What always happens when you slap the label "controversial" on something? I'll give you a hint, it doesn't make it unpopular. When I saw the "Parental Advisory: Explicit Material" sticker on Eminem's first CD, it was then that I knew I had to have it. Chalk it up to the forbidden fruit theory, or human nature itself, but something draws us to dangerous and disputed things.
Take the Special Olympics effort to discourage viewers from seeing the new movie "Tropic Thunder" because it contains a half hour of footage of Ben Stiller portraying a person who is mentally retarded. In light of our contraversy-seeking impulses, The Special Olympics Committee's media campaign to characterize Tropic Thunder as a film containing "extremely offensive material" will only increase ticket sales and the millions that this film is going to make anyway.
I have a suggestion for the Special Olympics committee- don't rely on this extreme rhetoric and these absolutist, black and white distinctions between things. According to them, content can either be offensive, or tolerant. If a film addresses the topic in anything other than a favorable light, it is insensitive, intolerant, and should be excluded from public discourse.
Wouldn't a more effective, reasonable, and fair solution be to encourage people to see this movie, decide for themselves if it is appropriate, and then have a balanced discussion of it?
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