Exhibit 78: The MRC's Non-Conforming Superhero Meltdown

The Media Research Center's Lindsay Kornick hate-watches shows like "Supergirl" and "Batwoman" just so she can complain that they have characters who aren't heterosexual or touch on issues in the news (or don't hate journalists).

By Terry Krepel
Posted 7/29/2021

Lindsay Kornick

The January 27 episode “Blood Memory” has our transgender superhero-to-be Nia Nal (Nicole Maines) going back to "her" fictional hometown of Parthas with friend and boss Kara Danvers aka Supergirl (Melissa Benoist). Previous episodes have revealed that not only is Nia a transgender woman but she is also part alien with the ability to dream the future. Yes, this one character has hit the liberal and super-power jackpot. That’s only part of the annoyance.

Parthas is, in fact, a haven where humans and aliens live peacefully and progressively. They are so progressive that they even quickly and readily except gender dysphoria as normal.

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Parthas is praised as some form of paradise, but any place that encourages transitioning young as “affirming an authentic self” sounds like a nightmare. Anyone who really cares about a family member or an “authentic self” should realize that most children who go through gender dysphoria eventually outgrow it by the time they become adults. If anything, transitioning Nia at a young age is probably the opposite of affirming her authentic self.

In an April 29 post, Kornick complained that the show defended the right of people to share their truth:

Let’s face it, CW’s Supergirl has always been preachy. But there’s preachy, and then there’s obnoxiously, sycophantically preachy. The superhero series flies towards the latter in yet another episode >proclaiming how being trans is being "strong" and "authentic" nowadays.

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In the meantime, our transgender hero Nia Nal (Nicole Maines) has stepped up to protect the city as the superhero Dreamer - and, yes, that is what they’re calling her with a straight face. Despite not having the mantle for long, she’s apparently doing a decent job against crime. However, that doesn’t stop all of the xenophobic attacks. The super friends then decide to come up with another idea to combat hate.

Supergirl, using her alter ego as reporter Kara Danvers, gives a public interview with “Dreamer” to promote a positive image of human and alien unity. After all, Nia is the product of a human father and an alien mother as well as a trans woman. That last detail really has nothing to do with the alien crisis, but the show just can’t help but remind us in this pandering speech.

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The other characters predictably hail her words as brave and inspiring instead of the preachy and cringey mess they really are. They act like we’ve never heard these words before in the media or even on this very show.

The Children of Liberty then come to arrest Dreamer for “an illegal seditious broadcast,” only to be stopped by CatCo Media editor James Olsen (Mechad Brooks). In full social justice warrior fashion, he defends the broadcast saying, “All I see are journalists exercising their right to freedom of speech and doing their duty to uphold freedom of press.” Strangely, I doubt that these characters would say the same thing about people discussing how men cannot be women. Or how landing on Earth shouldn’t automatically make you an American citizen. Then it would probably be considered a hate crime.

Supergirl continues to be one of the more hypocritical shows on the air, but now it’s definitely one of the more obnoxious shows as well. If we never get another episode waxing about sharing "our authentic selves," it’ll be too soon.

Meanwhile, nobody's stopping Kornick from being as preachy as she wants to be. But that's the only reason she hate-watches "Supergirl": She's also mad that it says nice things about journalism that deviate from the MRC's anti-media narrative.

Kornick huffed in a March 2019 post that the show gave "unmitigated praise towards journalism," which is apparently forbidden at the MRC. She lectured: "It’s so annoying that Supergirl acts like its storyline and journalism are apparently single-handedly stopping bigotry. The only bigotry I see is assuming everyone on the opposite side are angry, hateful jerks. Maybe Supergirl isn’t above this, but most of America should be."

Two months later, Kornick whined that the show's season finale was "honoring the real heroes of the show: journalists." She complains that Lex Luthor "is literally winning because of fake news and a stupid public" and was stopped only because Supergirl's alter ego "writes an expose on Luthor, detailing evidence that he committed treason, along with the President, to orchestrate his heroism. The article is so successful it leads to the Cabinet invoking the 25th Amendment. It’s truly a liberal dream come true."

And since only liberals like journalists, saying good things about journalists is clearly an evil liberal plot:

I’m honestly surprised anyone can brag how “the fourth estate saved the day” with a straight face anymore, but that’s how delusional this show has become over the last four years. It somehow imagines a world where noble journalists can take out evil presidents and single-handedly stop all political tension. In the meantime, it never seems to discuss journalists causing harmful tension or spreading fake news or genuinely not saving the day. Maybe that’s why they call it science “fiction.”

Kornick's link on "spreading fake news" was to a NewsBusters post about one of the Covington kids suing CNN for allegedly defaming them even though CNN eventually corrected it story. It did not link to any MRC post that heavily promoted a false Fox News story during the 2016 election that Hillary Clinton faced imminent indictment. The MRC never corrected the record, let alone apologized.

For the 2020 season of "Supergirl," Kornick returned that March to complain once again that the show didn't hate transgender people like she does:

CW’s Supergirl has put political issues on the back burner this season, leaving room for the obnoxious Batwoman to swoop in instead. This week, however, we returned to our regularly scheduled politics with the usual awful results. Unfortunately, it was yet another propping up of the transgender community.

The March 15 episode “Reality Bytes” centered around our transgender superhero Nia Nal aka Dreamer (Nicole Maines). Her transgender roommate Yvette (Roxy Wood) was targeted and attacked by a man trying to send a message to “Dreamer” about how “the world doesn’t want a trans superhero.”

Trust me when I say, it doesn’t get any deeper than that.

Of course, this led to Nia appealing to her friend Kara Danvers aka Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) for help. Kara offered to help the legal way, but Nia was determined to see justice for her “vulnerable” community. And that led us to our first instance of the show insisting that trans people are all assaulted “every day”:

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It’s strange how Nia believed that she could speak for literally every trans person on the grounds of being trans, and yet she’s never called out on being prejudiced. Then again, that would have involved criticizing a transgender person, and Supergirl jumped through hoops in a single bound to avoid that. In fact, there were many scenes of characters like Kara validating Nia’s perspective.

Um, isn't "the world doesn’t want a trans superhero" the entire message Kornick has been sending in her attacks on this show? (Of course, by "the world" she means "right-wing transphobes like herself".)

Kornick then tried to downplay violence against transgender people after the show referenced it:

For the record, there was no epidemic of bigoted white men murdering transgender people. While there were about twenty U.S. trans murders in 2019, most trans murders happened during personal disputes, not hate crimes. Second, the transgender homicide rate doesn’t even constitute half of the average homicide rate, much less an epidemic. Contrary to the apparently awful National City (or the comments of Nia’s actor Nicole Maines), the United States is actually pretty safe for Nia’s “community.”

But Supergirl didn’t care about that. All Supergirl cared about was fighting fictional bigots to shove a liberal agenda down our throats. The worst part of all was that it came in a ridiculously boring plot rivaling only that of Dreamer’s origin story. I’d like to say that the series can do better, but clearly that’s no longer true. 

In an April 12 post, Tierin-Rose Mandelburg went beyond the show to attack "Supergirl" actors for speaking out against the right-wing trend of anti-transgender laws:

Arkansas: Don’t let kids who are too young to make life altering decisions make any life altering decisions. Celebs: Arkansas wants to “hurt kids.”

For what seems like and is the safest option for kids who think they were born in the wrong body and want to chop off their genitals, Arkansas' HB 1570 law has come into quite the controversy. Recently, a lot of the cast of CW's Supergirl has taken it upon themselves to demand transgender youth be able to get sex changes ... because their job as actors just isn’t enough. 

On April 6, the Associated Press broke the news that Arkansas is the “first state to ban gender confirming treatments and surgery for transgender youth.” Essentially, those under age 18 will not be allowed puberty blockers, hormone treatments, or sex reassignment surgeries since they are minors and can’t even decide what they want to do as careers, never mind which gender they should be. To no one’s surprise, Bounding into Comics reported how these Supergirl actors spat their disapproval on the legislature (FYI, none of these actors live in Arkansas or are children).

Starting off strong is transgender actress Nicole Maines who plays a transgender superhero named Dreamer on the show. Maines once told Ellen that she was between three and four years old when she realized she was not the male that she was born as. Pretty woke three year old if you ask me. 

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Next up is another actress whose character is part of the alphabet community. Chyler Leigh, who plays a lesbian and is a real life lesbian, continued the emotional manipulation by screaming that “This is a matter of LIFE & DEATH.” Hey, at least she gets brownie points for dramatic effect.

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Straight white male Jon Cryer, whose character in the series is not gay or trans, took the next step and blamed Republicans in general for Arkansas’ passing of the bill. The last name fits the narrative for this crying baby.

As far as we know, Mandelburg is heterosexual (would she be working at the MRC if she wasn't), not a child and not a resident of Arkansas, so by her own standards, doesn't that disqualify her from speaking out on this issue as well?

Melting down over 'Batwoman'

"Supergirl" wasn't the only superhero show Kornick was hate-watching. In an October 2019 post, Kornick similarly lost it over the new "Batwoman" series for the title character not being heterosexual: "Batwoman, featuring the first lesbian superhero lead on television, is the latest comic-book series adapted by the CW. Unfortunately, following in the footsteps of Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman also is annoyingly preachy and obsessed with social justice. Even worse, it’s not even fun about it."

In January 2020, Kornick grumbled that the "Batwoman" series "goes the extra mile by 'outing' Batwoman as a lesbian in the universe of the show. Apparently, that’s the latest milestone for the LGBTQ community." She then lectured: "After all, what does Batwoman being a lesbian have to do with her being a superhero? Being gay doesn’t make one any more noble or self-sacrificing, so it hardly constitutes mentioning in a show about being a hero. Sadly, representation and having a progressive image seems to be more important than saving lives in the world of Batwoman."

For the 2021 season, Kornick is was triggered by the show tacking racial issues that don't handle racial issues like the good little right-wingers they're supposed to be, as well as a black character, Ryan Wilder, inheriting the Batwoman outfit. In a Feb. 21 post, Kornick complained that the show dared to be critical of the police, which apparently is forbidden:

The February 21 episode “Gore on Canvas” has both the new Batwoman aka Ryan Wilder (Javicia Leslie) and the private security firm known as the Crows working to find and recover a black-market painting. This painting, it turns out, can decipher the location of where a group of assassins is holding the previous Batwoman, Kate Kane. Unfortunately, Ryan has a visceral hatred for the Crows after a previous experience with them, and she makes that clear to the Crows' leader Commander Kane (Dougray Scott).

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The Crows may be a private security firm, but the show is clearly using them as a stand-in for the police, from the ACAB acronym to the demand to “burn it all down.” ... A private security firm going rogue and hurting people in a city with a superhero who dresses like a bat is far from representing what’s going on with the police in our country. However, that falls perfectly in line with all the fiction we’ve come to expect from BLM.

On March 28, Kornick went after a superhero show for not fawning over the police: "In case it wasn’t clear before, CW’s Batwoman really doesn’t like the police. As a little reminder, the latest episode for the caped crusader promotes more Black Lives Matter propaganda for 2021, this time with a 'Defund the Police' message," further whining: "Batwoman is hardly the best arbiter of justice. Now I doubt that Batwoman even knows what justice is."

Kornick complained in an April 11 post:

CW’s Batwoman has gone from peddling Black Lives Matter lines to peddling Black Lives Matter conspiracy theories. If the past few episodes weren't bad enough, attacking private prisons and gun owners takes it to a whole new level.

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It turns out the mastermind behind these crimes is the wealthy CEO of a private correctional facility. According to Batwoman’s research, he uses criminals from his prisons to target community centers and rewards them with time off their sentences. The reason he targeted the community centers is because they have successful programs helping at-risk youth. And according to Batwoman, "These programs keep kids from falling through the cracks, but you know who profits from the kids who do? Prisons."

Sounds like some terrible BLM prison abolition conspiracy theory come to life. And it only gets worse when Batwoman confronts CEO Ellis O'Brien on his crimes.

[...]

Fortunately, he’s later arrested, so justice is served, except for the fact that this is a nonsensical argument for the BLM goal of abolishing prisons. If you're forced to resort to insane conspiracy theories to have the moral high ground, then perhaps you’re not as right as you think.

But Kornick also isn't as right as she thinks. Research has shown that the presence of private prisons in a state tends to induce judges to give longer prison sentences in order to keep the facilities filled.

On May 16, Kornick grumbled that "It’s clear at this point that CW’s Batwoman’s mission is not to fight crime but to fight the police." After complaining about the storyline's events, she huffed:

The next episode promises to dive into this budding Black Lives Matter moment, but back in reality, we have to acknowledge the truth. Contrary to what this show believes, black people are not routinely shot or arrested for simply being black or pulling out cell phones. This show can make up whatever anti-police story it wants, but it can’t change facts. Unfortunately, this will probably not be the last time I have to say that this season.

Well, yeah, because the MRC is paying her to say that. Which brings us to her June 6 post featuring more of that well-compensated complaining:

Well, we can’t say we weren’t warned. CW’s Batwoman followed up its last blatant Black Lives Matter propaganda episode with an even more blatantly BLM-biased episode this week.

The June 6 episode “Armed and Dangerous” picks up right where we left off following Luke (Camrus Johnson) being shot by the private security team the Crows basically for being black. Unfortunately for him, his life hangs in the balance as he’s placed in a coma after losing too much blood. Meanwhile, Ryan/Batwoman (Javicia Leslie) tries to get to the bottom of the shooting to find justice for her friend and hopefully help save his life.

Of course, the episode makes it abundantly clear that Luke is only in this situation because he’s black and because the Crows, the show’s regular police stand-in, are racist. In fact, the Crows even let the real white suspect in a crime run away because they were too engrossed with shooting Luke. Even worse, they cover their tracks by falsifying bodycam footage of the shooting.

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Contrary to this scene, nobody believes shooting victims deserve it simply because they are black. Also, contrary to the scene, Luke does survive, but Ryan is unable to find the real video to clear his name.

Nevertheless, Jacob Kane (Dougray Scott) follows Ryan’s advice to “burn it down” by formally disbanding the Crows and charging the Crows agents with assault with intent to kill. If you are confused as to how a system that needs to be burned down would still trust a police precinct to investigate and arrest people, don’t hold your breath. The show does not and probably will not explain it.

Just like Kornick never explains why nobody is allowed to criticize the police.

Kornick used a June 13 post to rage against another episode: "With only two episodes left in the season, Batwoman’s in a race against the clock to squeeze in this propaganda, so it looks like they’re opting for the completely false route with their politics now." Kornick responded with more right-wing narratives: "The overwhelming majority of police shootings involve armed suspects or people resisting arrest, so police shootings don't just happen for 'no reason.' And talk of gunmen getting out of jail free makes sense if Luke is referring to the inner-city crime and gang bangers shooting people and getting turned back on the street thanks to lax bail laws."

That, as it turned out, was Kornick's last bit of hate-watching for the MRC. She's now an associate editor at Fox News, where she does MRC-esque clickbait-y attacks on non-conservative media -- and where any criticism of Fox News or other right-wing outlets is not permitted. Who says hate-watching doesn't pay off in the world of right-wing media?

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