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Netflix is releasing softcore pedophilia on their platform

Last posted Aug 28, 2020 at 05:39PM EDT. Added Aug 20, 2020 at 03:44AM EDT
26 posts from 15 users

The title of the show is "Cuties" (or "Mignonnes" in French-speaking countries) and it is to be released on September 9 on their platform, (the film was premiered in Sundance in January). The trailer was released on August 18 and was met with petitions and calls for its cancellation.
Here's the movie's description (I don't wanna include the movie's poster here):

4chan's /tv/ board mods are warning its users to not post any sexual imagery from the show:

Jesus christ what the fuck
honestly though, this sadly isn't surprising
it's the logical endpoint of allowing shit like child "beauty pageants" to exit
hopefully this will bring attention so we can get all this sick shit banned

Last edited Aug 20, 2020 at 04:23AM EDT

@Kenetic Kups: ''honestly though, this sadly isn't surprising''

That's what I'm really worried about. Once people are no longer shocked and start to become indifferent about this is when the normalization (of sexualizing minors) begins to set in.

It's funny how shows like Uzaki-chan is considered ''problematic'' because Twitter checkmarks think she looks like a child with big boobs, yet Cuties, a show with actual children dancing seductively in it, has flown mostly below the radar.

@Nox Lucis
Yeah. You'll know you've done something really wrong when 4chan of all places has the moral high ground.

Last edited Aug 20, 2020 at 05:53AM EDT

bmxbandit wrote:

if you understand spanish watch this, tl;dw the video is about a hollywood producer (John Paul Rice) that denounces this crap, and got his movie removed from amazon, the movies is "A Child's Voice" with actually addresses this topic.

There's also the video itself, albeit without a guy speaking Spanish over it.

As for Netflix itself and this video they put on their platform, all I can say:

Even if one tried to play Devil's Advocate as to what the movie itself is really about or what difference Netflix made over it's original, this all still comes off as creepy and the like. The poster they made for the movie really doesn't help.

Last edited Aug 20, 2020 at 05:18PM EDT

As this shit storm rages on, some things to note:

-The director of this film likely wasn't making something that sexualizes little girls so much as commenting on their hypersexualization while also drawing on her own experiences.
https://twitter.com/miggsboson/status/1296495374056775688

-The author has deleted her Twitter account after getting death threats.
https://twitter.com/notallbhas/status/1296555732683427840?s=19

Honestly, I don't know if the film itself really was trying to sexualize 11 year old girls but one thing is for sure: Netflix really, really screwed up here by using a poster that sexualized little girls rather than going with the original as shown in the miggsboson tweet I linked. All this said, threats are shit and I can get one being outraged with what Netflix used but that said, it may as well be safe to say the director of the film doesn't deserve the threats when her work looks to be one critical of the sexualization of little girls rather than glorifying it unlike Netflix had done with its version of the poster.

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>softcore pedophilia
you are joking, right?
Its some girls dancing. If you find that sexually attractive, then you are telling on yourself.

poochyena wrote:

>softcore pedophilia
you are joking, right?
Its some girls dancing. If you find that sexually attractive, then you are telling on yourself.

I don't think one needs to be attracted so much as just going "wtf" as to how Netflix advertised it with the poster. It may as well end up being spankbait for a pedo looking at it while everyone else looks at the poster with reactions such as disgust.

poochyena wrote:

>softcore pedophilia
you are joking, right?
Its some girls dancing. If you find that sexually attractive, then you are telling on yourself.

It's not any just any dance, though. They're dancing in sexually provocative ways that are not appropriate for their age. And if you saw the trailer you'll see that the young girls' movements, poses, and how they dress and present themselves exude a very sexual atmosphere outside of their dancing. It feels like the writer-director Maïmouna Doucouré is trying too hard to be provocative in her directorial debut that it kinda dilutes the message of the dangers of society sexualizing its youth (if ever that was really the intended message it tries to convey or not, I'm not sure).

Maybe describing this film as softcore pedophilia is too extreme. The way I depict softcore is anything suggestive or erotic but in an indirect way, and I thought that the girls twerking, posing and moving around and while in tight pants and exposed midriffs all fit the description. I'll be glad if you or anyone could correct me about this. The trailer and the marketing surrounding the film just feel squicky to me.

Anyhow, I've learned that the main character's family in this film is of Senegalese origin. While researching about this film I've stumbled on an old article about Senegalese women who dance provocatively in front of tourists for money, even showing their private parts to them. In the article it says there are instances where young girls are brought along in public dancing contests where they imitate their mothers dancing the ''Leumbeul'' while wearing the "Bethio" (a small transparent loincloth) and gyrating in all directions. Her being Senegalese as well, I believe the writer-director is trying to draw parallels with what she saw there to today's youth who trying to explore their sexuality. Though I believe that message would be better delivered if the film was instead a documentary-styled show depicting the corruption of the Senegalese youth in the country as-is rather than crafting this formulaic, coming-of-age film whose story structure is already done to death in cinema (as if 11 years old is considered coming-of-age. I'm pretty sure coming-of-age best describes those in their 17s to early 20s. I think children around the age of 11 should not worry about adult stuff and instead enjoy their youth while they still have it.)

Here's the article in question:

''Senegalese traditional dance, sex or pornography?'' by afrik-news

Last edited Aug 21, 2020 at 04:32AM EDT

poochyena wrote:

>softcore pedophilia
you are joking, right?
Its some girls dancing. If you find that sexually attractive, then you are telling on yourself.

If you don't see a problem in children twerking I've got some bad news for you.

SHSLNecromancer wrote:

If you don't see a problem in children twerking I've got some bad news for you.

Of course it's a problem, that's half the message of the movie. But rather than a "playing it safe for the masses" hollywood movie that just implies things that are uncomfortable, indie films like to actually show you the gritty shit when it has a message to convey. Why said kids end up in that situation to begin with, how they're exploited because of it, and the masses that ignore it/let it happen because "I'd rather not think about that". So here it is, bold, brash, and right in your face. You're not supposed to enjoy it, and you're not supposed to pretend it doesn't exist because "it's uncomfortable to see/think about".

Last edited Aug 24, 2020 at 03:28AM EDT

Baron O Beefdip wrote:

Of course it's a problem, that's half the message of the movie. But rather than a "playing it safe for the masses" hollywood movie that just implies things that are uncomfortable, indie films like to actually show you the gritty shit when it has a message to convey. Why said kids end up in that situation to begin with, how they're exploited because of it, and the masses that ignore it/let it happen because "I'd rather not think about that". So here it is, bold, brash, and right in your face. You're not supposed to enjoy it, and you're not supposed to pretend it doesn't exist because "it's uncomfortable to see/think about".

The problem is, in order to make this film, a director somewhere had to tell real children to put on provocative outfits and do provocative dance moves, in an industry that already doesn't treat child actors well.

Ryumaru Borike wrote:

The problem is, in order to make this film, a director somewhere had to tell real children to put on provocative outfits and do provocative dance moves, in an industry that already doesn't treat child actors well.

Yes they did, all in service of highlighting an issue in the entertainment industry, as well as the types of societies/living situations that facilitate these sorts of issues. An indie (worth highlighting because in general they do things outside the "safe" hollywood standard), anti war movie isn't going to put on a puppet show to convey the idea of "war is bad", they're going to depict the horrors of war as brutally as possible to get the message across.

Baron O Beefdip wrote:

Yes they did, all in service of highlighting an issue in the entertainment industry, as well as the types of societies/living situations that facilitate these sorts of issues. An indie (worth highlighting because in general they do things outside the "safe" hollywood standard), anti war movie isn't going to put on a puppet show to convey the idea of "war is bad", they're going to depict the horrors of war as brutally as possible to get the message across.

The difference is that in anti-war movies, all the violence you see is entirely fake. Fake wounds, fake blood, etc. Here, the sexual overtones are very real, and that's what makes this so different.

nocunoct wrote:

The difference is that in anti-war movies, all the violence you see is entirely fake. Fake wounds, fake blood, etc. Here, the sexual overtones are very real, and that's what makes this so different.

Yes they are, again, to serve the greater narrative. The issue of child exploitation (an issue that goes FAR beyond a simple matter of "scantily clad preteens" in the entertainment industry) didn't begin with this movie, nor is it "part of the problem" by simply existing, as that would imply they all operate and exist on the same level of "taking advantage of naive kids".

Clevergirl98 wrote:

I dont have netflix, but who made this call in the marketing department of Netflix?

Even a few years ago, South Park was making the joke that Netflix greenlights nearly everything. It's probably partly that and also partly them being told it won an award at Sundance and not looking to hard at it beyond that.

If you mean the specific promotional poster, who knows? Corporate bureaucracies often don't make a whole lot of sense--it's unlikely that "sexually suggestive images of minor in the promotional thumbnails/posters" was a regular enough problem that it made the list of things the rank and file were asked to keep an eye out for and elevate.

Last edited Aug 27, 2020 at 09:40PM EDT

If anyone is going to go after someone at netflix. It would make more sense if they went after the person who is in charge of the marketing department who made this stunt at Netflix.

Skeletor-sm

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