Originally a comment by Bruce Gorton on Everyone is on the same level.

A part of me agrees with having singular standards. I’d quite like it if Konstantin Kisin gave it a bash.

You see the standard I have is that one shouldn’t take what someone says in a specific context completely out of that context in order to demonize them.

And that appears to me to be what is happening to Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy here.

To put what she is saying into context, her filmography includes A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness. It is about a girl who survived an attempted honor killing by her father and uncle, only for the Pakistani public to pressure her into forgiveness – so the people who tried to kill would get to go back home.

An earlier documentary was Saving Face, about two women who survived acid attacks. Women in the Holy Kingdom is about feminists in Saudi Arabia.

As a man I do not object to being disturbed by subject matter like this. She should absolutely be happy that men find this stuff disturbing, and it is the precise sort of stuff that should be made with that in mind.

I am extremely opposed to this idea that I should never be disturbed, and generally when the shoe is on the other foot, well, if the shoe was on the other foot Kisin would be championing Sharmeen’s right to express ideas people find disturbing.

So far as to whether she’s the right person to revive Starwars, I don’t know. Her background in politics and economics could be useful for fixing the biggest flaw in Disney Starwars – the lack of solid world building.

In the OT – we know why the emperor wants to build the Death Star, it is because he wants to devolve governance to the system lords, and the Death Star is there to keep them from taking the opportunity to rebel. The conflict is between the empire that rules by fear, and the resistance which believes in rule by consent.

You never really get just what the First Order really believes in, what its ultimate big picture vision for the galaxy is. Having someone come in with a background in politics and economics, if she can bring some of that into the story, may well be what the series needs.