news Josh Gad Calls Out Racist Trolls Over ‘Little Mermaid’ Trailer on YouTube

Updated, March 17: The dislike counter is not publicly accessible and was removed by the platform in 2021. The alleged numbers are inaccurate.

Published, March 16: Josh Gad doesn’t want to be part of a world that allows racism.

Gad took to Twitter to slam the “pathetic” trolls who disliked the new live-action “Little Mermaid” trailer starring Halle Bailey as Ariel. “Imagine being so broken and pathetic in life that your chief concern is the skin color of…a make-believe singing mermaid,” Gad captioned a retweet of Democratic organization Call to Activism’s post citing that “The Little Mermaid” has been mass-disliked on YouTube.

Per Call to Activism, the teaser received 3 million down votes and the new trailer currently has at more than 600,000 dislikes. Disney debuted the trailer as part of the 95th Academy Awards March 12 in a segment that cost the studio $10 million.

Rob Marshall directs “The Little Mermaid,” with Melissa McCarthy, Javier Bardem, Jonah Hauer-King, Daveed Diggs, Awkwafina, Jacob Tremblay, Noma Dumezweni, and Art Malik rounding out the ensemble cast.

Marshall previously admitted that he “wasn’t anticipating” the public social media response to seeing Bailey as Ariel. “I felt like we’ve moved so far past that kind of thing,” Marshall said of the color-blind casting process. “But then you realize, in a way we haven’t. It was very moving to me to see how important this kind of casting is for the world.”

Marshall added that there was “no agenda” to casting Bailey as Ariel, other than the fact that she had a stellar singing voice and a “great deal of fire and joy” as a performer.

“We just were looking for the best actor for the role, period. The end,” Marshall said. “We saw everybody and every ethnicity.”

Bailey already received racist backlash when the clip of her singing “Part of Your World” received 1.5 million “dislikes” on YouTube before the rating feature was disabled. When Bailey was cast as Ariel in 2019, a racist #NotMyAriel Twitter campaign ensued. Late night host and comedian Trevor Noah spoke out on the controversy in September 2022.

“Really, people — we’re doing this again?” Noah said. “Once again, a bunch of internet racists are upset that a fictional character is being played by a Black person. This is so ridiculous.”

Diverse TV series like “She-Hulk” and “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” were also review-bombed on Rotten Tomatoes.

Imagine being so broken and pathetic in life that your chief concern is the skin color of… a make-believe singing mermaid. https://t.co/7F6F8LT2b9

— Josh Gad (@joshgad) March 16, 2023
 
Imagine dedicating your life to making movies, and then publicly mocking people for caring about movies.
It makes him sound like an asshole, cause yeah some of us really are pathetic and don't have friends or lives, sorry we cant all be famous and successful like you josh.

What I really hate is "news" articles like this - that exist purely to give a voice to racist haters
Everytime a group of racists fart someone has to write a news article about it, like it's some celebrity institution.

Gotta keep giving them a national voice, gotta keep promoting their racism, gotta keep them at the forefront of your mind every single day
Why? Why are we not just ignoring the racists? What the hell man, I think it's awful to write enitre news pieces about the opinion of racists.

I think what you're really doing is telling all the racists.. you're not alone. there are other people JUST LIKE YOU.
 
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I couldn't disagree more with S.F. there! I think that several statements are simply false. "Imagine dedicating ..."; that's not what's happening here. "Sorry we can't ..."; that's not what's happening here. "Exist purely ..."; that's not what's happening here. "gotta keep them ..."; that's not what's happening here. "I think what you're really doing ..."; evil must always be challenged, and silence implies consent. To some people, calling out racism is a worse offence than racist conduct. Can't agree with that.
 
I couldn't disagree more with S.F. there! I think that several statements are simply false. "Imagine dedicating ..."; that's not what's happening here. "Sorry we can't ..."; that's not what's happening here. "Exist purely ..."; that's not what's happening here. "gotta keep them ..."; that's not what's happening here. "I think what you're really doing ..."; evil must always be challenged, and silence implies consent. To some people, calling out racism is a worse offence than racist conduct. Can't agree with that.

Yeah we are on opposite sides here for sure lol, i think you're totally mad and a bit nonsensical.

Making the racists feel like they are not alone, that their beliefs are normal and millions of other people agree with them, and putting that in the news every single day is not going to have a positive impact.

You seem to think that evil is being challenged?? In what way?
Nobody is named in this article as being a racist, all its doing is saying racism is alive and strong.

How is that helpful? What positive changes happened as a result of this 'news'?

daily reminder to Halle Bailey - a bunch of people hate you!!
New headline news, hey halle bailey did you forget all these people hate you yet?

this shit is vile
 
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