Netflix's Cuties: Islamophobia Gone Wrong

Cuties, which is called Mignonnes in French, is a 

2020 French coming-of-age drama film written and directed by Maïmouna Doucouré. For short, Cuties can be described as a French movie with scabrous content that was meant to malign Islam.

The description of the movie by the makers is as follows: “Amy, 11, becomes fascinating with a twerking dance crew. Hoping to join them, she starts to explore her femininity defying her family’s tradition.”

After receiving a massive backlash from the public, Netflix tried to save face by unabashedly drafting another description which goes thus: “Eleven-year-old Amy starts to rebel against her conservative family’s tradition when she becomes fascinated with a free-spirited dance crew”.

The film premiered in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition section of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival on 23rd January 2020. It was released in France on 19th August 2020 by BAC Films and internationally on 9th September 2020 on Netflix.

Movie lovers and activists have called out Netflix over what has been called ‘the sexualization of children’. Netflix is an American online movie streaming service provider which has also delved into movie making. It is headquartered in Los Gatos, California. America.

Westerners tag anyone who has sexual relations with anyone below the age of 18 a pedophile however; millions of girls below 18 joyfully engage in premarital sex and get pregnant every day.

‘Pedophilia’ is another ‘crime’ Islamophobes have dropped at the door step of Islam. Pedophilia or paedophilia is defined as a psychiatric disorder in which an adult or older adolescent experiences a primary or exclusive sexual attraction to prepubescent children. Miraculously, the movie, Cuties, has exposed the fact that westerners very well fall in love with girls under 18.

Islamophobia

The demon, Islamophobia, has continued to rage across the globe. In extreme cases, Muslims have lost their lives. Islam-haters try to put a dampener on their bigotry by denying the existence of the words ‘Islamophobe’ and ‘islamophobia’; this will always be in vain.

A major narrative Islamophobes try to sell is the ‘Islam oppresses women’ cliché.

France has long been tagged the most Islamophobic country in the world. France was the first European country to announce a ban on the Islamic veil in public on 11th April 2011.

Though, movies with similar themes

(Islamophobia) have come from other countries, no movie has ever exposed the aim of Islamophobia like Cuties. Accuse others of that which you are guilty.

The makers of the movie tried to portray a Muslim girl oppressed into modesty in the character Amy.

With the number of individuals who have taken umbrage at Cuties and inveighed against Netflix, it is obvious western Islamophobic media overegged the pudding this time.

 Backlash

• On 10 September, #CancelNetflix started trending on Twitter in the United States.
• The Turkish Radio and Television Supreme Council, requested Netflix to remove the film.
• The National Center on Sexual Exploitation, a religious organization, condemned Netflix for giving a film "that has permitted the sexual exploitation of children" a platform.
• Shortly after its release on Netflix, Cuties had an IMDb rating of 1.7/10.

Quite disgustingly, the writer and director of the movie, Maïmouna Doucouré, won the Directing Award – Dramatic at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival.

Moral of the story; an attempt to paint Islam black has once again exposed the hypocrisy of Islam-haters.