Netflix Is Going to Pray on The Mountain and Hope To Get a Break as They Get Ready to Give Us a Gay Jesus
Netflix is facing conservative backlash over a Brazilian Christmas comedy special called "The First Temptation of Christ," which depicts Jesus as gay.
Nearly 1.8 million users have signed a Change.org petition for the special to be removed from Netflix and for the Brazilian YouTube comedy group Porta dos Fundos ("Back Door"), which made the special, to be "held responsible for the crime of villainous faith."
"Porta dos Fundos values artistic freedom and humor through satire on the most diverse cultural themes of our society and believes that freedom of expression is an essential construction for a democratic country," the group said in a statement.
Another petition from the conservative group CitizenGo has over 240,000 signatures.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
Netflix is in hot water with many conservative Christians over a new Brazilian Christmas comedy special called "The First Temptation of Christ," which depicts Jesus as gay.
Nearly 1.8 million users have signed a Change.org petition for the 46-minute, Portuguese-language special to be removed from Netflix. The petition also calls on the Brazilian YouTube comedy group Porta dos Fundos ("Back Door"), which made the special and has made similar ones for a decade, to be "held responsible for the crime of villainous faith." The special first premiered on Netflix Brazil on December 3.
Netflix declined to comment, but pointed Business Insider to Porta dos Fundos' statement:
"Porta dos Fundos values artistic freedom and humor through satire on the most diverse cultural themes of our society and believes that freedom of expression is an essential construction for a democratic country," the group said.
The Netflix description for "The First Temptation of Christ" says that "Jesus, who's hitting the big 3-0, brings a surprise guest to meet the family. A Christmas special so wrong, it must be from the comedians Porta dos Fundos."
Another petition for the special's removal, from the conservative group CitizenGo, has over 240,000 signatures. It calls the special a "clear attack to Christianity as Christmas approaches."
"It is an absolutely unacceptable provocation," the CitizenGo petition said. "No one has the right to attack the faith of millions of people around the world. This type of supposed 'shows' only cause one thing: numbing the population to attacks against Christians."
The National Conference of Bishops in Brazil released a statement last week condemning the special, saying "Nothing allows anyone the right to vilify people's deeply held beliefs. The right to freedom of expression does not nullify respect for people and their values."
This isn't the first time that Netflix has faced conservative backlash. The streaming giant also faced criticism for the animated superhero drag queen series, "Super Drags," and the Argentinian movie "Desire," which critics argued depicted "child pornography" because a young girl accidentally experiences an orgasm. The director of "Desire" defended the film in a statement at the time. Netflix didn't remove either title from its catalog.
Many also threatened to boycott Netflix after it struck a deal with Barack and Michelle Obama last year to produce original content (though data provided to Business Insider suggested that a very small fraction of users actually canceled the service).
Comments