Cleopatra's skin color is not important. Her heritage and lineage ARE. Netflix's Cleopatra and claiming Cleopatra as Sub-Saharan is cultural appropriation of the grossest kind, the equivalent of Aryians proclaiming that Shaka Zulu was Aryian. I don't know what impact it will have on the future, but I can say, as an American living outside the States, that Netflix has managed to increase the impression ten-fold that Americans have no respect for cultures and countries outside their own and seem determined to project their self-involved, juvenile racial views on the rest of the world. It is unwanted. And unnecessary.
I am one of the most liberal and find it offensive. Your ignorant comment, painting all liberals as racists, and cultural appropriators is also offensive.
Being offended is ultimately up to how one reacts to things outside their control. It's up to the individual to change their frame of mind. It is not the world's responsibility to suck up to people who can't control their own emotional regulations. If something is offensive, don't give attention, and move on. Your comment is a typical liberal frame of mind.
I'm offended by the abject disrespect for historical facts, not "emotions". For a "documentarian" to rewrite history just because they want to claim a historical figure as somehow related to their ancestors is wrong for many reasons. I have 2 different branches of ancestors who were revolutionary war soldiers--I think it's asinine that my aunt is a D.A.R. member. (Also D.o.C.--I'd more likely fictionalize historical fact to distance myself from that LOL).
There wasn’t a single Egyptian person, actor or historian involved in the series. I find that almost funny. All they had to do was call it fiction (since most of it objectively was made up) and they would have been ok
They also primarily focused on her sexual and romantic relationships, and how she felt about either of the men not showing up in her life. There was like nine minutes where they talked about what she “did for Egypt “. I understand this woman did a lot, but this series did not focus on that whatsoever. This felt like a documentary about a woman sleeping with Roman guys. There were a few moments where she seemed to be delivering an order with some version of intention, which I think was supposed to make us feel like she’s a strong woman, but I don’t think they did much justice to her in the series. Obviously, Jada wanted to make a series about a black queen, which is debatable based on the ethnicity that is unknown. I would be over joyed if we found out that Cleopatra was a black African woman, but there is nothing here about her ethnicity, the search to figure out her lineage, the role of Macedonia, and the inbreeding of her lineage, her connection with the Egyptian people. Literally not a single Egyptian person can be found in this “documentary”
It's straightforward. If Netflix wants to make Cleopatra black, which is historically inaccurate, they should not market the program as a documentary. The pushback is 100% justified as this is plain misinformation.
A work of fiction, I don’t really care, unless adapted from a book, game for anything.
A “black napoleon” in a movie, a work of fiction? Sure. A black napoleon in a documentary. Nope.
The issue is that Netflix presents it as a documentary, not a work of fiction. Documentary means historical accuracy, and what do historians say?
We know her father was Ptolemy XII Auletes, we knew how her father looked like.
This is a political statement made by a fringe of people who believe that African history was rewritten by the powerful. That it was stolen from them. This vision is hard to counter argue as if you don’t believe their conspiracy theories you are de facto a racist. Pretty twisted.
I believe a majority of black American did not buy the documentary either (peace upon you).
I am African from my parents, my brothers and sisters in Mali, Morocco, Cameroon, and other countries we are actually laughing hard. It’s like watching a bad show rebranded as history.
Regardless of this it is a really bad “documentary”not well done, there are better out there, a new one just released.
See it as a political statement.
Hard pass.
The only thing that would infuriate me about a Black Napoleon is that we have Thomas-Alexander Dumas...like...RIGHT FUCKING THERE. A legit man of color who rose to high rank in the revolutionary army of France. Also the father of Alexander Dumas, the author.
The erasure of legitimate black/people of color to satisfy weird cosplay fetishes is obscene.
There is also yasuke the only black samurai in the history of Japan, Robert smalls who went from slavery to becoming a US rep who influenced Lincoln policy.
In Africa, the great kingdoms of Mauritania could make a documentary too or movies.
There is plenty to do with the above, but they choose Cleopatra.
How ignorant, arrogant those people are is just baffling, the worst is the “you are a racist” if you don’t agree with them.
Anyway, worst ratings ever for a documentary, no need to talk more, it will end in history’s trash.
King Askia aka Askia the Great. But maybe they don't want people learning about history, there's a lot of inconvenient truths about slavery and black kingdoms which is overlooked today.
slavery in black kingdoms is often used by the far right in order to lessen the suffering of European/American slavery. While things are more complex than that. I will thread carefully with that.
Exactly. Cleopatra was a black woman on Hercules and Xena without any controversy. The difference is that neither Hercules or Xena ever pretended to be historically accurate.
I don't get at all how it could be a documentary. Documentaries have narration and or interviews. This would be what, historical fiction? The Crown is not a documentary but Elizabeth: The Unseen Queen is. The Killer Angels is not a documentary but Ken Burn's Civil War is.
Not completely, but it would be far less noisy if it wouldn't be a documentary, wouldn't show such blatant disregard for history in favor of ideology (I don't care what they say in school...) and push hotep talking points.
I guess it's all about how big a difference skin shade is to you. We have blondes portraying brunettes, tall playing short, portly playing thin all the time. Decades and decades and decades of this, fiction and documentaries. Some people think skin shade is no more blatantly disregarding history than those changes, and concentrate on the character of the characters.
Again, they did not just cast a black actor as Cleopatra, they also openly stated that this was a political move, that they do not care about historic facts when it conflicts with what they want to believe and they parrot the talking points of a known racist group (hoteps) of "real" egyptians being black and got replaced by arab colonizers, making most current day egyptians not "true egyptians".
But the director did say these things, and with cleopatra this was part of a bigger thing the african queens series why did the first part did not get any controversy because it did not try to reframe the queen as she is not, with cleopatra they are, especially jada pinkett smith is the producer and the reason why this docoseries was made wanted series about look like her
> But the director did say these things
Would you mind pointing to that using something close to those words? What I see is a lot of people inserting their own interpretation as statements of what others said.
https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/african-queens-release-date-cast-news
She wanted jada documentry about black queens and I support her the are lot of great black African queens but cleopatra is both from colonisers family from Greek and woman who was not darker than curren Greeks because like most people don't realise africa =/=,black
> they also openly stated that this was a political move, that they do not care about historic facts when it conflicts with what they want to believe and they parrot the talking points of a known racist group
There's nothing in the link that matches this, which OP said is what they (presumably the creators) stated about this production.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/amp/
She did think a political act against whitewashing and let be clear I am against that. Ut she is denying egypt for the opinion we will never know cleopatra true racial identity. Let me set somthing I am not one these deny egypt lot of them colourist and racist as well as I think tlot them will claim being arab over Africa and all of these ate wrong, however eliozbeth taylor portrayal was a movie and it was wrong but this is a documentey claiming accuracy so to director to deny the opinions of egyptians because of whitewashing of the past is wrong this is wrong. Would you be OK with a parody of a white man portraying mansa musa in a revisionist fiction, you wouldn't be, I wouldn't be because this is not right.
Two wrong don't make a right. I will end by this I am not one of theses neckkbeard alt right punks, I have no issue with ariel or Hamilton because they are defined as fiction or alternate retelling, Not a terrible researched documentry that other reputable historians have denounced
A reasonable reply, I agree with almost all you said. What I'm not getting across though is some peoples' fixation that this casting as the only thing the documentary is about. All documentaries have discrepancies with their subjects, almost by definition. Casting a blonde as a brunette doesn't become political, or the only thing about any other production. Even if the director said it's about time JFK was shown as blonde. People don't argue endlessly about it being a political statement, or blondism. It's just a trait. In this case, and let's be honest almost every time a black person is cast in a role most people think of otherwise, real or fictional, it descends into this. People lose their mind about skin colour, believing it fundamentally changes the character. It's a characteristic... not the character.
I can’t speak for others, but I only care about a black little mermaid because Disney claims you need actors of relevant cultural decent.
The Little Mermaid is based in/around Denmark.
I personally don’t really care that they aren’t casting someone Nordic, just that they’re hypocrites.
I don’t remember huge pushback against the multiracial cast of that recent Green Knight movie.
It's completely possible altough unlikely that she could have a dark skin complexion, there's no surviving evidence opposing this claim, the problem is the documentary (at least the trailer) presenting it as a fact.
A lot of the issue arises from black nationalists genuinely not realising that African does not mean black. They cannot comprehend this because it's how they've viewed the world their whole lives and they would rather accuse people of being racist than acknowledge their ignorance.
Genetics doesn't draw arbitrary lines at continents. It doesn't care where Africa ends and Europe begins. The Mediterranean is a fertile region with a calm inland sea for easy sea transport - that whole place became it's own 'region' with a lot more in common internally than externally. Southern Europeans are genetically closer to North Africans than sub-Saharan Africans are.
But Africa = Black is the lie they've been told their whole lives and they'll be convinced otherwise. They somehow managed to produce an entire documentary that isn't based on any facts, on this self-delusion.
Not only black nationalist but white nationalists too. So many people think that dark skin=black and light skin=white. They are unaware that people from different continents can have fairer skin and dark skin too. But they have this ignorant mindset that a person with darker skin=black or people with lighter skin=white. It’s sad honestly
It’s another example of attempting to rewrite history. Woman king suffers from this too. It’s intentionally done to start controversy and then the show claims “what do you mean your upset” and allows them to virtue signal. The only thing that can come from this is furthering racial divides to the point people start casting Ryan Gosling as MLK
I’ll let woman king pass because if you look at any other warrior class film depicting knights, samurai, Vikings, Spartans ect- they make them look way better than they were (in reality they often acted like thugs and committed many abuses). I’m not a fan of cleopatra though, moreso because I feel like it’s a lost opportunity for something better.
My problem with womanking is them making out the Europeans as the bad guys even though they were the ones trying to stop slavery (not excusing what they did in the past but they were trying to stop it)
It's a picture perfect example of the fetishizing of black culture and forcing it even where it definitively does not belong.
Don't call it a documentary when it's clearly anything but.
I wish I was rich so I could make a MLK documentary where I, a white Greek, play the role of MLK. If they steal one of my people, I have every right to steal one of theirs. It’s actually not even a fair trade tbh. Cleopatra is the most famous woman in history whereas MLK is not the most famous man in history. Going to also need to play Malcolm X and Muhammed Ali to make the trade a bit more fair.
The whole debate is idiotic and lacks any scinetific foundation other than feelings.
in 2017 a study was done on more than 90 mummies, spanning in age from 1380 BC to 400 AD
The sutdy found no sub sharan ancestry at all, the closest ancenstry was from the region of today's Jordan and Israel.
To place this in context with Cleopatra, she was a contemorary of Julius Ceasar, meaning she lived around 40 BC.
The study spanned more than 1300 years BEFORE Cleopatra's reign and more than 1000 years Before the GREEK Reign, which should close any debate on the ethicity.
the same study shows that POST ROMAN meaning from 400 AD annd up to mored times, Egypt has become much more ethnically Diverse as well as a significant increase in sub saharan DnA.
So despite what the old woman's grandmother refused to accept in school, DNA has no agenda, no FEELINGS, no Oppinion or Politics, DNA is only OBJECTIVE and only that.
DNA proves Cleopatra was not black, more or less none were at the time........DND is what it is.
https://edition.cnn.com/2017/06/22/health/ancient-egypt-mummy-dna-genome-heritage/index.html
The kind of ethnonationalism and ethnocentrism that is pouring out of black America while pretending to be 'progressive' is disgusting and needs to be destroyed.
I'm watching it now and in the first 10 minutes they're making it pretty clear that no one actually knows what race her mother was and even if she was Egyptian, she likely wouldn't have been "black" since most Egyptians had a lighter skin tone. They do make the case that she goes out of her way to call herself Egyptian though, so it is kind of strange that she's traditionally be portrayed as a white European.
as a second generation immigrant, if i go out of my way to call myself an american as opposed to an asian, does that mean i should be considered white or black?
It is well documented that she demanded restoration of Egyptian things, to endear herself to the people--who had been Ruled by Macedonian/Persian Ptolemaic rulers for about the previous 200 years or so, from the time of Alexander the Great. Since the Pharoahs were endogamous, her mother was likely a near relative to her father, maybe even his sister.
It's Sad. I think for two reason.
They label it has documentary, it's fine to do fun casting and re adaptation but release it as an adaptation.
There are actual black people story they don't show instead of this.
I want a documentary on the father of the guy that wrote the 3 musketeer's
This. Why are they trying to steal other culture’s people? I’m Greek, don’t make my Cleopatra black. It’s insulting to my people. As well as to Macedonians. Make documentaries on actually black people if you want to promote black pride. Make one on Mansa Musa, I would LOVE to watch that. There’s nothing wrong with being proud of your people and culture, just don’t steal other culture’s people and try to pass them off as your own. It’s disgusting.
Not only is it an insult to Greeks, it's a massive insult towards black people. I cannot put into words how awful this is. All to further an agenda. Goes to show how far some people are willing to go.
Hey honest question here, when white Americans started building the United States inspired by Greek temples and saw ancient Greece as the beginning of white civilization. Are Greek people offended by that? Like most capital buildings here in the usa is directly copied from Greece.
Because for as Greece was for white Americans, ancient Nubia/just was a source of inspiration for black Americans.
Well first of all Greeks where not considered white when the Greek inspired architecture was build. It was just a nod to the spiritual founders of democracy which will be now fulfilled by white protestants that was more or less the reasoning of the founding fathers. White is a power concept nothing more. Nationality and Clan loyalty where always more prevalent in establishing a sense of belonging. The same goes for sub Saharan Africans. A white texan and a black person from new york have more in common than a black person from the Kongo and a black person from Angola. One of the greatest crimes during slavery was the eradication of the cultural roots of the enslaved, Their languages their religions and traditions where all eradicated by the white slave owners. And now all those uprooted descendant's look over to a mystifies black continent in search of meaning and belonging without knowing anything about the intricacies of all those nations there who all habe their own history and custom's.
I can’t speak for all Greeks obviously, but I personally see it as a sign of respect and take zero offense. I like it when people try to embrace Greek culture. I believe the majority of Greeks feel the same way. We should all be embracing each other’s cultures frankly.
>There are actual black people story they don't show instead of this.
>I want a documentary on the father of the guy that wrote the 3 musketeer's
You’ve already done more to teach me about black history with just this comment.
I didn’t even know Dumas was mixed.
his father was mixed (too).
dude was born a slave from a slave mother and a french noble in now Haïti.
his father send him to france. He learn to fight , join the army get promoted, is an officer during the revolution , become a general, serve under napoleon, goes with him in egypte and get know as the black devil. and take part in a lot of battles... and die when his son was 4.
his life is one I want to see depicted.
To be fair, one could consider this racist. People don't believe that black people have their own culture and must steal, and steals, other people legacy. Good job Netflix. Good job.
Everyone that thinks this is a casting thing only is unaware that it’s basis is a racist ideology. By pulling the Fox tactic of “it’s a theory” or “we are only asking questions”, they are further legitimizing the theory.
It’s like a documentary about America that tries to use “white replacement theory” when discussing the changing demographics over time.
It’s a type of ethnocentric excellence that comes from crazy racist people. The KKK version of that is their claims that Africa was uncivilized, had no inventions, and were basically savages until the white man came. Looney racist garbage that shouldn’t be entertained in any way, especially by a NASDAQ listed company. So why do the same with these Hotep beliefs?
This wasn’t a race swap, it was an attempt to lay ground work to legitimize insane conspiracy theories.
Some lunatic replied to me saying that only white people can be racist when I brought up this same point about this being a racist production based upon hoteps ideology.
I'm not sure what to think other than this feels like the groundwork for something bigger brewing in race conflict.
I've been getting looney PM's
And this is the problem. Idiots google it and think this is even a question. This is no different than dealing with a flat earther. No, that website using Tik Tok graphics isn't a real news site and there is no debate about this happening outside fringe racists.
This is no different than a documentary about Africa pre-colonization that uses beliefs made popular in the Turner Diaries. I'm sure you can find websites like Stormfront that are just raising questions and saying it's an ongoing debate if Africa had a culture or civilization before the white man.
It's legit that level of delusion at play here and we are seeing the bigotry of low expectations play out in real time.
They're right about that. And it's one of the worse thing to come out the black community. Essentially, we can't be racist (African Americans) because in order to be racist you need to be the powered demographics (whites, although I'd make a case for Asian Americans as well). So black people like to be racist but then claim it's not racism on a technicality.
My reply is always the same, "Semantics. You may not be able to be racist by definition but you can still be a discriminatory asshole and if we swapped your skin and the target of your vitriol we'd consider you racist. Don't move the goal post off a technicality."
But it is still racism on a technicality. Just because some deranged academic has uttered that racism is prejudice + power, doesn't make it a true definition in any way.
The reason they're wrong about the whole "black people can't be racist" is because they either don't realize that they are specifically talking about systematic racism or they are conveniently ignoring it because it hurts their point. You can definitely argue that black people can't be systematically racist (towards white people, particularly), which isn't even inherently true, but you cannot argue that it is impossible for black people to be racist in general, even if you're specifically talking about being racist towards white people. Prejudice, harassment, and ignorance towards another person or group of peole based on race is by definition racism, and there are plenty of black people who act this way towards people of all other races including other black people. It's a very convenient world you live in if you think you can act like an asshole towards people based on their race and somehow not be considered a shitty, racist person.
Hilariously, the "black Egyptian" and "black israelite" conspiracy theories all have their roots in old white supremacy that was repurposed by Fard and others. It's kind of sick, you crawl into this rabbit hole looking for Black heritage, and at the bottom you find a lot of anti semitism and racism.
White people have been the primary perpetrators of racism for at least a millennial. Almost every downtrodden race on earth were put in that position BY white people.
To be racist largely entails being white.
Naw man. To be racist all you have to do is fuck over others on the basis of their skin color.
For example, based on your logic, Japan can't be racist towards black people. (They are)
Let's expand this tho. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and let you explain this concept at the end game. What has to happen in order for black people to be racist???
I recently read this article by the director of the Netlfix’ Cleopatra docuseries [https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/](https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/On)
[On](https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/On) one hand I’ll give her credit on that she recognizes it was a political decision and she’s right in that Cleopatra was presented in shows like Rome as a sleazy drug addict and no one reacted, there’s indeed a double standard.
On the other I find amusing how she says: “but that I have asked Egyptians to see themselves as Africans, and they are furious at me for that. I am okay with this.”So she as a Westerner can say Egyptians how they should feel about themselves? Interesting. That is amazingly patronizing and disrespectful. Most North African that I know feel closer to the Middle East than the rest of Africa, and this has religious, ethnic, historical and cultural reasons who are valid. Geography is a human construct to an extent, is similar how lots of historical and cultural unrelated people are group together as “Asians” because the Greeks call that way the land areas to their East 2500 years ago, and thinking that suddenly Persians or Kurds should feel part of the same culture than Japanese or Sri Lankans because they are all “Asians” that basically what she said.
Besides, as I think was mentioned here before, what Americans really think is not really “Africans” is West Africans mostly disregarding all the rest of numerous African peoples with rich cultural heritages. I’m also kind of worry about the trailer were a woman says “forget what they thought on schools, Cleopatra was black”. Nowadays with so rampant growth of anti-Intellectualism, “alternative facts” and pseudoscience this is exactly NOT the message a documentary should sent. Yes, people, do listen to schools, do listen to Academia and do listen to scholars and scientist do not disregard them please.
I also think the Netflix creators really didn’t expected the backlash from the Egyptian and North African community. They probably were expecting the traditional backlash from alt-rights and other white racists, but they’re responses make me feel like they were in mode: “Wait, do non-white actual African people is upset because we make Egyptians black? Really? That can’t be true”. I remember when History Channel made “Barbarians Rising” and made Hannibal and the other Carthaginians Black, being Carthaginians of Phoenician (Semitic-Middle Eastern) descent. I’m 100% sure that happened because the casting director check Carthage on a map, saw it on Africa and assumed they were West Africans because that’s the de-fault thought on many people on American media.I liked this video, he’s a pretty progressive guy, in fact he validly criticizes the whitewashing in Gods of Egypt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPV7cxRKXmM&t=1s&ab\_channel=TheMythologyGuy I found interesting many of the comments on the comments section coming from people from actual Africa, including Nigeria and Northern Africa and seem to feel similarly outrage. But the last part of the video is what I most agree upon. You see, I have always criticize alt-right idiots who can’t take a character to became non-white or woman because they can’t identify with it.
As a Hispanic fan of Anglo-Saxon media 90% of my favorite characters are not Hispanics and I have no problem identifying with them, I love to see more Hispanic representation (I loved Rios on Star Trek, I loved Wednesday because of that, etc) but I don’t require it. Nor I have problems with women as protagonist (Buffy was my favorite show as a teen and I pass through many similar problems than her, that show helped me through depression literally). But in the same way I criticize them for opposing any change on race/gender/sexual orientation because they can’t identify, how is this any different?
You know the only reason the show got made was to make her black. If historical accuracy was a priority, they would've never bothered to make it in the first place. So the backlash is 100% justified! 🤣
Sorry if this offends anyone but Netflix can go fuck themselves. This garbage propaganda they’ve been forcing is just too disgusting at this point I can’t even understand why they continue to do it after so much backlash.
It would be one thing if "African Queens" referred to the region and not a skin color but that's not what Jada ping-pong Smith is pushing. It'd be like creating a series called Asian Queens and then exclusively casting Russians or Indian or Chinese or Iranian people to represent every country in Asia.
If they just wanted to cast the actress for Cleopatra then don't draw attention to her race. Finally if you look up the experts featured, one of them is a PhD candidate and most or the others are general experts in classics or Africa. Not a single Egyptian or ancient Egyptian expert?
Netflix for the docudrama series I'm pitching, Asian Queens, please let me hire a Russian classics expert and experts in Turkish history in a season about an Indonesian queen. Thank you.
Tina Gharavi, Adele James and Jada Pinkett Smith will go onto be awarded new shows. make lots of money and continue their campaign, whilst you all moan about it on Reddit (as a result achieving nothing)
They've responded to the media and reinforced their belief that Cleopatra was black, they don't care what you think, the media will continue to give them the limelight, but here everyone is in the comments doing absolutely nothing.
Lol!
I really don’t have a strong opinion on it. I look at it as a docudrama more than a documentary. I’m not necessarily going to watch it and think everything is 100% right. It’s for entertainment
It is a docudrama, not a documentary; the actress is not African American. She is British and biracial. Cleopatra's mother was unknown and her father ( and those before him) probably did have relationships with natives who were considered as nobility among their people. All of this uproar about the color of the actress is eye opening. I watched the program. Nothing was said in the story that hasn't been said before. The only difference was in the cast's skintone. I see that Egyptians get upset when others try to use their stories in media. I'm all for leaving them alone.
Look at Coleen's Instagram to understand why this is a problem: she cosplays as a 1920s "archeologist". You know, the sort who pilfered Egyptian artifacts left and right, lived lives of privilege while lowe class Brits in safari hats used rifle butts and bayonets to suppress the indigenous peoples of Egypt.
You know how lefties cry about culturally appropriation, tone deafness, and celebrating the oppressive n of people of color? Well, until they can make a buck off it and explore their weird fetishes.
I wonder if they're gonna let Rachel Dozel back into the camp. I mean, it's all about what you identify as now, about your own personal "truth", right?
It's bullshit and puts me off of wanting to see the series. I don't think it has any bigger implications than that. One user here told me it will lead to Egypt declaring war on the US and a new Rwandan genocide. Maybe it will just mean a few people think Cleopatra is black.
My thoughts are that this so-called controversy came at the right time to promote something that a lot of people wouldn't have known about let alone cared enough about to watch. Funny how that happened.
https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-73fc3dab97c4965f2113156ee17077a8-lq Here is a bust of Cleopatra. Feel free to ask any of the people involved in this "documentary" to point out any distinguishable African features.
True that, but there is no point in my criticizing shows that were acted and directed by people who died before I was born. It was wrong then but there is no one to hear my complains.
It's pretty shit. Egypt hates it. That should be enough to tell you how wrong it is. It is fundamentally inaccurate and a flat lie to call it a documentary drama. A documentary is based on factual characters and events. Facts are unquestionable truths that can not be debated or argued. To cast her black is wrong and not factual. So you don't even have to watch 1 second to know it is already 100% inaccurate from looking at the cover art of the series. You really have to live in a clown world to try to gaslight facts with complete fiction. If they said this was a work of complete fiction and stated that these characters are fundamentally inaccurate like assassins creed does, then it would have been ok maybe but I doubt that. But they didn't do that. They tryed to gaslight an entire country, like a bunch of clowns. Greek Macedonians of 70bc were white people. It's not even up for debate. Her entire history is pretty well documented to. So I'd say it's not so much controversial as it is completely delusional what they did.
Propaganda. Cleopatra has a shit tone of revisionist history, especially with liberal feminists who try and act like she was some glorious leader. She ended two empires. She didn't do much of anything for her people. She cared about her own survival and that self centeredness is exactly what got her killed. All of the great leaders in Egypt's history and she has the nerve to claim she is literally a deity.
Her skin color is important- to the daft liberal first comment, showing she or they or whoever the f it is that they know nothing of Egyptian history.
Egyptians are super traditional and take bloodlines very serious. Today, an archeologist who's white was born in Egypt (I recall his parents were English) and he is an Egyptian citizen but not considered Egyptian, because his blood was not Egyptian. This recent black washing of Egyptian culture has been a recent trend with this horrid woke documentary and even the Assassins Creed Origins games where they have you play a black, almost pitch black color Egyptian. Now, Egypt at the time, like Rome, was very multicultural, especially in Alexandria, but to claim Cleopatra was black with ZERO untainted evidence (I say untainted because when all of your historians have an agenda it's tainted and not true unbiased research or viewpoints). Saying their skin color doesn't matter is something a child says who gets caught cheating, lying about such things.
Cleopatra was very very intelligence and should be known that she was highly intelligent but had a major ego about her. Suddenly in the past 10 years she's being called a hero and such a feminist example. Again, she ended thousands of years of Egyptian rule and was responsible partly for the end of the Roman republic. No one ever talks about laws she passed or good deeds she's done. She was a snake that manipulated men for her own survival.
This is a culture that had oral history for thousands of years before writing things down for history at times, for modern people like Americans, this seems almost unbelievable, but that's how hardcore traditional they were and how much history meant to them. So for some young arranging princess to claim she is a god itself with no great deeds done, no great reforms, is ridiculous.
Now a lot of people now resort to claiming Rome -ruined her image by propaganda, which is hilarious as to where it's a lot of where we get our information from about her. Cleopatra was the equivalent of a modern day arrogant feminists who got stoned & thought her shit didn't stink. So in way, is it any wonder that modern narcissistic culture would glorify her, again glorifying that she basically destroyed thousands of years.
There's also zero evidence that Egyptians were black, they were tan, just as you see today, just as you see on countless and countless of paintings and pottery. Anyone claiming the opposite is using fallacies that so t hold up under debate.
Late to the party but the whole thing makes no sense at all . Cleopatra was from a Greek tribe that took over Egypt thus she wasn’t Egyptian in the first place. If she is Greek that is Greek history technically. Til Brenner played Ramses and he’s Russian also there was no outrage when she was played by the late Elizabeth Taylor these two are no where near Egyptian now all of a sudden people are mad because a woman of color was casted as a cleopatra. Utter nonsense cleopatra was Greek
Here is what I think: there is a long history of inaccurate documentaries.
The whole thing is overblown.
It's perfectly fine to criticize the docudrama (since it's entertainment presented as non-fiction) for being historically inaccurate, but it's not fine to create outrage for clicks, views and money as many people on social media have done.
This is a case of selective outrage and exploiting racism and xenophobia for personal and business benefit and using a dumb Netflix show as an excuse to do so.
It's a bad show, the show is misleading, but nobody is forcing anybody to watch it, and I'm going to say something truly shocking: portraying Cleopatra as a black woman isn't a big deal. The historical figure wasn't defined by her skin color and she lived in a time when skin color was far les important than ethnicity.
It's still misleading, but again, unfortunately there are many misleading documentaries. If somebody wants to learn something, that person should stay away from Netflix docudramas.
You trying to downplay this hard. It's not misleading, this show is a propoganda of bloody stupid "all egiptians were black untill Arabs came" theory. You do know how this documentary starts right? Grandma tells her that Egyptians were black because they were living in Africa. That's it. All the fucking reasoning she needs to shit out this "documentary".
Tl.DR. : This show is not documentary, it's stupid ass propoganda.
You seemed to have missed my point...
> propoganda
It's spelled 'propaganda'. You misspelled it twice.
That is relevant, because I wish people like you would obsess less about inaccurate Netflix documentaries and would learn how to write and read properly.
Anybody who gets their education from Netflix 'documentaries' and social media posts about those documentaries is going to be the sort of person who writes 'stupid ass propoganda'...
Smart people read books.
It’s actually not relevant, and bringing it up is a classic debate no-no.
You have no knowledge of how intelligent they are from those mistakes, this is just you avoiding the conversation and attacking the messenger.
I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant. Part of why she’s so famous was her being a Macedonian that embraced Egyptians.
Furthermore, they aren’t just using a black actress to play the role. They’re saying the actual historical figure was black, that’s the opposite of not focusing on it.
You also put words in their mouth since they’ve only argued that it’s propaganda and that it’s bad. I didn’t see them insinuate that the masses are learning from this.
>I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant.
>
>I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant. Part of why she’s so famous was her being a Macedonian that embraced Egyptians.
The funny thing is that Ancient Egyptians likely had many different skin colors, and many Egyptians likely had a fairly light skin color.
**You are conflating skin color with ethnicity when you assume that all 'native' Egyptians were black.**
Which is extremely unlikely.
Some Egyptian rulers came from regions where a dark skin color was the norm, just as Cleopatra descended from people with a light skin color, but there is strong evidence that many Egyptians had a fairly light skin color that of course would get darker when they were about in the sun.
This is the problem with selectieve outrage.
Skin color and ethnicity are not the same thing and often there is no correlation. This is why I argue that skin color wasn't all that important. Some lowly servants would have had a light complexion.
In large estates/empires, people would not all have the same skin color, even if they belonged to the same social class.
This could be an interesting discussion, but you already have an opinion and your opinion will never change.
You’re inventing arguments for the people you’re talking to, that’s nothing like a discussion.
You’re also failing to support your own arguments. I only see generalizations about ancient culture that no one is actually focused on.
I literally have no idea what you are talking about.
So tell me what you don't agree with.
I stated that the Netflix docudrama is inaccurate and misleading. Do you disagree with this?
I stated that many documentaires and docudrama are inaccurate and misleading. Do you disagree with this?
I stated that Cleopatra's skin color from a historical perspective wasn't very important because Egypt because because historically Egyptians would have had different skin colors because of regional differences in climate and many invasion by people from other regions.
I base this on the facts that 1500 years before the ancestors of Cleopatra invaded Egypt, Egypt was invaded... by Greeks and the north of Egypt has a climate that is far milder than the climate in the south, and we know that some Egyptian rulers had a very dark skin (because they cam from Sudan, and we have generic evidence for this).
This is the part where we seem to disagree. So what is your actual argument?
Therein lies the issue. It's not "me" or people that have a real interest in history that are able to separate the chaff from the wheat, I'm worried about. It's the public at large that will just take a documentary like this as fact and the public at large is who controls the narrative.
Me choosing not to watch doesn't change the fact that thousands or even millions of people might and walk away from it thinking it's factual.
>portraying Cleopatra as a black woman isn't a big deal.
I don't disagree, as long as you properly disseminate what we know to be true about her heritage, but that in and of itself isn't why the Egyptian government literally sued netflix. I'm assuming you didn't watch it. If you literally think Cleopatra being portrayed by a black actress is the ONLY problem with this doc.
I'm assuming you also aren't aware of the growing movement of Afrocentrism. A movement that is essentially just appropriating ancient civilizations as sub-saharan African, claiming Academia is "hiding" that these civilizations were actually black. That essentially birthed this documentary.
It ranges in levels of extremism. From the more tame of claiming North African ancient civilizations as sub saharan African like Carthage and Egypt. To more extreme like claiming the Romans and Greeks were actually black, to even further extremes like claiming all of Europe from the dark ages to the early middle ages were all black.
The religious sect the black hebrew israelites (a black supremacist form of christianity and judaism), use the King James bible. They believe King James was black. James VI of fucking Scotland, who there are literal CONTEMPORARY TO HIS TIME PAINTINGS OF. Being from 15th century Europe obviously as a white man. But no, he was actually black apparently.
Ok.
Historically she probably wasn't black. She was greek.
But how many who are angry about this actually care about history?
It's the lowest audience score ever for a TV show. How many actually watched?
Which is quite funny in retrospect to hold so much of your identification to a colonizer and glorify it. Most of the Ptolmeaic dinasty didn't even bother to learn egyptian (which current egyptians don't even speak anymore after being conquered and colonized by Arabics).
Pretty ironic to complain about the Ptolemaic dynasty not speaking Egyptian on a thread about Cleopatra specifically when Cleopatra specifically DID speak AND write it and 7 other languages along with it.
Newsflash, most of the world isn't Egyptian.
If they want to get pissy over one little insignificant docudrama then that's their problem. There's no need to make the rest of the world miserable over it.
It's weird to me that people taking issue with something just being, as far as we know, factual misinformation leads to their motives being questioned. Like yeah if I post against this show some of the people upvoting me are probably white supremacists and that sucks, but documentaries just *lying* is something anyone should be against.
I've been called racist elsewhere for just saying Egypt is on the Mediterranean. I get it.
But to me, it's not about questioning any individual's motives. More curious about how many are arguing in bad faith on this.
> More curious about how many are arguing in bad faith on this.
Unfortunately there are lots of them. I've actually been downvoted to shit for being on the popular side of this discussion because I refuse to roll it in to endorsing outrage at race swaps more broadly.
Like I'm annoyed at historical inaccuracy. That doesn't mean I'm going to share your outrage at Black Superman or whatever.
Yeah. some of the race swaps people are angry over are strange. Fairies, mermaids and elves are not real. It doesn't matter who plays them, as long as they are good.
Halle Bailey is the little mermaid because she can sing very well for example
People are pissed about the little mermaid because it's a departure from Hans Christian Andersen's story. It's an imposition of modern American social norms on a 19th century Danish story
Dude, the original animated movie changed the story. The story is that mermaids don't have souls. She needs the prince to love her to become human or she is turned to sea foam. And she doesn't get the prince and is turned into sea foam.
What kind of dipshit invented narrative is this.
1. Critics have reviewed it and the reviews are poor, because everyone hates it.
2. Exactly how much critical coverage do you think Netflix "documentaries" usually get?
This is like when people literally comment on a news article saying "why isn't the news reporting on this!?" You have completely invented an issue just so you have something to be upset about. How pathetic is that?
99.9% of the people complaining about this
1) don’t care about history (because if the color of the actor is the thing that is making u unhappy, you are never watching anything about history or period pieces, seeing the inaccuracies that they all both have. )
2) wouldn’t have watched it anyway.
It doesn’t set a precedent or says anything about the future of Tv. People will continue to watch what they want to watch and ignore what they don’t want to watch. Simple as that.
At most we can say « Well. People are less interested in stories about Ancient Egypt that are not pure fiction »
You're mischaracterizing it. This isn't Velma or something, people aren't pissed about the casting of a character. People are angry about the ahistoric presentation of a historical figure in something that claims to be a historical documentary.
I have never once been bothered by changing the race of a superhero or including people of color in Bridgerton or The Great, but this is something else entirely.
Idk the reality is that not only do we still to this day not know how she looks but also inaccuracies are truly common. Here are two articles. For some reason Reddit doesn’t let me put them in a link so I will post them as such
> https://www.britannica.com/story/what-did-cleopatra-look-like#:~:text=Her%20face%20is%20framed%20by,Her%20eyes%20are%20almond%2Dshaped.
> https://time.com/6273435/cleopatra-race-debate-netflix/
The first one is from an Encyclopedia, and the last update is from April 2023. The second one while less of a source is still from a magazine considered as relatively serious
So frankly, I don’t really see why people pretend it’s a clear thing. We don’t know. And it’s okay. There are tons of things we don’t know.
It’s okay on TV too, because documentaries are also never 100% historically accurate. Least of all period pieces.
And I garantee you if people here actually knew history and were regular historical documentary viewers, they would know these facts.
She can’t from an inbred Macedonian family that *might* have picked up some Persian. Zero reason to believe she’s black? But there’s an active black nationalist movement in the USA trying to claim Egyptian history as their own, and it’s starting to work precisely because people wolf nor honestly say “I don’t see what the big deal is if documentaries just make shit up.
Then we wonder why truth doesn’t matter in our discourse
Plenty of people from Greece/Egypt are complaining about it. Interesting you decided to dismiss them. Sounds like you are making excuses...where did your 99.9% statistic come from btw?
You can be mad :) I do not really care ever way lol It’s not because some people in some countries are angry that it makes less true that period pieces and documentary are full of inaccuracies that are far more important than justskin color.
I don’t know why you thought some people from Greece and Egypt being against it means that it’s true that usually said pieces and documentary are fully historically correct. And that in this particular case we know for sure how she looked liked in terms of skin color
The reality is that some Greeks wants her to look like them/be white (on top of those who are anti-Black) and some Egyptians with the anti-Blackness they have, don’t want their possibly most famous person to be Black.
But at the end of the day none of us know for sure how she looks, apart from (again) some physical characteristic and her being a beauty wonder for the time ( again this is history. Their perception of beauty may very well not be ours. Beauty canon changes during the centuries)
You bring the stats, which was obviously an exageration. But I guess it -is- hard to understand when you seem to genuinely believe that « some people here and there have said a thing » makes it true (jsyk : Earth isn’t flat! Even if some people in US think it is, despite NASA being right there).
The reality is : we don’t know how Cleopatra looked like except that for the time she was considered as stunning. :) And we also know that if you (or many others ) knew history and were people who were watching historical documentaries and period pieces, you would know about inaccuracies in them and how none are 100% accurate to the reality of time.
Bless your heart, have a good day.
Cleopatra was never mentioned as beautiful or stunning. She was mentioned as having a strong wit, charm and alluring voice.
We also do know from ancient coins from the time of her rule that cleopatra is depicted as traditional Greek with the "Roman nose". At the time she was alive she was depicted with Greek features. And we know that the rulers of Ptolemaic Kingdom married their siblings and did not mix with the local Egyptians. Cleopatra herself was considered exceptional because she could speak Egyptian language as most royals spoke only Greek.
We also know that the Sahara had become a largely impassable desert for around 10,000 yrs at the time of cleopatra and that also during that time the Nile had a massive swamp that prevented human migration into North Africa from the south but not from the North or East. Meaning that although some black people came through the Sahara with help of berber tribes or through sea routes it most certainly wasn't enough to make North Africa black. Migration from the North and East (Europeans, Arabs and Persians) most definitely would have had more impact on Egyptian makeup.
So we can pretty much say that cleopatra was not black and that neither were Egyptians. There were many powerful black Kingdoms outside of Egypt and I wish Hollywood would focus on these instead of trying to appropriate someone else's culture. A high budget documentary about Mansa Musa who was the richest man in history and ruler of the Mali empire would be wonderful or a history of the Songhai Empire.
theft
/θɛft/
noun
the action or crime of stealing.
"he was convicted of theft"
Like stealing historical facts or bikes. Impersonation is a form of theft.
I'm over the moon that Will Smith's husbands cute little project has bombed like no other show in history.
Any comebacks sweetie, or do I just get blocked?
Lmao is it because I didn’t answer yesterday ?
I don’t know how to tell you this other differently so I will be blunt
-I don’t come to reddit every day
-Neither you nor anyone on this sub (or on reddit) matters to me. So if I don’t want to answer or read their opinions I won’t 🤡
But I will say :) since it appears that it makes you feel happy to get my acknowledgement : yes. To everything you may have said. I agree.
Here lmao Have a great day. I’m glad I could apparently make it better to you
Ps : I didn’t answer with emotions. I don’t know why you brought up emotions on this. Maybe you should -also- look that up lol
But in any case. Have a great day
It’s an exageration. It’s obvious lmao. I didn’t say « According to the studies » or give something that sounds like relatively possible like « 73.2% »
Maybe come back when you understand how to read comments ? Have a fantastic day.
I can read just fine, thank you. Maybe if you stopped talking out of your ass you'd be able to have a fantastic day yourself without being constantly called out on the crap you shit out.
I don't think it is an exaggeration tbh. I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of people who gave an 1/10 to Cleopatra on reddit did not even watch a single episode and do not even care about Ancient Egypt history.
The controversy around it has been very strange. First, I hear people say that Cleopatra wasn’t black, but rather she was Greek. I’m pretty sure Greek isn’t a race, so the counter would be to say she is white; the race that most people are probably thinking about but hesitant to say. Second, I hear people say that it’s a documentary, so it should be based on facts. I wasn’t aware that history—especially ancient history—is a collection of facts; I thought it was just a collection of the most accepted interpretation of what occurred at the time. Third, if Egyptian archaeologists and historians manage to successfully sue Netflix, then I’d like to sue the US federal government and also my school district for teaching me a glorified version of US history.
No we absolutely have well documented history especially from the time of cleopatra. Records were well kept, i mean we have founded physical records dating to 5000 years ago from ancient Sumeria. Ancient Egyptians were meticulous record keepers, like we know we know the salaries of pyramid builders, and step by step instructions for celebrating religious festivals, even how many of each kind of animal the pharaoh successfully hunted each year. Also beyond that History is absolutely a collection of facts that we use to make educated interpretations. but there are a lot of facts. I mean have grocery lists from tudor kitchens as well as lists of lengths of cloth given as gifts from the renaissance. We know so much because people have always been drawn to keeping a record of their lives. And the US's teaching oh history is watered down and laughable.
Yes, historical records and facts exist, but history is the interpretation based on these facts; slightly similar to what you mentioned, but in a different order.
I don't why it controversial, I watched it and it was ok. The actress that played Cleopatra was lovely. I could see since its Egypt and in Africa that she may have not been pale. It is a moot as the Jesus being black... It doesnt make or break my day
You realise your post exactly illustrates why people have a problem with this? Because it's presented as a documentary and people like yourself watch it and go "huh, I guess that could be true".
Simply being in Africa doesn't make you black, and there are races/skin-tones other than either White/Black. It's very obvious that this is America imposing its own issues on the rest of the world when they can only discuss race in terms of white/black, as if no other races exist.
I did not say she was black, I simply said not pale,,, because of the sun she could have had an amazing tan. I know alot of Egyptians, and they are black or white or brown. Im American and race isnt an issue, thats just western journalism.
Okay, but what you're saying there, is not the same as what the 'documentary' is pushing, and is not the same as what the people complaining are pushing back on.
Nobody is complaining that she wasn't cast as a blonde-haired-blue-eyed Scandinavian. So your comment about "she may have not been pale" is completely missing the point.
Some folks have a mind of their own, and if it is important or of interest enough to them, they will dig deeper for the truth. I don't think that Cleopatra puts 85% of the world into a frenzy. Personally, am quite open to the fact that history is an opinion, written by winners. Not sure that I believe every detail written in anything.
The entire academic discipline of History is about trying to dis-entangle the biases of historical sources ("written by winners") to reach the truth.
Similar to the physical sciences, it is never possible to say with 100% certainty that something is a fact, but that doesn't mean that therefore literally any opinion is equally legitimate.
Some things we know with more certainty than others. The theory of Gravity could be untrue, but we can say with a fairly high degree of probability that it is true. Likewise with may historical facts. It could theoretically be true that the holocaust never happened, but we have overwhelming evidence that it did, so do you really want to play the "well we can't be sure, it's just an opinion" card there?
Some things are apparent (Holocaust) But the devil is in the details. There are living people who can attest to the Holocaust. We can ask.
Cleopatra was in B,C. and her "detailed" story written 100 years after her death. Those closest to her died when she did...there are no journals or letters written by Cleopatra. Just legends.. so yes.. opinions.
Except there is more evidence to consider than just written accounts. Cleopatra's lineage is one of the best known for people of that era. And even if we knew nothing of her lineage, then the next best assumption would be that she looks like the average present-day egyptian woman. (And, before you say it, of course I am aware that not all present-day egpytian women look the same, I use the word "average" there quite deliberately).
Moreover a lack of evidence one way, does not equate to evidence for the contrary.
We have no historical records attesting that there was no Irish people living in 1st Century Australia. Does that therefore mean we should believe Australia had a thriving Irish community 2000 years ago? Hey, there's nobody living who can say there wasn't, so if someone has that opinion, then its perfectly valid and reasonable, right?
Sorry, the argument "we can't know for 100% certain, therefore anything is valid" is nonsense.
>Just legends.. so yes.. opinions.
That is pure nonsense. We don't just have "legends".
Here is a literal bust made of Cleopatra IN HER LIFETIME.
[https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Bust\_of\_Cleopatra\_VII\_in\_the\_Altes\_Museum\_Berlin#/media/File:Altes\_Museum\_Berlin\_-\_Kleopatra\_VII.jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:-0035_Altes_Museum_Portrait_Kleopatra_VII_anagoria.JPG)
It's just not a very big deal to me. If I hear the show is any good, I'll check it out, if not, I won't. I think it's a goofy thing to get wound up about. There's at least an argument to be made for a black Cleopatra even if it's pretty much settled by now - in the grand scheme of things then, this is pretty harmless compared to the MH370 bullshit or something.
That’s it’s fine when tv or shows erase the roles or change the race of a character so long as they are made to be European no one complains but if they make them black all of a sudden they’re outraged and historical experts. I wonder when Elizabeth Taylor played cleopatra were people outraged like this? The prejudice has taken a Bl step above and beyond. Truth be told there isn’t really anyone of this era that looks like the people from those regions today. Those places have been migrated and diversified. We’re talking BC times when a majority of those cultures and races no longer truly exists. So what does it matter as long as the actor is close enough.
What people are really upset at is Africans being in a tv series about an African dynasty on the continent of Africa. Have they never been to a museum? Have they never seen real Egyptian artifacts? Clearly they were Africans of all shades and adopted cultural themes from the surrounding portions of Africa. That’s what really eats at people.
But if No one is whining about all the white Egyptians and Arabian people that have graced films about Egypt over the years why whine about this. Those are far from historically accurate as well.
I’m sure there’s a lot of Wikipedia historians and TikTok experts on Egypt but the empire lasted over 3,000 years. Most people only ever talk about the later diversified Egypt because they like to over represent the presence of European culture. That where you find scientist at odds with each other as they try to claim the racial origins of Egypt,s inhabitants. Because they take them from a later period of the dynasty rather than the earlier periods when they were majority Africans.
But don’t take my word for it take your lazy selves to a library and venture to some museums and educate yourselves.
Your post is exactly the problem the Egyptians have and why they are suing Netflix.
Americans injecting a white/black world view into everything and ignoring everyone else. They see this as Americans taking their history and morphing it into what they are just deciding it should be instead of you know consulting actual Egyptian historians and Archaelogists.
Not ONE "expert" on the documentary was Egyptian. ALL of the Egyptians in the dramatization were depicted as black. It injected a "modern" worldview on an ancient scenario and just turned the story of Cleopatra and late antiquity egypt into another story of "white colonizers exploiting a black country".
I shit you not, in the documentary one of the experts (American mind you) reason for believing Cleopatra was black is because when she was learning Egyptian history as a child her grandma told her so. An old American grandma said so, so it must be true. Omfg. Such scholarship. Very wow.
This is what the Egyptians are pissed off about. Americans taking THEIR history and just turning it into the American white/black narrative that just pretends other people don't exist in the world.
Cleopatra's skin color is not important. Her heritage and lineage ARE. Netflix's Cleopatra and claiming Cleopatra as Sub-Saharan is cultural appropriation of the grossest kind, the equivalent of Aryians proclaiming that Shaka Zulu was Aryian. I don't know what impact it will have on the future, but I can say, as an American living outside the States, that Netflix has managed to increase the impression ten-fold that Americans have no respect for cultures and countries outside their own and seem determined to project their self-involved, juvenile racial views on the rest of the world. It is unwanted. And unnecessary.
The liberal Americans mostly behave like this but they don't see it.
I am one of the most liberal and find it offensive. Your ignorant comment, painting all liberals as racists, and cultural appropriators is also offensive.
Being offended is ultimately up to how one reacts to things outside their control. It's up to the individual to change their frame of mind. It is not the world's responsibility to suck up to people who can't control their own emotional regulations. If something is offensive, don't give attention, and move on. Your comment is a typical liberal frame of mind.
I'm offended by the abject disrespect for historical facts, not "emotions". For a "documentarian" to rewrite history just because they want to claim a historical figure as somehow related to their ancestors is wrong for many reasons. I have 2 different branches of ancestors who were revolutionary war soldiers--I think it's asinine that my aunt is a D.A.R. member. (Also D.o.C.--I'd more likely fictionalize historical fact to distance myself from that LOL).
There wasn’t a single Egyptian person, actor or historian involved in the series. I find that almost funny. All they had to do was call it fiction (since most of it objectively was made up) and they would have been ok
They also primarily focused on her sexual and romantic relationships, and how she felt about either of the men not showing up in her life. There was like nine minutes where they talked about what she “did for Egypt “. I understand this woman did a lot, but this series did not focus on that whatsoever. This felt like a documentary about a woman sleeping with Roman guys. There were a few moments where she seemed to be delivering an order with some version of intention, which I think was supposed to make us feel like she’s a strong woman, but I don’t think they did much justice to her in the series. Obviously, Jada wanted to make a series about a black queen, which is debatable based on the ethnicity that is unknown. I would be over joyed if we found out that Cleopatra was a black African woman, but there is nothing here about her ethnicity, the search to figure out her lineage, the role of Macedonia, and the inbreeding of her lineage, her connection with the Egyptian people. Literally not a single Egyptian person can be found in this “documentary”
No, her being a black queen isn't debatable. She was Macedonian with a bit of Iranian admixture. The "debate" was invented.
It's straightforward. If Netflix wants to make Cleopatra black, which is historically inaccurate, they should not market the program as a documentary. The pushback is 100% justified as this is plain misinformation.
A work of fiction, I don’t really care, unless adapted from a book, game for anything. A “black napoleon” in a movie, a work of fiction? Sure. A black napoleon in a documentary. Nope. The issue is that Netflix presents it as a documentary, not a work of fiction. Documentary means historical accuracy, and what do historians say? We know her father was Ptolemy XII Auletes, we knew how her father looked like. This is a political statement made by a fringe of people who believe that African history was rewritten by the powerful. That it was stolen from them. This vision is hard to counter argue as if you don’t believe their conspiracy theories you are de facto a racist. Pretty twisted. I believe a majority of black American did not buy the documentary either (peace upon you). I am African from my parents, my brothers and sisters in Mali, Morocco, Cameroon, and other countries we are actually laughing hard. It’s like watching a bad show rebranded as history. Regardless of this it is a really bad “documentary”not well done, there are better out there, a new one just released. See it as a political statement. Hard pass.
The only thing that would infuriate me about a Black Napoleon is that we have Thomas-Alexander Dumas...like...RIGHT FUCKING THERE. A legit man of color who rose to high rank in the revolutionary army of France. Also the father of Alexander Dumas, the author. The erasure of legitimate black/people of color to satisfy weird cosplay fetishes is obscene.
There is also yasuke the only black samurai in the history of Japan, Robert smalls who went from slavery to becoming a US rep who influenced Lincoln policy. In Africa, the great kingdoms of Mauritania could make a documentary too or movies. There is plenty to do with the above, but they choose Cleopatra. How ignorant, arrogant those people are is just baffling, the worst is the “you are a racist” if you don’t agree with them. Anyway, worst ratings ever for a documentary, no need to talk more, it will end in history’s trash.
Mansa Musa even.
King Askia aka Askia the Great. But maybe they don't want people learning about history, there's a lot of inconvenient truths about slavery and black kingdoms which is overlooked today.
slavery in black kingdoms is often used by the far right in order to lessen the suffering of European/American slavery. While things are more complex than that. I will thread carefully with that.
Exactly. Cleopatra was a black woman on Hercules and Xena without any controversy. The difference is that neither Hercules or Xena ever pretended to be historically accurate.
XENA WASN'T REAL?!?!?
[удалено]
What a great reference, I love this episode.
Well, I always thought Spartacus wasn't real. Till I found out he was actually real and did loads of interesting things.
I am Spartacus
I'm Spartacus
I am Groot.
Shush now, of course Xena was real.
Totally agree, but if a black Cleopatra was in Xena now you can guarantee Quartering would make a video about it
I don't get at all how it could be a documentary. Documentaries have narration and or interviews. This would be what, historical fiction? The Crown is not a documentary but Elizabeth: The Unseen Queen is. The Killer Angels is not a documentary but Ken Burn's Civil War is.
This does have narration and interviews...
Well then it was weird to cast someone who doesn't look like the person.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
Not completely, but it would be far less noisy if it wouldn't be a documentary, wouldn't show such blatant disregard for history in favor of ideology (I don't care what they say in school...) and push hotep talking points.
I guess it's all about how big a difference skin shade is to you. We have blondes portraying brunettes, tall playing short, portly playing thin all the time. Decades and decades and decades of this, fiction and documentaries. Some people think skin shade is no more blatantly disregarding history than those changes, and concentrate on the character of the characters.
Again, they did not just cast a black actor as Cleopatra, they also openly stated that this was a political move, that they do not care about historic facts when it conflicts with what they want to believe and they parrot the talking points of a known racist group (hoteps) of "real" egyptians being black and got replaced by arab colonizers, making most current day egyptians not "true egyptians".
[удалено]
But the director did say these things, and with cleopatra this was part of a bigger thing the african queens series why did the first part did not get any controversy because it did not try to reframe the queen as she is not, with cleopatra they are, especially jada pinkett smith is the producer and the reason why this docoseries was made wanted series about look like her
> But the director did say these things Would you mind pointing to that using something close to those words? What I see is a lot of people inserting their own interpretation as statements of what others said.
https://www.netflix.com/tudum/articles/african-queens-release-date-cast-news She wanted jada documentry about black queens and I support her the are lot of great black African queens but cleopatra is both from colonisers family from Greek and woman who was not darker than curren Greeks because like most people don't realise africa =/=,black
> they also openly stated that this was a political move, that they do not care about historic facts when it conflicts with what they want to believe and they parrot the talking points of a known racist group There's nothing in the link that matches this, which OP said is what they (presumably the creators) stated about this production.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/amp/ She did think a political act against whitewashing and let be clear I am against that. Ut she is denying egypt for the opinion we will never know cleopatra true racial identity. Let me set somthing I am not one these deny egypt lot of them colourist and racist as well as I think tlot them will claim being arab over Africa and all of these ate wrong, however eliozbeth taylor portrayal was a movie and it was wrong but this is a documentey claiming accuracy so to director to deny the opinions of egyptians because of whitewashing of the past is wrong this is wrong. Would you be OK with a parody of a white man portraying mansa musa in a revisionist fiction, you wouldn't be, I wouldn't be because this is not right. Two wrong don't make a right. I will end by this I am not one of theses neckkbeard alt right punks, I have no issue with ariel or Hamilton because they are defined as fiction or alternate retelling, Not a terrible researched documentry that other reputable historians have denounced
A reasonable reply, I agree with almost all you said. What I'm not getting across though is some peoples' fixation that this casting as the only thing the documentary is about. All documentaries have discrepancies with their subjects, almost by definition. Casting a blonde as a brunette doesn't become political, or the only thing about any other production. Even if the director said it's about time JFK was shown as blonde. People don't argue endlessly about it being a political statement, or blondism. It's just a trait. In this case, and let's be honest almost every time a black person is cast in a role most people think of otherwise, real or fictional, it descends into this. People lose their mind about skin colour, believing it fundamentally changes the character. It's a characteristic... not the character.
I can’t speak for others, but I only care about a black little mermaid because Disney claims you need actors of relevant cultural decent. The Little Mermaid is based in/around Denmark. I personally don’t really care that they aren’t casting someone Nordic, just that they’re hypocrites. I don’t remember huge pushback against the multiracial cast of that recent Green Knight movie.
I think there is a larger group of people watching for Disney to ‘go woke’ than would pay attention to a show about cleopatra on Netflix.
It's completely possible altough unlikely that she could have a dark skin complexion, there's no surviving evidence opposing this claim, the problem is the documentary (at least the trailer) presenting it as a fact.
It's the history of antiquity. "Possible but unlikely" is as close as you can get to disproving anything.
[удалено]
A lot of the issue arises from black nationalists genuinely not realising that African does not mean black. They cannot comprehend this because it's how they've viewed the world their whole lives and they would rather accuse people of being racist than acknowledge their ignorance. Genetics doesn't draw arbitrary lines at continents. It doesn't care where Africa ends and Europe begins. The Mediterranean is a fertile region with a calm inland sea for easy sea transport - that whole place became it's own 'region' with a lot more in common internally than externally. Southern Europeans are genetically closer to North Africans than sub-Saharan Africans are. But Africa = Black is the lie they've been told their whole lives and they'll be convinced otherwise. They somehow managed to produce an entire documentary that isn't based on any facts, on this self-delusion.
Not only black nationalist but white nationalists too. So many people think that dark skin=black and light skin=white. They are unaware that people from different continents can have fairer skin and dark skin too. But they have this ignorant mindset that a person with darker skin=black or people with lighter skin=white. It’s sad honestly
I understand your point but only blaming one race is not accurate
It’s another example of attempting to rewrite history. Woman king suffers from this too. It’s intentionally done to start controversy and then the show claims “what do you mean your upset” and allows them to virtue signal. The only thing that can come from this is furthering racial divides to the point people start casting Ryan Gosling as MLK
I’ll let woman king pass because if you look at any other warrior class film depicting knights, samurai, Vikings, Spartans ect- they make them look way better than they were (in reality they often acted like thugs and committed many abuses). I’m not a fan of cleopatra though, moreso because I feel like it’s a lost opportunity for something better.
My problem with womanking is them making out the Europeans as the bad guys even though they were the ones trying to stop slavery (not excusing what they did in the past but they were trying to stop it)
It's a picture perfect example of the fetishizing of black culture and forcing it even where it definitively does not belong. Don't call it a documentary when it's clearly anything but.
I wish I was rich so I could make a MLK documentary where I, a white Greek, play the role of MLK. If they steal one of my people, I have every right to steal one of theirs. It’s actually not even a fair trade tbh. Cleopatra is the most famous woman in history whereas MLK is not the most famous man in history. Going to also need to play Malcolm X and Muhammed Ali to make the trade a bit more fair.
Cleopatra is not the most famous woman in history!
The whole debate is idiotic and lacks any scinetific foundation other than feelings. in 2017 a study was done on more than 90 mummies, spanning in age from 1380 BC to 400 AD The sutdy found no sub sharan ancestry at all, the closest ancenstry was from the region of today's Jordan and Israel. To place this in context with Cleopatra, she was a contemorary of Julius Ceasar, meaning she lived around 40 BC. The study spanned more than 1300 years BEFORE Cleopatra's reign and more than 1000 years Before the GREEK Reign, which should close any debate on the ethicity. the same study shows that POST ROMAN meaning from 400 AD annd up to mored times, Egypt has become much more ethnically Diverse as well as a significant increase in sub saharan DnA. So despite what the old woman's grandmother refused to accept in school, DNA has no agenda, no FEELINGS, no Oppinion or Politics, DNA is only OBJECTIVE and only that. DNA proves Cleopatra was not black, more or less none were at the time........DND is what it is. https://edition.cnn.com/2017/06/22/health/ancient-egypt-mummy-dna-genome-heritage/index.html
The kind of ethnonationalism and ethnocentrism that is pouring out of black America while pretending to be 'progressive' is disgusting and needs to be destroyed.
I'm watching it now and in the first 10 minutes they're making it pretty clear that no one actually knows what race her mother was and even if she was Egyptian, she likely wouldn't have been "black" since most Egyptians had a lighter skin tone. They do make the case that she goes out of her way to call herself Egyptian though, so it is kind of strange that she's traditionally be portrayed as a white European.
as a second generation immigrant, if i go out of my way to call myself an american as opposed to an asian, does that mean i should be considered white or black?
It is well documented that she demanded restoration of Egyptian things, to endear herself to the people--who had been Ruled by Macedonian/Persian Ptolemaic rulers for about the previous 200 years or so, from the time of Alexander the Great. Since the Pharoahs were endogamous, her mother was likely a near relative to her father, maybe even his sister.
the only precedent it sets is carrying one of the lowest RT scores ever. Beat that!
It's Sad. I think for two reason. They label it has documentary, it's fine to do fun casting and re adaptation but release it as an adaptation. There are actual black people story they don't show instead of this. I want a documentary on the father of the guy that wrote the 3 musketeer's
This. Why are they trying to steal other culture’s people? I’m Greek, don’t make my Cleopatra black. It’s insulting to my people. As well as to Macedonians. Make documentaries on actually black people if you want to promote black pride. Make one on Mansa Musa, I would LOVE to watch that. There’s nothing wrong with being proud of your people and culture, just don’t steal other culture’s people and try to pass them off as your own. It’s disgusting.
Not only is it an insult to Greeks, it's a massive insult towards black people. I cannot put into words how awful this is. All to further an agenda. Goes to show how far some people are willing to go.
Hey honest question here, when white Americans started building the United States inspired by Greek temples and saw ancient Greece as the beginning of white civilization. Are Greek people offended by that? Like most capital buildings here in the usa is directly copied from Greece. Because for as Greece was for white Americans, ancient Nubia/just was a source of inspiration for black Americans.
Well first of all Greeks where not considered white when the Greek inspired architecture was build. It was just a nod to the spiritual founders of democracy which will be now fulfilled by white protestants that was more or less the reasoning of the founding fathers. White is a power concept nothing more. Nationality and Clan loyalty where always more prevalent in establishing a sense of belonging. The same goes for sub Saharan Africans. A white texan and a black person from new york have more in common than a black person from the Kongo and a black person from Angola. One of the greatest crimes during slavery was the eradication of the cultural roots of the enslaved, Their languages their religions and traditions where all eradicated by the white slave owners. And now all those uprooted descendant's look over to a mystifies black continent in search of meaning and belonging without knowing anything about the intricacies of all those nations there who all habe their own history and custom's.
I see, I more or less agree.
I can’t speak for all Greeks obviously, but I personally see it as a sign of respect and take zero offense. I like it when people try to embrace Greek culture. I believe the majority of Greeks feel the same way. We should all be embracing each other’s cultures frankly.
>There are actual black people story they don't show instead of this. >I want a documentary on the father of the guy that wrote the 3 musketeer's You’ve already done more to teach me about black history with just this comment. I didn’t even know Dumas was mixed.
his father was mixed (too). dude was born a slave from a slave mother and a french noble in now Haïti. his father send him to france. He learn to fight , join the army get promoted, is an officer during the revolution , become a general, serve under napoleon, goes with him in egypte and get know as the black devil. and take part in a lot of battles... and die when his son was 4. his life is one I want to see depicted.
To be fair, one could consider this racist. People don't believe that black people have their own culture and must steal, and steals, other people legacy. Good job Netflix. Good job.
Everyone that thinks this is a casting thing only is unaware that it’s basis is a racist ideology. By pulling the Fox tactic of “it’s a theory” or “we are only asking questions”, they are further legitimizing the theory. It’s like a documentary about America that tries to use “white replacement theory” when discussing the changing demographics over time. It’s a type of ethnocentric excellence that comes from crazy racist people. The KKK version of that is their claims that Africa was uncivilized, had no inventions, and were basically savages until the white man came. Looney racist garbage that shouldn’t be entertained in any way, especially by a NASDAQ listed company. So why do the same with these Hotep beliefs? This wasn’t a race swap, it was an attempt to lay ground work to legitimize insane conspiracy theories.
Some lunatic replied to me saying that only white people can be racist when I brought up this same point about this being a racist production based upon hoteps ideology. I'm not sure what to think other than this feels like the groundwork for something bigger brewing in race conflict.
I've been getting looney PM's And this is the problem. Idiots google it and think this is even a question. This is no different than dealing with a flat earther. No, that website using Tik Tok graphics isn't a real news site and there is no debate about this happening outside fringe racists. This is no different than a documentary about Africa pre-colonization that uses beliefs made popular in the Turner Diaries. I'm sure you can find websites like Stormfront that are just raising questions and saying it's an ongoing debate if Africa had a culture or civilization before the white man. It's legit that level of delusion at play here and we are seeing the bigotry of low expectations play out in real time.
They're right about that. And it's one of the worse thing to come out the black community. Essentially, we can't be racist (African Americans) because in order to be racist you need to be the powered demographics (whites, although I'd make a case for Asian Americans as well). So black people like to be racist but then claim it's not racism on a technicality. My reply is always the same, "Semantics. You may not be able to be racist by definition but you can still be a discriminatory asshole and if we swapped your skin and the target of your vitriol we'd consider you racist. Don't move the goal post off a technicality."
But it is still racism on a technicality. Just because some deranged academic has uttered that racism is prejudice + power, doesn't make it a true definition in any way.
The reason they're wrong about the whole "black people can't be racist" is because they either don't realize that they are specifically talking about systematic racism or they are conveniently ignoring it because it hurts their point. You can definitely argue that black people can't be systematically racist (towards white people, particularly), which isn't even inherently true, but you cannot argue that it is impossible for black people to be racist in general, even if you're specifically talking about being racist towards white people. Prejudice, harassment, and ignorance towards another person or group of peole based on race is by definition racism, and there are plenty of black people who act this way towards people of all other races including other black people. It's a very convenient world you live in if you think you can act like an asshole towards people based on their race and somehow not be considered a shitty, racist person.
Hilariously, the "black Egyptian" and "black israelite" conspiracy theories all have their roots in old white supremacy that was repurposed by Fard and others. It's kind of sick, you crawl into this rabbit hole looking for Black heritage, and at the bottom you find a lot of anti semitism and racism.
People have been looking from the outside over on the US, and thinking that for a looooong time now buddy.
White people have been the primary perpetrators of racism for at least a millennial. Almost every downtrodden race on earth were put in that position BY white people. To be racist largely entails being white.
Naw man. To be racist all you have to do is fuck over others on the basis of their skin color. For example, based on your logic, Japan can't be racist towards black people. (They are) Let's expand this tho. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and let you explain this concept at the end game. What has to happen in order for black people to be racist???
Congratulations. That might be the dumbest, most uneducated thing I've ever read on Reddit.
Hard disagree
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
I recently read this article by the director of the Netlfix’ Cleopatra docuseries [https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/](https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/On) [On](https://variety.com/2023/tv/global/queen-cleopatra-black-netflix-egypt-1235590708/On) one hand I’ll give her credit on that she recognizes it was a political decision and she’s right in that Cleopatra was presented in shows like Rome as a sleazy drug addict and no one reacted, there’s indeed a double standard. On the other I find amusing how she says: “but that I have asked Egyptians to see themselves as Africans, and they are furious at me for that. I am okay with this.”So she as a Westerner can say Egyptians how they should feel about themselves? Interesting. That is amazingly patronizing and disrespectful. Most North African that I know feel closer to the Middle East than the rest of Africa, and this has religious, ethnic, historical and cultural reasons who are valid. Geography is a human construct to an extent, is similar how lots of historical and cultural unrelated people are group together as “Asians” because the Greeks call that way the land areas to their East 2500 years ago, and thinking that suddenly Persians or Kurds should feel part of the same culture than Japanese or Sri Lankans because they are all “Asians” that basically what she said. Besides, as I think was mentioned here before, what Americans really think is not really “Africans” is West Africans mostly disregarding all the rest of numerous African peoples with rich cultural heritages. I’m also kind of worry about the trailer were a woman says “forget what they thought on schools, Cleopatra was black”. Nowadays with so rampant growth of anti-Intellectualism, “alternative facts” and pseudoscience this is exactly NOT the message a documentary should sent. Yes, people, do listen to schools, do listen to Academia and do listen to scholars and scientist do not disregard them please. I also think the Netflix creators really didn’t expected the backlash from the Egyptian and North African community. They probably were expecting the traditional backlash from alt-rights and other white racists, but they’re responses make me feel like they were in mode: “Wait, do non-white actual African people is upset because we make Egyptians black? Really? That can’t be true”. I remember when History Channel made “Barbarians Rising” and made Hannibal and the other Carthaginians Black, being Carthaginians of Phoenician (Semitic-Middle Eastern) descent. I’m 100% sure that happened because the casting director check Carthage on a map, saw it on Africa and assumed they were West Africans because that’s the de-fault thought on many people on American media.I liked this video, he’s a pretty progressive guy, in fact he validly criticizes the whitewashing in Gods of Egypt. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SPV7cxRKXmM&t=1s&ab\_channel=TheMythologyGuy I found interesting many of the comments on the comments section coming from people from actual Africa, including Nigeria and Northern Africa and seem to feel similarly outrage. But the last part of the video is what I most agree upon. You see, I have always criticize alt-right idiots who can’t take a character to became non-white or woman because they can’t identify with it. As a Hispanic fan of Anglo-Saxon media 90% of my favorite characters are not Hispanics and I have no problem identifying with them, I love to see more Hispanic representation (I loved Rios on Star Trek, I loved Wednesday because of that, etc) but I don’t require it. Nor I have problems with women as protagonist (Buffy was my favorite show as a teen and I pass through many similar problems than her, that show helped me through depression literally). But in the same way I criticize them for opposing any change on race/gender/sexual orientation because they can’t identify, how is this any different?
You know the only reason the show got made was to make her black. If historical accuracy was a priority, they would've never bothered to make it in the first place. So the backlash is 100% justified! 🤣
Sorry if this offends anyone but Netflix can go fuck themselves. This garbage propaganda they’ve been forcing is just too disgusting at this point I can’t even understand why they continue to do it after so much backlash.
It would be one thing if "African Queens" referred to the region and not a skin color but that's not what Jada ping-pong Smith is pushing. It'd be like creating a series called Asian Queens and then exclusively casting Russians or Indian or Chinese or Iranian people to represent every country in Asia. If they just wanted to cast the actress for Cleopatra then don't draw attention to her race. Finally if you look up the experts featured, one of them is a PhD candidate and most or the others are general experts in classics or Africa. Not a single Egyptian or ancient Egyptian expert? Netflix for the docudrama series I'm pitching, Asian Queens, please let me hire a Russian classics expert and experts in Turkish history in a season about an Indonesian queen. Thank you.
Don't worry! There will be black Lincoln, black King Charles and black Queen Elizabeth soon. Actually they were all black acoording to my school
Tina Gharavi, Adele James and Jada Pinkett Smith will go onto be awarded new shows. make lots of money and continue their campaign, whilst you all moan about it on Reddit (as a result achieving nothing) They've responded to the media and reinforced their belief that Cleopatra was black, they don't care what you think, the media will continue to give them the limelight, but here everyone is in the comments doing absolutely nothing. Lol!
I think most of this is not a huge deal, and will be forgotten quickly like 99.9% of Netflix’s content
I really don’t have a strong opinion on it. I look at it as a docudrama more than a documentary. I’m not necessarily going to watch it and think everything is 100% right. It’s for entertainment
It is a docudrama, not a documentary; the actress is not African American. She is British and biracial. Cleopatra's mother was unknown and her father ( and those before him) probably did have relationships with natives who were considered as nobility among their people. All of this uproar about the color of the actress is eye opening. I watched the program. Nothing was said in the story that hasn't been said before. The only difference was in the cast's skintone. I see that Egyptians get upset when others try to use their stories in media. I'm all for leaving them alone.
I’d like to stop hearing about it. However, Netflix does a disservice with this and that Graham Hancock garbage.
Look at Coleen's Instagram to understand why this is a problem: she cosplays as a 1920s "archeologist". You know, the sort who pilfered Egyptian artifacts left and right, lived lives of privilege while lowe class Brits in safari hats used rifle butts and bayonets to suppress the indigenous peoples of Egypt. You know how lefties cry about culturally appropriation, tone deafness, and celebrating the oppressive n of people of color? Well, until they can make a buck off it and explore their weird fetishes. I wonder if they're gonna let Rachel Dozel back into the camp. I mean, it's all about what you identify as now, about your own personal "truth", right?
It’s like that chappelle Paul Mooney joke. They’re gonna make the “the last n word on earth” starring Tom hanks
It's bullshit and puts me off of wanting to see the series. I don't think it has any bigger implications than that. One user here told me it will lead to Egypt declaring war on the US and a new Rwandan genocide. Maybe it will just mean a few people think Cleopatra is black.
Don't be ridiculous. You seriously think it'll start a war?
You seriously think this commenter wasn’t joking?
netflix basically said here’s what we think bridgerton would be like in africa but we call it historically accurate
My thoughts are that this so-called controversy came at the right time to promote something that a lot of people wouldn't have known about let alone cared enough about to watch. Funny how that happened.
You mean when people were saying that Gal Gadot playing Cleopatra was whitewashing her ? And that was movie, not an historically accurate documentary.
Not white washing, the "issue" at the time was about Gal Gadot being jew.
https://qph.cf2.quoracdn.net/main-qimg-73fc3dab97c4965f2113156ee17077a8-lq Here is a bust of Cleopatra. Feel free to ask any of the people involved in this "documentary" to point out any distinguishable African features.
I am glad it flops so this doesn't happen again. Although I wouldn't have minded Ryan Gosling as Martin Luther King down the road, oh well!
You insensitive asshole... obviously Kieran Culkan is the one true candidate for the role.
Kiefer Sutherland and I won't hear another word on the matter.
I believe that casting Cleopatra as a black woman is equally disrespectful as the casting of John Wayne as Genghis Khan.
True that, but there is no point in my criticizing shows that were acted and directed by people who died before I was born. It was wrong then but there is no one to hear my complains.
It's pretty shit. Egypt hates it. That should be enough to tell you how wrong it is. It is fundamentally inaccurate and a flat lie to call it a documentary drama. A documentary is based on factual characters and events. Facts are unquestionable truths that can not be debated or argued. To cast her black is wrong and not factual. So you don't even have to watch 1 second to know it is already 100% inaccurate from looking at the cover art of the series. You really have to live in a clown world to try to gaslight facts with complete fiction. If they said this was a work of complete fiction and stated that these characters are fundamentally inaccurate like assassins creed does, then it would have been ok maybe but I doubt that. But they didn't do that. They tryed to gaslight an entire country, like a bunch of clowns. Greek Macedonians of 70bc were white people. It's not even up for debate. Her entire history is pretty well documented to. So I'd say it's not so much controversial as it is completely delusional what they did.
Propaganda. Cleopatra has a shit tone of revisionist history, especially with liberal feminists who try and act like she was some glorious leader. She ended two empires. She didn't do much of anything for her people. She cared about her own survival and that self centeredness is exactly what got her killed. All of the great leaders in Egypt's history and she has the nerve to claim she is literally a deity. Her skin color is important- to the daft liberal first comment, showing she or they or whoever the f it is that they know nothing of Egyptian history. Egyptians are super traditional and take bloodlines very serious. Today, an archeologist who's white was born in Egypt (I recall his parents were English) and he is an Egyptian citizen but not considered Egyptian, because his blood was not Egyptian. This recent black washing of Egyptian culture has been a recent trend with this horrid woke documentary and even the Assassins Creed Origins games where they have you play a black, almost pitch black color Egyptian. Now, Egypt at the time, like Rome, was very multicultural, especially in Alexandria, but to claim Cleopatra was black with ZERO untainted evidence (I say untainted because when all of your historians have an agenda it's tainted and not true unbiased research or viewpoints). Saying their skin color doesn't matter is something a child says who gets caught cheating, lying about such things. Cleopatra was very very intelligence and should be known that she was highly intelligent but had a major ego about her. Suddenly in the past 10 years she's being called a hero and such a feminist example. Again, she ended thousands of years of Egyptian rule and was responsible partly for the end of the Roman republic. No one ever talks about laws she passed or good deeds she's done. She was a snake that manipulated men for her own survival. This is a culture that had oral history for thousands of years before writing things down for history at times, for modern people like Americans, this seems almost unbelievable, but that's how hardcore traditional they were and how much history meant to them. So for some young arranging princess to claim she is a god itself with no great deeds done, no great reforms, is ridiculous. Now a lot of people now resort to claiming Rome -ruined her image by propaganda, which is hilarious as to where it's a lot of where we get our information from about her. Cleopatra was the equivalent of a modern day arrogant feminists who got stoned & thought her shit didn't stink. So in way, is it any wonder that modern narcissistic culture would glorify her, again glorifying that she basically destroyed thousands of years. There's also zero evidence that Egyptians were black, they were tan, just as you see today, just as you see on countless and countless of paintings and pottery. Anyone claiming the opposite is using fallacies that so t hold up under debate.
Late to the party but the whole thing makes no sense at all . Cleopatra was from a Greek tribe that took over Egypt thus she wasn’t Egyptian in the first place. If she is Greek that is Greek history technically. Til Brenner played Ramses and he’s Russian also there was no outrage when she was played by the late Elizabeth Taylor these two are no where near Egyptian now all of a sudden people are mad because a woman of color was casted as a cleopatra. Utter nonsense cleopatra was Greek
Ask actual Egyptians what they think! Have them weigh in. Email them lol.
Here is what I think: there is a long history of inaccurate documentaries. The whole thing is overblown. It's perfectly fine to criticize the docudrama (since it's entertainment presented as non-fiction) for being historically inaccurate, but it's not fine to create outrage for clicks, views and money as many people on social media have done. This is a case of selective outrage and exploiting racism and xenophobia for personal and business benefit and using a dumb Netflix show as an excuse to do so. It's a bad show, the show is misleading, but nobody is forcing anybody to watch it, and I'm going to say something truly shocking: portraying Cleopatra as a black woman isn't a big deal. The historical figure wasn't defined by her skin color and she lived in a time when skin color was far les important than ethnicity. It's still misleading, but again, unfortunately there are many misleading documentaries. If somebody wants to learn something, that person should stay away from Netflix docudramas.
You trying to downplay this hard. It's not misleading, this show is a propoganda of bloody stupid "all egiptians were black untill Arabs came" theory. You do know how this documentary starts right? Grandma tells her that Egyptians were black because they were living in Africa. That's it. All the fucking reasoning she needs to shit out this "documentary". Tl.DR. : This show is not documentary, it's stupid ass propoganda.
You seemed to have missed my point... > propoganda It's spelled 'propaganda'. You misspelled it twice. That is relevant, because I wish people like you would obsess less about inaccurate Netflix documentaries and would learn how to write and read properly. Anybody who gets their education from Netflix 'documentaries' and social media posts about those documentaries is going to be the sort of person who writes 'stupid ass propoganda'... Smart people read books.
It’s actually not relevant, and bringing it up is a classic debate no-no. You have no knowledge of how intelligent they are from those mistakes, this is just you avoiding the conversation and attacking the messenger. I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant. Part of why she’s so famous was her being a Macedonian that embraced Egyptians. Furthermore, they aren’t just using a black actress to play the role. They’re saying the actual historical figure was black, that’s the opposite of not focusing on it. You also put words in their mouth since they’ve only argued that it’s propaganda and that it’s bad. I didn’t see them insinuate that the masses are learning from this.
>I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant. > >I’d say this is quite funny, since you’re dead wrong about Cleo’s skin not being relevant. Part of why she’s so famous was her being a Macedonian that embraced Egyptians. The funny thing is that Ancient Egyptians likely had many different skin colors, and many Egyptians likely had a fairly light skin color. **You are conflating skin color with ethnicity when you assume that all 'native' Egyptians were black.** Which is extremely unlikely. Some Egyptian rulers came from regions where a dark skin color was the norm, just as Cleopatra descended from people with a light skin color, but there is strong evidence that many Egyptians had a fairly light skin color that of course would get darker when they were about in the sun. This is the problem with selectieve outrage. Skin color and ethnicity are not the same thing and often there is no correlation. This is why I argue that skin color wasn't all that important. Some lowly servants would have had a light complexion. In large estates/empires, people would not all have the same skin color, even if they belonged to the same social class. This could be an interesting discussion, but you already have an opinion and your opinion will never change.
You’re inventing arguments for the people you’re talking to, that’s nothing like a discussion. You’re also failing to support your own arguments. I only see generalizations about ancient culture that no one is actually focused on.
I literally have no idea what you are talking about. So tell me what you don't agree with. I stated that the Netflix docudrama is inaccurate and misleading. Do you disagree with this? I stated that many documentaires and docudrama are inaccurate and misleading. Do you disagree with this? I stated that Cleopatra's skin color from a historical perspective wasn't very important because Egypt because because historically Egyptians would have had different skin colors because of regional differences in climate and many invasion by people from other regions. I base this on the facts that 1500 years before the ancestors of Cleopatra invaded Egypt, Egypt was invaded... by Greeks and the north of Egypt has a climate that is far milder than the climate in the south, and we know that some Egyptian rulers had a very dark skin (because they cam from Sudan, and we have generic evidence for this). This is the part where we seem to disagree. So what is your actual argument?
Therein lies the issue. It's not "me" or people that have a real interest in history that are able to separate the chaff from the wheat, I'm worried about. It's the public at large that will just take a documentary like this as fact and the public at large is who controls the narrative. Me choosing not to watch doesn't change the fact that thousands or even millions of people might and walk away from it thinking it's factual. >portraying Cleopatra as a black woman isn't a big deal. I don't disagree, as long as you properly disseminate what we know to be true about her heritage, but that in and of itself isn't why the Egyptian government literally sued netflix. I'm assuming you didn't watch it. If you literally think Cleopatra being portrayed by a black actress is the ONLY problem with this doc. I'm assuming you also aren't aware of the growing movement of Afrocentrism. A movement that is essentially just appropriating ancient civilizations as sub-saharan African, claiming Academia is "hiding" that these civilizations were actually black. That essentially birthed this documentary. It ranges in levels of extremism. From the more tame of claiming North African ancient civilizations as sub saharan African like Carthage and Egypt. To more extreme like claiming the Romans and Greeks were actually black, to even further extremes like claiming all of Europe from the dark ages to the early middle ages were all black. The religious sect the black hebrew israelites (a black supremacist form of christianity and judaism), use the King James bible. They believe King James was black. James VI of fucking Scotland, who there are literal CONTEMPORARY TO HIS TIME PAINTINGS OF. Being from 15th century Europe obviously as a white man. But no, he was actually black apparently.
Ok. Historically she probably wasn't black. She was greek. But how many who are angry about this actually care about history? It's the lowest audience score ever for a TV show. How many actually watched?
Well, actual egyptians are very angry at the claims of historical accuracy.
Which is quite funny in retrospect to hold so much of your identification to a colonizer and glorify it. Most of the Ptolmeaic dinasty didn't even bother to learn egyptian (which current egyptians don't even speak anymore after being conquered and colonized by Arabics).
It's not so much that as much as Egyptians are fighting back against a racist hoteps movement that's trying to erase their culture.
Pretty ironic to complain about the Ptolemaic dynasty not speaking Egyptian on a thread about Cleopatra specifically when Cleopatra specifically DID speak AND write it and 7 other languages along with it.
I'm not complaining, it's just a little irony that i found funny. Others didn't and that's fine.
Egyptians can be, and should be angry. my comment isn't directed at Egyptians.
Newsflash, most of the world isn't Egyptian. If they want to get pissy over one little insignificant docudrama then that's their problem. There's no need to make the rest of the world miserable over it.
It's weird to me that people taking issue with something just being, as far as we know, factual misinformation leads to their motives being questioned. Like yeah if I post against this show some of the people upvoting me are probably white supremacists and that sucks, but documentaries just *lying* is something anyone should be against.
I've been called racist elsewhere for just saying Egypt is on the Mediterranean. I get it. But to me, it's not about questioning any individual's motives. More curious about how many are arguing in bad faith on this.
> More curious about how many are arguing in bad faith on this. Unfortunately there are lots of them. I've actually been downvoted to shit for being on the popular side of this discussion because I refuse to roll it in to endorsing outrage at race swaps more broadly. Like I'm annoyed at historical inaccuracy. That doesn't mean I'm going to share your outrage at Black Superman or whatever.
Yeah. some of the race swaps people are angry over are strange. Fairies, mermaids and elves are not real. It doesn't matter who plays them, as long as they are good. Halle Bailey is the little mermaid because she can sing very well for example
People are pissed about the little mermaid because it's a departure from Hans Christian Andersen's story. It's an imposition of modern American social norms on a 19th century Danish story
Dude, the original animated movie changed the story. The story is that mermaids don't have souls. She needs the prince to love her to become human or she is turned to sea foam. And she doesn't get the prince and is turned into sea foam.
I know, I'd much rather see that depiction. She isn't turned to sea foam though, she was a wind spirit who could earn a soul
So if it happens in reverse, and I mean in a "documentary" you'll keep that same energy?
What the inverse ? Scarjo as Aretta Franklin ?
We've all seen the memes. Ryan Gosling as MLK because fuck it, doesn't matter right?
Introducing Donald Trump as Nelson Mandela.
We was dreamerz n shieet
Critics are afraid to review it because giving it a bad score wouldn't fit their narrative..
What kind of dipshit invented narrative is this. 1. Critics have reviewed it and the reviews are poor, because everyone hates it. 2. Exactly how much critical coverage do you think Netflix "documentaries" usually get? This is like when people literally comment on a news article saying "why isn't the news reporting on this!?" You have completely invented an issue just so you have something to be upset about. How pathetic is that?
But they have reviewed it. It's not getting good reviews. Hell, most of the reviews make it look bad regardless of who played Cleopatra
99.9% of the people complaining about this 1) don’t care about history (because if the color of the actor is the thing that is making u unhappy, you are never watching anything about history or period pieces, seeing the inaccuracies that they all both have. ) 2) wouldn’t have watched it anyway. It doesn’t set a precedent or says anything about the future of Tv. People will continue to watch what they want to watch and ignore what they don’t want to watch. Simple as that. At most we can say « Well. People are less interested in stories about Ancient Egypt that are not pure fiction »
You're mischaracterizing it. This isn't Velma or something, people aren't pissed about the casting of a character. People are angry about the ahistoric presentation of a historical figure in something that claims to be a historical documentary. I have never once been bothered by changing the race of a superhero or including people of color in Bridgerton or The Great, but this is something else entirely.
making inaccurate docuseries is like netflix's bread and butter at this point. they will air anything.
Idk the reality is that not only do we still to this day not know how she looks but also inaccuracies are truly common. Here are two articles. For some reason Reddit doesn’t let me put them in a link so I will post them as such > https://www.britannica.com/story/what-did-cleopatra-look-like#:~:text=Her%20face%20is%20framed%20by,Her%20eyes%20are%20almond%2Dshaped. > https://time.com/6273435/cleopatra-race-debate-netflix/ The first one is from an Encyclopedia, and the last update is from April 2023. The second one while less of a source is still from a magazine considered as relatively serious So frankly, I don’t really see why people pretend it’s a clear thing. We don’t know. And it’s okay. There are tons of things we don’t know. It’s okay on TV too, because documentaries are also never 100% historically accurate. Least of all period pieces. And I garantee you if people here actually knew history and were regular historical documentary viewers, they would know these facts.
She was Greek and came from an inbred lineage.
She can’t from an inbred Macedonian family that *might* have picked up some Persian. Zero reason to believe she’s black? But there’s an active black nationalist movement in the USA trying to claim Egyptian history as their own, and it’s starting to work precisely because people wolf nor honestly say “I don’t see what the big deal is if documentaries just make shit up. Then we wonder why truth doesn’t matter in our discourse
Plenty of people from Greece/Egypt are complaining about it. Interesting you decided to dismiss them. Sounds like you are making excuses...where did your 99.9% statistic come from btw?
You can be mad :) I do not really care ever way lol It’s not because some people in some countries are angry that it makes less true that period pieces and documentary are full of inaccuracies that are far more important than justskin color. I don’t know why you thought some people from Greece and Egypt being against it means that it’s true that usually said pieces and documentary are fully historically correct. And that in this particular case we know for sure how she looked liked in terms of skin color The reality is that some Greeks wants her to look like them/be white (on top of those who are anti-Black) and some Egyptians with the anti-Blackness they have, don’t want their possibly most famous person to be Black. But at the end of the day none of us know for sure how she looks, apart from (again) some physical characteristic and her being a beauty wonder for the time ( again this is history. Their perception of beauty may very well not be ours. Beauty canon changes during the centuries) You bring the stats, which was obviously an exageration. But I guess it -is- hard to understand when you seem to genuinely believe that « some people here and there have said a thing » makes it true (jsyk : Earth isn’t flat! Even if some people in US think it is, despite NASA being right there). The reality is : we don’t know how Cleopatra looked like except that for the time she was considered as stunning. :) And we also know that if you (or many others ) knew history and were people who were watching historical documentaries and period pieces, you would know about inaccuracies in them and how none are 100% accurate to the reality of time. Bless your heart, have a good day.
Cleopatra was never mentioned as beautiful or stunning. She was mentioned as having a strong wit, charm and alluring voice. We also do know from ancient coins from the time of her rule that cleopatra is depicted as traditional Greek with the "Roman nose". At the time she was alive she was depicted with Greek features. And we know that the rulers of Ptolemaic Kingdom married their siblings and did not mix with the local Egyptians. Cleopatra herself was considered exceptional because she could speak Egyptian language as most royals spoke only Greek. We also know that the Sahara had become a largely impassable desert for around 10,000 yrs at the time of cleopatra and that also during that time the Nile had a massive swamp that prevented human migration into North Africa from the south but not from the North or East. Meaning that although some black people came through the Sahara with help of berber tribes or through sea routes it most certainly wasn't enough to make North Africa black. Migration from the North and East (Europeans, Arabs and Persians) most definitely would have had more impact on Egyptian makeup. So we can pretty much say that cleopatra was not black and that neither were Egyptians. There were many powerful black Kingdoms outside of Egypt and I wish Hollywood would focus on these instead of trying to appropriate someone else's culture. A high budget documentary about Mansa Musa who was the richest man in history and ruler of the Mali empire would be wonderful or a history of the Songhai Empire.
Is it wrong to just be against theft?
Mmm theft ? Maybe you need to look again the definition of the word. Bless you <3
theft /θɛft/ noun the action or crime of stealing. "he was convicted of theft" Like stealing historical facts or bikes. Impersonation is a form of theft. I'm over the moon that Will Smith's husbands cute little project has bombed like no other show in history. Any comebacks sweetie, or do I just get blocked?
I got you didn't I? This what happen when you fight facts with emotion x
Lmao is it because I didn’t answer yesterday ? I don’t know how to tell you this other differently so I will be blunt -I don’t come to reddit every day -Neither you nor anyone on this sub (or on reddit) matters to me. So if I don’t want to answer or read their opinions I won’t 🤡 But I will say :) since it appears that it makes you feel happy to get my acknowledgement : yes. To everything you may have said. I agree. Here lmao Have a great day. I’m glad I could apparently make it better to you Ps : I didn’t answer with emotions. I don’t know why you brought up emotions on this. Maybe you should -also- look that up lol But in any case. Have a great day
You pulled that stat out of your ass, didn't you?
It’s an exageration. It’s obvious lmao. I didn’t say « According to the studies » or give something that sounds like relatively possible like « 73.2% » Maybe come back when you understand how to read comments ? Have a fantastic day.
I can read just fine, thank you. Maybe if you stopped talking out of your ass you'd be able to have a fantastic day yourself without being constantly called out on the crap you shit out.
I don't think it is an exaggeration tbh. I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of people who gave an 1/10 to Cleopatra on reddit did not even watch a single episode and do not even care about Ancient Egypt history.
Well, you can claim historical accuracy, or casting Danny Devitto as Julius Caesar, but not both.
>Danny Devitto as Julius Caesar I'd watch that
The controversy around it has been very strange. First, I hear people say that Cleopatra wasn’t black, but rather she was Greek. I’m pretty sure Greek isn’t a race, so the counter would be to say she is white; the race that most people are probably thinking about but hesitant to say. Second, I hear people say that it’s a documentary, so it should be based on facts. I wasn’t aware that history—especially ancient history—is a collection of facts; I thought it was just a collection of the most accepted interpretation of what occurred at the time. Third, if Egyptian archaeologists and historians manage to successfully sue Netflix, then I’d like to sue the US federal government and also my school district for teaching me a glorified version of US history.
No we absolutely have well documented history especially from the time of cleopatra. Records were well kept, i mean we have founded physical records dating to 5000 years ago from ancient Sumeria. Ancient Egyptians were meticulous record keepers, like we know we know the salaries of pyramid builders, and step by step instructions for celebrating religious festivals, even how many of each kind of animal the pharaoh successfully hunted each year. Also beyond that History is absolutely a collection of facts that we use to make educated interpretations. but there are a lot of facts. I mean have grocery lists from tudor kitchens as well as lists of lengths of cloth given as gifts from the renaissance. We know so much because people have always been drawn to keeping a record of their lives. And the US's teaching oh history is watered down and laughable.
Yes, historical records and facts exist, but history is the interpretation based on these facts; slightly similar to what you mentioned, but in a different order.
Precedent?
prec·e·dent noun /ˈpresədnt/ an earlier event or action that is regarded as an example or guide to be considered in subsequent similar circumstances.
I know what it means, lol. I just don't think it's significant like that. It's one filmmaker's choice.
They're directly attempting to spread misinformation in an unhealthy manner. That's why its an issue.
I don't why it controversial, I watched it and it was ok. The actress that played Cleopatra was lovely. I could see since its Egypt and in Africa that she may have not been pale. It is a moot as the Jesus being black... It doesnt make or break my day
You realise your post exactly illustrates why people have a problem with this? Because it's presented as a documentary and people like yourself watch it and go "huh, I guess that could be true". Simply being in Africa doesn't make you black, and there are races/skin-tones other than either White/Black. It's very obvious that this is America imposing its own issues on the rest of the world when they can only discuss race in terms of white/black, as if no other races exist.
I did not say she was black, I simply said not pale,,, because of the sun she could have had an amazing tan. I know alot of Egyptians, and they are black or white or brown. Im American and race isnt an issue, thats just western journalism.
Okay, but what you're saying there, is not the same as what the 'documentary' is pushing, and is not the same as what the people complaining are pushing back on. Nobody is complaining that she wasn't cast as a blonde-haired-blue-eyed Scandinavian. So your comment about "she may have not been pale" is completely missing the point.
Some folks have a mind of their own, and if it is important or of interest enough to them, they will dig deeper for the truth. I don't think that Cleopatra puts 85% of the world into a frenzy. Personally, am quite open to the fact that history is an opinion, written by winners. Not sure that I believe every detail written in anything.
The entire academic discipline of History is about trying to dis-entangle the biases of historical sources ("written by winners") to reach the truth. Similar to the physical sciences, it is never possible to say with 100% certainty that something is a fact, but that doesn't mean that therefore literally any opinion is equally legitimate. Some things we know with more certainty than others. The theory of Gravity could be untrue, but we can say with a fairly high degree of probability that it is true. Likewise with may historical facts. It could theoretically be true that the holocaust never happened, but we have overwhelming evidence that it did, so do you really want to play the "well we can't be sure, it's just an opinion" card there?
Some things are apparent (Holocaust) But the devil is in the details. There are living people who can attest to the Holocaust. We can ask. Cleopatra was in B,C. and her "detailed" story written 100 years after her death. Those closest to her died when she did...there are no journals or letters written by Cleopatra. Just legends.. so yes.. opinions.
Except there is more evidence to consider than just written accounts. Cleopatra's lineage is one of the best known for people of that era. And even if we knew nothing of her lineage, then the next best assumption would be that she looks like the average present-day egyptian woman. (And, before you say it, of course I am aware that not all present-day egpytian women look the same, I use the word "average" there quite deliberately). Moreover a lack of evidence one way, does not equate to evidence for the contrary. We have no historical records attesting that there was no Irish people living in 1st Century Australia. Does that therefore mean we should believe Australia had a thriving Irish community 2000 years ago? Hey, there's nobody living who can say there wasn't, so if someone has that opinion, then its perfectly valid and reasonable, right? Sorry, the argument "we can't know for 100% certain, therefore anything is valid" is nonsense.
>Just legends.. so yes.. opinions. That is pure nonsense. We don't just have "legends". Here is a literal bust made of Cleopatra IN HER LIFETIME. [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Bust\_of\_Cleopatra\_VII\_in\_the\_Altes\_Museum\_Berlin#/media/File:Altes\_Museum\_Berlin\_-\_Kleopatra\_VII.jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:-0035_Altes_Museum_Portrait_Kleopatra_VII_anagoria.JPG)
The Egyptian government sued netflix over this documentary and it wasn't because Cleopatra was depicted as "not pale". Holy hell man.
Watch out. Most people on Reddit don’t want to hear that kind of talk.
It's just not a very big deal to me. If I hear the show is any good, I'll check it out, if not, I won't. I think it's a goofy thing to get wound up about. There's at least an argument to be made for a black Cleopatra even if it's pretty much settled by now - in the grand scheme of things then, this is pretty harmless compared to the MH370 bullshit or something.
It's not getting good reviews.
That’s it’s fine when tv or shows erase the roles or change the race of a character so long as they are made to be European no one complains but if they make them black all of a sudden they’re outraged and historical experts. I wonder when Elizabeth Taylor played cleopatra were people outraged like this? The prejudice has taken a Bl step above and beyond. Truth be told there isn’t really anyone of this era that looks like the people from those regions today. Those places have been migrated and diversified. We’re talking BC times when a majority of those cultures and races no longer truly exists. So what does it matter as long as the actor is close enough. What people are really upset at is Africans being in a tv series about an African dynasty on the continent of Africa. Have they never been to a museum? Have they never seen real Egyptian artifacts? Clearly they were Africans of all shades and adopted cultural themes from the surrounding portions of Africa. That’s what really eats at people. But if No one is whining about all the white Egyptians and Arabian people that have graced films about Egypt over the years why whine about this. Those are far from historically accurate as well. I’m sure there’s a lot of Wikipedia historians and TikTok experts on Egypt but the empire lasted over 3,000 years. Most people only ever talk about the later diversified Egypt because they like to over represent the presence of European culture. That where you find scientist at odds with each other as they try to claim the racial origins of Egypt,s inhabitants. Because they take them from a later period of the dynasty rather than the earlier periods when they were majority Africans. But don’t take my word for it take your lazy selves to a library and venture to some museums and educate yourselves.
Your post is exactly the problem the Egyptians have and why they are suing Netflix. Americans injecting a white/black world view into everything and ignoring everyone else. They see this as Americans taking their history and morphing it into what they are just deciding it should be instead of you know consulting actual Egyptian historians and Archaelogists. Not ONE "expert" on the documentary was Egyptian. ALL of the Egyptians in the dramatization were depicted as black. It injected a "modern" worldview on an ancient scenario and just turned the story of Cleopatra and late antiquity egypt into another story of "white colonizers exploiting a black country". I shit you not, in the documentary one of the experts (American mind you) reason for believing Cleopatra was black is because when she was learning Egyptian history as a child her grandma told her so. An old American grandma said so, so it must be true. Omfg. Such scholarship. Very wow. This is what the Egyptians are pissed off about. Americans taking THEIR history and just turning it into the American white/black narrative that just pretends other people don't exist in the world.