had shut up after the fiasco in Venezuela where he supported the dictators and socialism that destroyed that country.

And YOU helped BUILD IT, MORON!

Best acting roles: Spicoli and Snowman.

Best when he plays moron stoners..wonder why.

Morgan Freeman?

I thought he was one of the good guys

Morgan Freeman is not known for holding back his political opinions. In fact, he’s such a vocal advocate on issues such as police brutality, the media, and marijuana legislation, that he often goes viral as a result of his punchy remarks. Sometimes that doesn’t go so well, like when he discussed his disdain for Black History Month during a 2005 interview on 60 Minutes (via Snopes).

Read More: https://www.nickiswift.com/124092/shady-side-morgan-freeman/?utm_campaign=clip

“Freeman said he thinks the idea of Black History Month is “ridiculous” because “black history is American history” and it should not be “relegated” to just a month. He then said the only way to get rid of racism is to stop talking about it. “I’m going to stop calling you a white man. And I’m going to ask you to stop calling me a black man,” he told interviewer Mike Wallace. “You know me as Morgan Freeman. You’re not going to say, ‘I know this white guy named Mike Wallace.’ Hear what I’m saying?”

The exchange attracted plenty of criticism. The Rev. Al Sharpton described Freeman’s remarks to Showbiz Tonight as “idealistic,” but ultimately “naive.” 

Freeman raised eyebrows again nearly a decade later when he told CNN’s Don Lemon that he didn’t believe race was a factor in wealth distribution and that discussing race issues as they relate to economic inequality makes it “a bigger issue than it needs to be.”

Read More: https://www.nickiswift.com/124092/shady-side-morgan-freeman/?utm_campaign=clip

I thought Morgan Freeman was a big liberal. It sounds like he has some good ideas.

JusticeDelivered | July 11, 2021 at 12:12 pm

“Hollywood has lunged into a suicidal downward spiral”

They took that leap 20-30 years ago. It is so bad that there is very little I am interested in coming out of Hollywood.

Wow, an intelligent thought from Spicoli… I didn’t know he had it in him.

You’d almost have to believe that acting consists of portraying a person you are not.

Maybe Hollywood should stick exclusively to documentaries so blacks will be portrayed by blacks, gays by gays, etc. Real documentaries that is, not the fictional stuff of Michael Moore.