If you need to observe one of the more obvious double standards in the media, look no further than the difference in the treatment of two “canceled” celebrities.
Both Gina Carano and Ezra Miller have effectively been banished from mainstream pop culture, but the two situations could not be any more different in tenor or circumstance.
Miller, the leading man in the “The Flash” movie that bombed spectacularly in 2023, has largely been handled with kiddie gloves despite a mountain of heinous allegations lobbied against the man.
The 31-year-old actor, who uses “they/them” pronouns, has had a litany of issues attached to him going back over 10 years:
- A 2011 disorderly conduct charge
- A controversial video from 2020 that appeared to show Miller choking a woman
- A number of incidents in 2022 while Miller relocated to Hawaii — and this one involved a restraining order
- A 2022 burglary charge
But the most alarming — and contemptible — of Miller’s allegations included a number of accusations involving younger people. In June 2022, there was the issue with 18-year-old activist Tokata Iron Eyes (this ordeal revealed that Miller allegedly thinks of himself as a sort of messianic figure for Native Americans… Yikes). A separate June 2022 issue involved a mother and her young child being granted temporary harassment prevention against Miller in Massachusetts. Yet again in June 2022, Rolling Stone magazine reported that Miller was housing a woman and her three children at an unsafe (marijuana and bullets were allegedly lying around) Vermont farmhouse.
Despite all that, Miller was still advertised and promoted for the 2023 “The Flash” movie.
When that movie flopped, everyone sort of dusted Miller under the rug and pretended that “The Flash” — and all the controversy leading up to it — never even happened.
(Even in a literal sense, the newly rebooted DC superhero movie universe may very well treat its predecessor movies as non-canon.)
Have you ever heard of “Invincible”?
And now, very quietly, Miller has been removed from his voice acting role in Amazon Prime’s smash hit, animated superhero series, “Invincible,” according to The Hollywood Reporter.
Miller, who voiced evil scientist/elected official District Attorney Sinclair in the show, was replaced by veteran voice actor Eric Bauza, whose credits include an upcoming role in the well-reviewed “X-Men ’97.”
Miller voiced Sinclair in Season 1 of “Invincible,” but in the ongoing Season 2 of the show, Bauza has taken over Sinclair’s role.
The entire thing was a soft, quiet change — a stark contrast to the faux and vocal outrage surrounding Carano’s departure from the Star Wars show “The Mandalorian” back in early 2021.
After vocal complainers successfully lobbied to get Carano fired after mischaracterizing her social media posts as abhorrent (spoiler alert: they’re not), the smear campaign against Carano didn’t end.
In early February, Carano fired back at her unceremonious ouster with a massive lawsuit.
Today is an important day for me–I am filing a lawsuit against @lucasfilm & @Disney
After my 20 years of building a career from scratch, and during the regime of former Disney CEO Bob Chapek, Lucasfilm made this statement on Twitter, terminating me from The Mandalorian: “Gina…
— Gina Carano 🕯 (@ginacarano) February 6, 2024
By any objective metric, the allegations levied against Miller are far, far heavier than “mean” or controversial social media posts from someone.
But when he’s removed from a project, he gets the quiet and meek treatment, while Carano is dragged through the mud?
There is a non-zero chance that had Carano also characterized herself as mentally disturbed with “they/them” pronouns, the outrage may have been quite subdued.
And that’s a disgusting double standard that needs to be called out.
