For much of the country over this past weekend, the release of the movie "Barbie" was an unapologetically joyous occasion. The pink-drenched comedy based on the long-beloved Mattel toy captured the spirit of the summer of 2023. People are finally shaking off pandemic trauma, it seems, and just want to bop along to Dua Lipa tunes in a bubblegum-colored Corvette. Sure, everybody knows we still have a lot of problems that need fixing. But "Barbie" set box office records by reminding everyone that it's OK to make some time for fun.
Republicans, of course, can't let people have a good time without getting angry about it. The right-wing propaganda machine whipped into high gear over the weekend, screeching at endless top volume about how America was being destroyed because Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling were making campy jokes in an imaginary universe. These complaints, unsurprisingly, had nothing to do with Hollywood's addiction to rebooting existing intellectual properties or its chronic lack of creativity. Instead, the gripes were chaotic and hard to follow. Fox News was furious about the fact that one actor in "Barbie," Hari Nef, is trans. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas was yelling about maps and China, airing a convoluted conspiracy theory that's not worth trying to figure out. There was lots of yammering that "Barbie" is supposedly a man-hating movie, an almost inevitable complaint anytime women get prominent speaking roles — in a film directed by a woman, no less! — these days.
