Why Environmentalists Hate Captain Planet
Channel: vlogbrothers
Date: 2018-07-27

All of this is much easier to see in retrospect, which I think is telling. It's hard to see bias in the moment, and it's easy to feel justified in simplifying the stories of your adversaries when you're in the middle of what you see as a war. But that's why it's good to look back at things like this. 

I think it's fine to create content for any age that accurately portrays the difficulties we face as a species...that's a completely apolitical act. But while the creators of Captain Planet will tell you that each of the villains represents the extremes, not the norms, none of those things are (at least in the beginning) modeled in nuanced ways. I am particularly troubled by the portrayal of the laborers as sub-human. It's one thing for billionaire Looten Plunder to be terrible (and yes, his pony tail is appropriately grotesque) but modeling the people who are laboring as garbage collectors or machine operators as monsters, at this point, downright pisses me off. 


----
Subscribe to our newsletter! http://nerdfighteria.com/newsletter/ 
And join the community at http://nerdfighteria.com  http://effyeahnerdfighters.com
Help transcribe videos - http://nerdfighteria.info
John's twitter - http://twitter.com/johngreen
John's tumblr - http://fishingboatproceeds.tumblr.com
Hank's twitter - http://twitter.com/hankgreen
Hank's tumblr - http://edwardspoonhands.tumblr.com