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Well kind of
James Gunn has not been shy about criticizing Trump
So some of trump's alt-right fanboys dug up his 8 year old tweets where he made a lot of paedo jokes, so now Disney have fired him, he'd just started writing GOTG 3, apparently some of the actors are now looking for a way out too.
Obvs Gunn made these jokes, though this was already raked over a few years ago & he did make his start at Troma, which is pretty much the anti-disney studio!
Offending tweets...
https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1020229342549413890?s=19
This is the new mccarthyism at work.
I thought his response was one of the better ones, pretty much "I was trying very hard to be shocking and funny and didn't manage either, I'm a bellend".
Pfft, snowflakes!
Social media is such a bunch of dirty hairy ass crack isn't it?
It’s the New Puritanism - the lurking feeling that someone, somewhere, is having fun.
And the overwhelming desire to stop them at all costs.
It's utterly disgraceful: Some guy cracks a couple of [bad] jokes and 10 years later is sacked because of it. There's definitely something fishy about this.
I'm just surprised that Disney hadn't done due diligence on his social media output. I bet they'll be balancing that with plausible deniability on the rest of their high profile workforce now though.
indeed, Disney makes more money than many countries GDPs
they can afford some researchers & Im sure they did their due dilligence, they knew who they were buying into, but GOTG2 made $415m from the film alone
OK, bit confused here- just to confirm, most of the above posters are initimating that he shouldn't have been fired and are offering up various reasons for that?
You think he should be fired?
Well at least they stopped the pretence of framing the argument as "the left would be calling for him to be fired if he was right wing" so there is progress of a kind.
You think he should be fired?
Yeah, publicly known guy who posts over the line jokes on social media- can't be kept, certainly not by major corporation.
Would you like it if someone went to your employer, pointed out that you made some bad jokes 10 years ago, that they didn’t like, and have you fired over it? Even though you weren’t working for that company at the time? And that most likely the company knew you had made those jokes, but were previously ok with it, possibly even hired you because of those jokes, and ones like them?
How do we know they are jokes? Asking as I've read them as they are presented in the first link and I'm not seeing them as obvious jokes...I'm hoping they are and it has backfired but what makes us sure they are? Really not good attempts.
How do we know they are jokes?
No, you are right, they are obviously to be taken literally. String him up.
Err......If not poor attempts at jokes what else would they be? I admit it would be much easier for police to catch child molesters if they posted updates on Twitter.
He shouldn’t have been fired bearing in mind that Disney regularly employ actors who have been accused of and seen to conduct themselves in unsavoury ways.
Yeah, publicly known guy who posts over the line jokes on social media- can’t be kept, certainly not by major corporation.
Don’t the makers of South Park pretty much do that for a living? All whilst working for a large corporation.
possibly even hired you because of those jokes, and ones like them?
Bit of a stretch with Disney, isn't it?
I think people should be accountable for what they say and have said in the past, but to what degree that diminishes with time is the question. Valid mitigation can be made for context, naivety and generally being young IMO but it's never clear cut and always subjective.
The problem is you have to have an individual and a corporation that feels constrained (or needs to appear to be) by normal social mores for them to be affected by this. The utterly shameless will continue to grab 'em by the pussy and boast about it with impunity.
How do we know they are jokes? Asking as I’ve read them as they are presented in the first link and I’m not seeing them as obvious jokes
FFS! They're clearly jokes, shit ones but obviously not serious.
Bit of a stretch with Disney, isn’t it?
Im sure even the best, most savoury of comedians have some work that is not of their normal standard.
I agree, utterly terrible jokes with no humour. Given the way the US is just now, I'm asking as I suspect there are many people there who wouldn't see them as jokes at all...which is why I asked. We are all smart enough to realise they are and to recognise how poor they are, but there are plenty of people who won't.
Given the way the US is just now
These were written between 6 and 10 years ago.
Given the way the US is just now, I’m asking as I suspect there are many people there who wouldn’t see them as jokes at all
Oh you were asking for an American friend.
Nope, I was asking to try to make people think about it. We all recognise it as poor attempts at jokes. Irrespective of when they were posted, he is being judged now, so it is today's US climate that has decided he is fired.
So no one should do or say anything now that might become/be interpreted as offensive to anyone, or their associates or made to look that way with some red marker pen, within their working lives?
Good job he wasn’t Scottish. He’d be on trial for a hate crime.
Well at least they stopped the pretence of framing the argument as “the left would be calling for him to be fired if he was right wing” so there is progress of a kind.
Oh, I certianly can’t imagine the left digging up comments that people had made years ago and making a big fuss out of them, calling for people to be sacked... would never happen, would it?
He made very inappropriate comments (jokes?) about paedophilia on social media and is working for a company whose business model is to sell films and merchandise in the main to children it was right that he should have been sacked, his position is untenable. Whats the problem here?
Oh, I certianly can’t imagine the left digging up comments that people had made years ago and making a big fuss out of them, calling for people to be sacked… would never happen, would it?
You seem confused about the character you are playing today and their comprehension of the English language. D- must try harder.
Irrespective of if it is right or wrong for him to get sacked..........
I've never watched a GOTG - is anything worth watching from a mind that generates those comments as 'humour'? I'm not even judging it by its taste just it's lack of humour/intelligence. I'm assuming he is an intelligent bloke otherwise to have had the success he has, but most of that reads like it's from the keyboard of a slightly dysfunctional 15 year old. This is obviously heavily filtered - has he posted anything worth reading at other times?
The only good thing that will come from this is a high profile person being given the boot for crass comments posted online making the great unwashed think a little before contributing to the shitfest that is social media. We've lost a couple of staff here for similar - some people are just too stupid for their own good.
I’ve never watched a GOTG – is anything worth watching from a mind that generates those comments as ‘humour’?
Yeah, both films are hilarious. Weirdly, no child molesting jokes, but ho hum.
Trump is far more powerful than I could have imagined.
He has gone back in time and made a whole bunch of correctly spelt tweets on someone else's twitter, making them look a bit nonce-y and rape-y.
Trump is far more powerful than I could have imagined

So if someone mocked a disabled reporter, or had made racist comments years ago I guess they should be fired too?
Oh, I certianly can’t imagine the left digging up comments that people had made years ago and making a big fuss out of them, calling for people to be sacked… would never happen, would it?
Obvious troll is obvious. And so very, very predictable. #rollseyes
I've seen people on here go to people's employers to grass them up for something they said/wrote.
working for a company whose business model is to sell films and merchandise in the main to children it was right that he should have been sacked, his position is untenable. Whats the problem here?
Jonny Depp, Robert Downey Jr and others also work for the same company. Should they too be sacked for previous, very public, behaviour or is it just the ones you don’t see who write things on Twitter?
Just checking for an American friend.
The question is why are you and others defending comments/jokes about paedophilia, really what is wrong with you?
Obvious troll is obvious. And so very, very predictable.
The thing is, it isn't actually trolling to point out that Gunn has been hoisted on the left's own petard of puritanism and that there are a lot of people whinging about this that would have been rubbing their thighs with a frisson of sexual delight had <span style="text-decoration: underline;">exactly</span> the same thing happened to someone of a different political leaning.
Though it could be uncomfortable of those with a very selective morality to realise that they are culpable and that culpability is all too obvious to others.
If you react in defence of Gunn when you would have gone all Social Justice w****** had these been the tweets of the time-travelling Commander in Chief, you probably need to have a good, hard think about what sort of person you are.
<div class="bbp-reply-author">superdez75
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The question is why are you and others defending comments/jokes about paedophilia, really what is wrong with you?
I won't defend jokes about paedophilia, but I might ask the question whether people should be fired over it.
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Yes of course they should especially when they are working for a company whose main raison d'etre is for the purposes of entertaining children.
The thing is, it isn’t actually trolling to point out that Gunn has been hoisted on the left’s own petard of puritanism
In Ninfan’s case it is.
^^What he said. The guy made a few shit jokes years ago. Why should that impact anything he does now?
edit - too slow! what Northwind said.
The thing is, it isn’t actually trolling to point out that Gunn has been hoisted on the left’s own petard of puritanism
Well apart from the fact that it isn't the lefts petard of puritsm, that is just the lie repeated constantly by the right wing blowhards as they attack anyone who opposes them.
From McCarthyism, through the civil rights movement and ant-Vietnam war protests to football players taking a knee, it has been a constant tactic of the right to attack freedom of speech, left wing politics are mere amateurs by comparison, yet the alt-right bawbags have the audacity to lay the fault at those who promote equality and fairness, and it is somehow believed by idiots who can only see their words and not their actions.