I am grateful to have been born a few decades before the woke, race, gender, DEI, and medical-industrial psychological operations, among others, were in full swing. I’m grateful, too, to have always had a different way of looking at life in general — not that it has made the journey any easier. Quite the opposite, in fact. The hearts and minds of the young today are under constant assault from all directions, and as tech devices of perpetual surveillance and screens of all sizes are ubiquitous and omnipresent, it requires a truly awake and aware, consciously deliberate choice to limit your exposure to the persistent mind control, indoctrination, and propaganda inundating everyone, all the time, everywhere, all at once.
I was doing research for a film I am helping to produce, looking through a long list of talented Canadian actors and actresses who might be suitable for the principal roles. I came across a trailer for a film called My Old Ass that was quirky and interesting. It is written and directed by Megan Park, her second feature film, following her directorial debut, Fallout. It was immediately evident to me that only 10 years ago this video clip wouldn’t have caused much of a stir among the general community, but today, it would without a doubt attract the unconscious, automatic, and programmed — and very predictable, weak-minded, and belligerent — ire and vitriol of a heavily propagandized and indoctrinated generation. Looking through a few “top” and “featured” comments and reviews, you quickly find nonsensical terms such as “lesbophobic” and talk of racism, misogyny, and all the usual things that pronoun-addled characters hiding behind fake names and AI-generated avatars spew and spit out onto social media feeds. Granted, many of them were likely bots, but those, too, are funded and propagated by someone with an angle and a motive.
For me, until I had read some of the feedback, I hadn’t even thought about the fact that the main character’s older self was Latina, where her younger self was not. It didn’t matter. My disbelief had been adequately suspended. I didn’t even consider the notion that a young man coming into her life — whom she fell for — had “converted her” into a “cis” or “bi” or that “all she needed was a good man” had anything whatsoever to do with it. It seemed to me that she was simply exploring her values, her sexuality, her attractions, and what all of that could mean. And she was tripping on mushrooms, conjuring up her older self, and Aubrey Plaza would certainly make that work in a funny and interesting way.
There was no sense nor need of finality or box-defining, nothing that warranted scoffing or derision. Her path was distinctly “to be determined.” She was still quite young. That’s the whole point of going through that phase of life — childhood and through adolescence — having the time and space to delve into innocence and curiosity to examine, test, and evaluate our impulses and inclinations. Then, to let them percolate, process, and slowly evolve and integrate as we discern and define our personalities and priorities. It’s not simply to adopt severe reductionistic black-or-white psychology, nor to consider brutal, violent, aggressive, and permanent alterations to our minds and bodies, as has become so very prominent and trendy in this era — forcibly, artificially so.
A father in British Columbia was powerless to stop the transition of his 13-year-old daughter, and he went to prison for speaking out about it.
The girl started to identify as a boy at school, the first year they started teaching gender ideology. The school then sent her to a psychologist named Wallace Wong, a man who says he’s transitioning more than 1000 children, including more than 500 in state care.
Wong sent her to the BC Children’s Hospital, who determined she needed puberty blockers and testosterone.
The father objected, so the endocrinologist sent him a letter saying he could be a “friend and advisor” to his daughter, but had no legal right to stop her medical transition.
The father spoke out, was given a gag order by a judge, violated the gag order, and was given a 6-month prison sentence.
In the trailer, a seemingly healthy, normal, curious young woman explores elements of LGB values, lifestyle, and identity, and there was nothing untoward or divisive and derogatory about it. If there was, it was fabricated and projected thereon by the unconscious viewer.
It was nice to see Maddie Ziegler in another film, away from the contractual clutches of Sia. You might recognize her, now all grown up, as the talented and evocative wig-wearing dancer who starred in most of Sia’s biggest hits over the past decade. That’s an interesting story in itself.
Of course, I haven’t seen the film My Old Ass. It isn’t available to the general public as of this writing. But as it is with many trailers offered these days, you get to see much of the film condensed into a few minutes, though I suspect in this case they were at least a little clever and misleading, leaving us wondering about the full story. Regardless, it is one I am curious to see play out in full. I doubt if even then I’ll find any reason to come back to the IMDb page or Megan’s Instagram profile and stamp my opinion for all to see, employing some misguided and misinformed stance or impulse to signal virtue or an unconsidered and inappropriate cry for social justice or some other half-baked nonsense.
Don’t just imitate. Elevate.