US Geological Survey / Via earthquake.usgs.gov

An powerful earthquake struck off the coast of Panguna, Papua New Guinea, early Sunday morning.

The US Geological Survey reported it was a magnitude 8.0 quake.

The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said that "widespread hazardous tsunami waves are possible" and could affect Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Nauru, Vanuatu, parts of the Federated States of Micronesia, and Indonesia.

This is a developing story. Check back later and follow @BuzzFeedNews on Twitter for updates.

Ava DuVernay

Eugene Gologursky / Getty Images

A new study suggests that female movie directors hire way more women into their productions than male directors do.

The Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film at San Diego State University found that for 2016 films with at least one female director, 64% of writers were women. When films had only male directors, 9% of writers were women. Films with at least one female director also had higher percentages of female editors, female cinematographers, and female composers.

Martha Lauzen, PhD, who led the study, confirmed to BuzzFeed News that in order to have a large enough sample size to learn anything about female directors' hiring practices, she and her team crunched data from 2016's top 500 highest-grossing films by Americans — as opposed to top 100 or top 250 — because there were simply too few women overall.

Lauzen wasn't ready to definitively say that male directors hire fewer women behind the scenes than female directors, she wrote in an email. "However, logic would suggest that the director would be the individual (or one of the individuals) who has a great deal of influence regarding the selection of an editor or cinematographer on a film," she said. 👀

In 2016, 35% of the top 250 films had one woman or no women at all working in a major above-the-line leadership role behind the scenes.

Only 7% of directors on the top 250 films of 2016 were women. That's slightly less than the percentage of female directors on top films in 1998.

Diane Freed / Hulton Archive / Getty Images; Theo Wargo / Getty Images Entertainment

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Meryl Streep

Paul Drinkwater / NBCUniversal via Getty Images

As she accepted her Cecil B. DeMille award on Jan. 8 at the Golden Globes, acclaimed actor Meryl Streep sharply criticized President-elect Donald Trump for ridiculing a journalist's disability. "The person asking to sit in the most respected seat in our country imitated a disabled reporter — someone he outranked in privilege, power, and the capacity to fight back," she said. "It kind of broke my heart when I saw it, and I still can’t get it out of my head." Streep was referencing a moment in November 2015 when Trump mocked Serge F. Kovaleski, a New York Times reporter with arthrogryposis.

Streep denounced Trump's incivility toward Kovaleski: "Disrespect invites disrespect. Violence incites violence. And when the powerful use their position to bully others, we all lose."

Marlee Matlin

Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images

In response to Streep's speech, Oscar-winning actor Marlee Matlin tweeted, "SPEAK THE TRUTH!"

Comedian, writer, and disability rights advocate Maysoon Zayid responded similarly to Streep's speech. "She won't get the Cecil B. DeMille Award again — it's once in a lifetime, and she chose to use that platform to condemn something that was so painful to so many of us," she told BuzzFeed News on the phone.

The speech, however, was a reminder that Hollywood itself has a long way to go in destigmatizing disability. "Last night, the only mention of disability was Meryl Streep reminding the world that Donald Trump mocked us and became president," Zayid said.

According to the US Census Bureau, people with disabilities make up nearly 20% of the population, and yet — as Zayid said — they were not represented at the Golden Globes. A recent study by the Ruderman Family Foundation confirmed that those with disabilities are grossly underrepresented in television — and when they do appear, they are almost always played by actors who do not have a disability themselves.

Danny Woodburn, an actor who is on the Screen Actors Guild's Performers With Disabilities Committee, wrote in an email to BuzzFeed News: "To progress as a people, we need to embrace those who have been excluded."

Matlin, speaking with BuzzFeed News via a Twitter direct message, said that Hollywood needs to "make disability and actors with disabilities part of the diversity conversation, which includes hiring actual people with disabilities to play disabled roles."

Maysoon Zayid

D Dipasupil / Getty Images

As Woodburn put it, "My industry, [which] has always been the standard-bearer for addressing injustice ... needs to continue on the path that has really only just begun for the disabled."

Zayid offered concrete steps. She said Hollywood needs to "make sure that studios and auditions are ADA-compliant so that the disabled community — the largest minority in America — can actually have representation on television. Right now, we're barely there."

Streep's speech has come under fire from conservatives, for illustrating a "liberal bubble." Countering this charge, Matlin said that increased inclusivity on TV shows and movies can work to puncture a bubble that mostly excludes people with disabilities. "When you create a role for a character with disability, you get a potentially richer, more interesting story that accurately reflects the varied fabric of America," Matlin wrote.

A24; FX; Suzanne Tenner; The CW; Sony; Matthew Murphy; Amazon; STX

60 Days In

Seven law-abiding citizens volunteered to spend two months behind bars to help a frustrated sheriff fix his problematic prison, and every second was filmed for A&E’s hit docuseries. This is how they pulled it off. (By Jarett Wieselman)

A&E

American Crime

American Crime creator John Ridley and stars Felicity Huffman, Connor Jessup, and Joey Pollari told BuzzFeed News how socially responsible storytelling turned the ABC drama into the most daring TV show in years. (By Jarett Wieselman)

Ryan Green / ABC

American Idol

Since 2002, American Idol has discovered unknown talented singers and offered them the chance to achieve superstar status. While not everyone has reached the heights of Kelly Clarkson or Jennifer Hudson, many have left indelible marks on the hearts and ears of the viewers who did “Dial Idol” for them. Before the series finale, BuzzFeed News asked past contestants to reflect on how the show changed their lives. Within are their slightly edited responses. (By Jarett Wieselman)

Fox

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Half of human beings are women, but far fewer than half of protagonists in top-grossing films are female. However! A thought that has occurred to some Hollywood geniuses is, Women: Maybe we should put them in our films? And sometimes those films do well at the box office, if not better!

However, one funny *effect* is that, often, filmmakers and screenwriters will feature a woman in their movie but then have everything in her life almost exclusively revolve around men. In 2016, we’ve seen women who were driven to a bizarre degree by weird relationships with their boyfriends, their dads, a male deity, or — for one sad mom — her superhero son and his awful friends. It sometimes seems as if the imagination is only big enough to accommodate one central female character, and anything more (say, a relationship with her mom or a friendly female teapot) would be distracting, even unbelievable.

Without further ado, here are eight female characters from major motion pictures and the male characters who had an outsize impact on their behaviors and fates! (Major spoilers for movies and the logic of patriarchy.)

1. Aurora, Passengers

Release date: Dec. 21, 2016
Men who shape her fate: Her dad, her kidnapper-boyfriend
How they mess with her: Aurora's dad, who died when she was a teenager, was a writer, a war correspondent, a bold and sometimes reckless man of the world. Aurora, played by Jennifer Lawrence, spends her whole life trying to live up to his legacy, which is why she ends up on a spaceship headed to a space colony. It's on the spaceship that another man, Jim (Chris Pratt), sees her in hibernation and decides he wants to wake her up so they can have sex. Jim ruins everything Aurora had planned for her life, but she is ultimately okay with it.

Columbia Pictures

2. Jyn, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

Release date: Dec. 16, 2016
Men who shape her fate: Her dad, her adoptive dad
How they mess with her: Jyn (Felicity Jones) has a dad who has been building an incredibly dangerous weapon for the Galactic Empire, which — as we all know — is basically pure evil. Because of his work, he was abducted, Jyn's mom Lyra was murdered, and little Jyn was raised by a bonus father figure, with whom she also has issues! Jyn spends much of her energy and time confronting her complex relationship with each dad: First she gets into a big argument with her stand-in father, who raised her but then abandoned her when she was still a youth; then she tries to reunite with her biological father all the while trying to convince a bunch of people that he's not pure evil. Eventually, she dies — because she's developed principles, but also to finish what her father started.

Lucasfilm Ltd

3. Carol, Office Christmas Party

Release date: Dec. 9, 2016
Men who shape her fate: Her dad, her brother
How they mess with her: Carol (Jennifer Aniston) is a hardworking, competent executive who works at her late father's firm, but he always gave more attention to her brother, even though she's extremely smart and accomplished. As a result, Carol is a textbook resentful bitch. For some reason, her incompetent brother and his enabling co-worker are the heroes of this movie, and she's the antagonist for most of it. So the thing that makes her the antagonist is that she's good at her job? What will filmmakers think of next!

Glen Wilson / Paramount Pictures

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When Gina Rodriguez loved her body.

Looking at her cover of Women's Health, the actor wrote, "My curves are healthy and strong and I work hard to feel good in my skin, I work hard to combat the images that make me go inward and destroy my self acceptance/confidence. No longer will I allow those lies to win. Beauty belongs to everyone."

Rich Polk / Getty Images

When America Ferrera became a force for change.

At an awards show hosted by the Feminist Majority Foundation, the actor said, “The very first film I did, Real Women Have Curves, received a response from so many — not just women, not just Latinas — all kinds of people from around the world who saw themselves. And I realized what I already knew as a young person: the power of seeing ourselves, being shown ourselves, being shown our own potential as women, as human beings, as people of color, as people from disadvantaged backgrounds. … It was then that I went from wanting to be a famous, successful actress to wanting my work to matter.”

Nicholas Hunt / Getty Images Entertainment

When Jenny Beavan didn't do heels.

The costume designer showed up to the famously chichi Academy Awards to claim an Oscar for Mad Max wearing a fake leather jacket and boots. She said, "I really don’t do frocks, and I absolutely don’t do heels. I simply can’t wear them. ... I just like feeling comfortable. And I’m sorry, as far as I’m concerned, I’m really dressed up."

Jason Merritt / Getty Images

When Madonna called out sexism.

Speaking at the Billboard Women in Music Awards, the iconic performer addressed her radical career — and the misogyny she's faced: "There are no rules if you’re a boy. If you’re a girl, you have to play the game.

"What is that game? You are allowed to be pretty and cute and sexy, but don’t act too smart. Don’t have an opinion. Don’t have an opinion that is out of line with the status quo, at least. You are allowed to be objectified by men and dressed like a slut, but don’t own your sluttiness, and do not, I repeat, do not share your own sexual fantasies with the world. Be what men want you to be, but more importantly, be what women feel comfortable with you being around other men. And finally, do not age, because to age is a sin. You will be criticized, you will be vilified, and you will definitely not be played on the radio. …

"People say that I’m so controversial, but I think the most controversial thing I have ever done is to stick around. What I would like to say to all the women here today is this: Women have been so oppressed for so long, they believe what men have to say about them. And they believe they have to back a man to get the job done. ... As women, we have to start appreciating our own worth and each other’s worth. Seek out strong women to befriend, to align yourself with. To learn from. To be inspired by. To collaborate with. To support. To be enlightened by."

Angela Weiss / AFP / Getty Images

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Nikki Benz

Instagram: @nikkibenz

On Monday, porn actor Nikki Benz began tweeting about an alleged sexual assault during a scene for Brazzers, a Canada-based porn production company. By Wednesday, several other female performers had publicly reported similar experiences with Brazzers and the director, Tony T.

Benz's initial tweets on Monday called the scene in question "horrific." She continued, "I guess when I'm signing out and I tell you I'm not ok with the scene, you make me say I'm ok so I get paid." On Tuesday, she said, "It wasn't supposed to be a rape scene."

The details of her allegations were not completely clear from her tweets, and Benz, who is out of the country, did not immediately respond to BuzzFeed News' request for a comment on Wednesday. But she did tweet, "The director himself put his hands on me and was choking me." She said she called "cut" and explicitly said she was not okay with the scene they were shooting, but the shoot continued.

Brazzers posted a response on its website, emphasizing that "we do not produce content ourselves." The statement said the scene was "unscripted ... with the artistic direction left open to the producer’s discretion" and promised an investigation of the allegations. A representative for Brazzers' parent company, MindGeek, a heavyweight in the industry, didn't immediately respond to BuzzFeed News' request for a further comment. Tony T could not be reached.

On Tuesday night, porn actor and director Dana DeArmond tweeted that Tony T and two other Brazzers directors "have all pulled this same shit with me. I was told to keep quiet and reprimanded by my agent." She continued, "Brazzers directors cross the limits of female performers and bully them so they don't talk about it." Porn performer Gen Padova replied to Benz, tweeting, "I've worked with [Tony T] many years ago and have a very good idea what you dealt with." Porn actor and model Carter Cruise, apparently referring to Tony T, said, "That guy is psychotic." And porn actor Devon said, "Same thing happened to me." She added, "They only apologize to #certain girls, when Mr. T steps outta line." DeArmond, Cruise, Padova, and Devon did not immediately respond to requests for further comments.

DeArmond also tweeted that a male performer was instructed to punch her in the face on a Brazzers set because "I 'could take it because I worked at Kink'" — a BDSM and fetish-focused company in San Francisco. "Brazzers owns the porn industry," DeArmond wrote. "Women have no other choice than to accept the abuse or not feed their families."

Four TV characters who had abortions in 2016.

The CW, FXX, The CW, Netflix

Although abortion has long been considered something of a taboo on television, four shows debuted normalized, even humorous abortion plotlines in 2016, making it a landmark year for unwavering abortions. Notably, all of these episodes were written by women who work in gender-balanced comedy writers rooms. That’s particularly striking in a year when prominent male politicians weighed in on women’s reproductive health care — often loudly and inaccurately.

BoJack Horseman, Jane the Virgin, You’re the Worst, and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend all featured abortions that were not framed as tragic endings, but rather as hopeful beginnings. Women behind the shows all told BuzzFeed News that they wanted to portray a “different” type of abortion story — one where the female character knew exactly what she wanted and felt good about her decisions. These stories were told by women who could view abortion as a welcome option, not a burden. Two of the characters on the aforementioned shows didn’t even consult their male partners. On You’re the Worst, Lindsay (Kether Donohue) said with a shrug, “My body, my choice.”

It’s a clear break from the habitual equivocation around abortion on TV. Writers rooms tend to be liberal on many issues (see Orange Is the New Black for “the humanity of transgender people”); nonetheless, they’ve been remarkably skittish in the way they write about ending pregnancies. A mere two years ago, Mindy Project creator and star Mindy Kaling, whose show is literally about a female OB-GYN, told HuffPost Live that abortion “doesn’t strike me — and I don’t think this is controversial — as the funniest of areas.” In 2010, Fox declined to air an episode of Family Guy that dealt with ending a pregnancy. Television has erred on the side of "let’s keep the unplanned pregnancy": Recent examples include a 2006 episode of Scrubs that focused on the male protagonist J.D.’s (Zach Braff) feelings about what he calls the most difficult decision of his life (they decide to have a baby), and even Miranda Hobbes (Cynthia Nixon) on Sex and the City had a change of heart in the abortion clinic in 2001.

FXX

But in November 2015, Scandal set a new standard when its protagonist Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) had a drama-free abortion. Showrunner Shonda Rhimes saw abortion as a simple fact of life: “A woman made a choice about her body that she legally has the right to make,” she told an audience during a panel discussion in March. The dramatic series offered a preview of the equanimity to come.

In July, BoJack Horseman led the way for comedies with Diane Nguyen (Alison Brie) quickly and confidently deciding to terminate her accidental pregnancy in the cold open of “Brrap Brrap Pew Pew.” In October, Jane the Virgin saw Xo (Andrea Navedo) worry that her Catholic mother would judge her for ending a pregnancy she didn’t want; Xo stands by her decision anyway. In November, You’re the Worst showed Lindsay finally nixing her very-bad-idea pregnancy, which allowed her to strike out on her own. And later that month, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend’s Paula (Donna Lynne Champlin) decides an unintended pregnancy shouldn’t derail her law school plans. Xo and Paula already have children and want to forge ahead without a baby; Diane and Lindsay have no children and want to keep it that way.

These characters are not making a difficult personal decision — a common way to characterize abortion that can undermine women’s ability to make the choice without interference. Rather, Xo, Paula, Diane, and Lindsay are making clear-cut personal decisions with eyes trained on their futures. And as more women rise to positions of power in television, more female characters are seeking abortion with certainty — and without histrionics. Writers on the series intentionally tried to tell normalized stories about abortion that had been underrepresented in pop culture.

Paula (Donna Lynne Champlin) resting after her abortion on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.

The CW

Aline Brosh McKenna, the showrunner and co-creator of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, said Paula’s abortion was “best for her happiness” and called her dilemma relatable. “Paula’s closer to my age, and I know a lot of women who have gone through this,” she said. Jane the Virgin showrunner Jennie Snyder Urman wrote in an email that guilt-inducing abortions are not “the only story that should be told.” Alison Bennett, who wrote the You’re the Worst episode in which Lindsay gets an abortion, said in an interview, “It’s specifically important to the female writers of the show that it’s done in a way where it’s almost casual, and not this big dramatic decision that could potentially ruin people’s lives.” And Joanna Calo, who wrote the abortion episode of BoJack Horseman, hoped her work would speak directly to women in abortion-hostile situations. “I love the idea that someone who is going through something like this — thinking about getting an abortion in a town where it’s hard to get, or not accepted, or in a family where that’s not something they’re supposed to talk about — that it might make them realize that there are other people that feel differently,” she said.

On BoJack in particular, telling Diane’s story meant “saying the word ‘abortion’ out loud a lot, and walking her through the procedure,” said Calo. There is a long history of tiptoeing around the topic: A 1991 episode of Murphy Brown about a pregnancy dilemma discussed abortion without naming it; the show’s creator told the New York Times at the time that the word itself was too “inflammatory,” and she wanted the show to speak to everyone. (The character did not get an abortion in the end.) Now, You’re the Worst calls them “abobos” — and the abortion plotline speaks directly to women.

The dour aversion that has long been tied to abortion also exists in the political sphere. In October 2016, then–Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump displayed a grave misunderstanding of late-term abortion but nonetheless expressed horror at what he imagined it might be. “In the ninth month, you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother,” Trump incorrectly said, raising his eyelids in shock. Female TV writers resisted this national resurgence of ignorant revulsion: Where Trump saw unfathomable darkness, the writers saw something they recognized. McKenna, whose Crazy Ex-Girlfriend writers room has more women than men, noted, “Somebody said that our show was the most gynecologically in-depth TV series.”

Diane (Alison Brie) and her husband at the Planned Parrothood clinic on BoJack Horseman.

Netflix

For these writers, their work is part of the opposition to politicians who want to limit — or eliminate — women’s right to choose abortion. “The rhetoric, especially now, especially in that third debate, was so horrific, divisive, inflammatory, and false — that I feel like it’s absolutely the right time to counterbalance that hate and fear,” Urman wrote in October. Bennett said, “There’s been such a backlash against abortion,” referencing in particular Trump’s vice president-elect, Mike Pence, who has a legislative track record of restricting decisions women can make about the contents of their uteruses.

“I think that once a woman’s fundamental right to choose gets threatened, artistically, people are interested in addressing that,” Bennett added. “For joke weirdos like ourselves, we’re gonna do it in a comedic way.”

The increasingly uncompromising depiction of bodily autonomy on TV spawned sputtering responses from conservatives online: One right-wing site said BoJack “grotesquely and callously advocates for unapologetic abortion on-demand while bashing pro-lifers.” Another criticized Jane the Virgin for Xo's lack of remorse: “Any larger hurt — any guilt or fear or regret — associated with that decision was swept under the rug, in the name of tolerance, acceptance, and ‘choice.’” The conservative Media Research Center’s blog took issue with Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, saying the show was “working the subject into casual conversation like it is nothing unusual at all.” Which is true. The Guttmacher Institute found in 2008 that one in three women would have an abortion, so abortion is nothing unusual at all. More than anything else, the hand-wringing is over the absence of hand-wringing for these characters. “What morally truncated human beings,” a mystified LifeNews writer wrote, referring to Lindsay’s abortion on You’re the Worst and those who praised the depiction. The writer summed up Lindsay’s decision sadly: “And she felt fine about it.”

That's correct — Lindsay, Xo, Paula, and Diane all felt fine about getting abortions, because women controlled the narrative. And there was no room for moral panic.

With additional reporting by Alanna Bennett.

LINK: Inside The Radical Abortion Episode On “BoJack Horseman”

LINK: “Jane The Virgin” Has Finally Portrayed An Abortion

The Muppets Take Manhattan

"Together again. Gee, it’s good to be together again."

Those are the first words said — or rather, sung — in The Muppets Take Manhattan, and they capture the heartwarming spirit of inclusion that permeates the best Muppet film ever made. As Kermit, Miss Piggy, and their deeply diverse cavalcade of friends attempt to put on a Broadway musical, the film examines the hardships endured by those down on their luck, the power of positive thinking, and the ties that bind us together.

By the time the movie reaches its emotional conclusion and Kermit declares their Broadway musical needs "more frogs and dogs and bears and chickens," you'll have spent 90 minutes watching a joyous celebration of love, unity, and the fact that we're always stronger together. —Jarett Wieselman

TriStar Pictures

Keeping Up With the Kardashians

I've been rewatching all of Keeping Up With the Kardashians for the past few months, in order from the beginning. That means the spinoffs too, all of which are on Hulu except for the two seasons of Khloe & Lamar, which I had to buy on Amazon. (Maybe Hulu was like, No, this one is too depressing in retrospect, we will spare you all.)

It's not a walk in a sunny park, these shows with this family, especially watching all at once now. There are divorces and deaths and substance abuse spirals and mental unravelings: What happens to Rob Kardashian is slow and confusing, and still not over in 2016; Lamar Odom's downfall, handled tastefully throughout, is terribly sad and also obscured by dimmed privacy concerns. Only Scott Disick, Kourtney Kardashian's erstwhile partner and the father of her children, is transparent in his messiness. And there is the strange experience of watching Caitlyn Jenner evolve into whom she was always meant to be, with a journey that included anti-gay panic when Kris hired a gay man in Season 2 to give Caitlyn a clothes makeover, as well as all of the struggles over growing her hair out, which she has since said was a painful symbol of her hidden desires.

But there is a compelling reason to watch this show, especially at the dawn of the age of Trump. I would never compare Donald Trump to the Kardashians — because I like them. Yet there is a lesson to learn about reality television fame and its currency in our culture now that we have a president who has never held office or served the public good, and is known only through the machinations of the publicity cycle. The way CNN showed Trump's unfiltered, un-fact-checked speeches before they finally realized he wasn't a joke is a luxury the Kardashians are never afforded. Being a womanly brand led by a matriarch, they have been questioned and bullied at every turn; even after Kim Kardashian was robbed at gunpoint, which has yet to play out on the show, the media's primary stance was to mock her and doubt the story. (Morning Joe on MSNBC, which gave Trump free publicity for months, was openly laughing/sneering after the robbery — ugliness that characterizes the reaction to the Kardashians.)

We develop affiliations with reality stars. The first episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians was in fall 2007, when George W. Bush was still president. It's shocking that today that seems like an innocent, more gentle time. But I'm glad to have spent these many hours with a supportive family that chooses to take on politics as a central part of its identity. Raising awareness about the Armenian genocide, racism and Black Lives Matter, and the rise of trans civil rights has played out on the show and in the sisters' ancillary outlets on social media. If the lesson learned from this election is that celebrity is toxic and that more people hate women and people of color than we ever could have imagined, the Kardashians offer an antidote to the notion that reality television is pestilential. It can also be instructional, and a fascinating view of these changing, troubling times. —Kate Aurthur

E! Entertainment Television

Spirited Away

I love everything about Spirited Away. I love the spongy, incomparable dream logic of the story, which begins with 10-year-old Chihiro’s parents transforming into pigs after eating too much nonhuman food, then introduces us to an otherworld of magical bathhouses and giant babies and vacationing river spirits scheduling a spa day to rinse away pollution. I love the beauty of it, the bright colors and haunting character designs that swirl cuteness with eeriness. I love the totally weird and yet irresistibly romantic connection between Chihiro and the helpful dragon Haku.

Most of all, though, I love that Chihiro, whose name gets taken away from her and replaced with "Sen" when she settles into a new life as a spirit realm employee, isn't some chosen one and doesn't become the instant center of the mythical world into which she's stumbled. The spirit world in Spirited Away wasn't created or waiting for her. She's a visitor there, one who is, at first, bewildered and alarmed by the strangeness of everything she's seeing, but remains open to learning about it. She doesn't have special powers, just tenacity and bravery, and it is with those qualities that she saves her mom, her dad, and the day.

Rather than fight the monsters she encounters, Sen bargains with, chastises, befriends, or changes them. Even the worker-gobbling being named No-Face, at first the film's most frightening creation, ends up turning into a lovable, apologetic companion. After months of political rhetoric stoking fears of otherness, it's beyond soothing to settle into a movie that's all about the value of trying to understand people — or spirits — who may not be exactly like you. —Alison Willmore

Gkids

MasterChef Junior

First, there is nothing more comforting to me than food during times of distress. And second, there is nothing more inspiring than watching children as young as 8 display the kind of genuine good sportsmanship and sincere kindness I wish more adults would exhibit. They help each other when a competitor's dough fails to rise as the clock winds down, they cheer for each other in team relay challenges, and they comfort each other when they're eliminated and forced to hang up their aprons. Someday, kids like the ones on MasterChef Junior, from a wide range of states and backgrounds, will feed and rule the world…and that gives me hope. —Jaimie Etkin

Greg Gayne / Fox

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Donald Trump speaking at the Southeastern Livestock Pavillion in Ocala, Florida.

Gerardo Mora / Getty Images

OCALA, Florida — Gathered under the glare of a central Florida sun on Wednesday, Donald Trump supporters said they were ready to weather yet more allegations that the Republican businessman behaved inappropriately around women.

And later in the evening they would, after the New York Times and the Palm Beach Post published accounts of at least three more women who accused Trump of making unwanted sexual advances.

Earlier on Wednesday, BuzzFeed News published an account of four former contestants in the 1997 Miss Teen USA pageant who said Trump walked into the dressing room while girls between the ages of 14 and 19 were changing.

“I remember putting on my dress really quick because I was like, ‘Oh my god, there’s a man in here,’” Mariah Billado, the former Miss Vermont Teen USA, told BuzzFeed News.

In about dozen interviews, women supporting Trump, many of them mothers, seemed unfazed as they waited to enter the rally and the Teen USA accounts reverberated through the media cycle.

“Frankly, I think that was years ago. It didn’t kill anybody,” said Gay Light of Oxford, Florida. She echoed the sentiment of many here that the statute of limitations to be outraged by Trump's barging in had passed.

Gay Light and two friends, Rick and Rosemary Stagg, on their way back to their car after the rally.

BuzzFeed News / Dino Grandoni

“They should have done something back then,” said Mary Holt, stopping for a moment while waving an oversized “TRUMP PENCE” flag to talk. “Now that he’s wanting to be the president, all the dirty news comes out."

Mary Holt pausing to pose for a picture.

Dino Grandoni / BuzzFeed News

Other supporters trotted out a retort used by Trump himself in the most recent presidential debate: that his behavior pales in comparison to the infidelities and alleged sexual assaults of Hillary Clinton’s husband.

“He didn’t rape them, right?” Celeste Lovett said. “Well, Bill Clinton actually raped people.” She was referring to Juanita Broaddrick, who for decades has claimed that Bill Clinton raped her in 1978.

“It’s no different than the Secret Service walking in on a president with a woman on his desk,” Light said, perhaps referring to an ex-Secret Service officer who claimed to have discovered Bill Clinton “making out on the Map Room table” with the daughter of former Vice President Walter Mondale.

At a rally in Lakeland later that afternoon, seven women likewise echoed the campaign's pivot to the Clintons, with some going even further. Trump supporter Debora Johnson defended the candidate against the former pageant contestants' allegations, saying "a lot of rich men, they would do that."

Glenda Starn suggested it was the teenagers' fault: "They want their name in the news, they want the glory of it. That’s my opinion. So give ’em the glory."

In Ocala, one supporter named Connie who declined to give her last name, echoed some Teen USA contestants that BuzzFeed interviewed who doubted Trump could have entered the dressing room.

“It’s not that I don’t believe the story,” Connie said. “But these are pageants with a lot of people going back and forth.”

Others, again echoing Trump, simply dismissed the story outright because they no longer trusted mainstream media, which they see as being in cahoots with the Clinton campaign.

“There’s just so much slander out there that Hillary’s been spreading on Trump,” Cindy Fox said over the loudspeakers at the rally. “You don’t know if half of that is true.”

Cindy Fox cheering as Trump entered the arena.

Dino Grandoni / BuzzFeed News

Lovett and her friend, Margaret Vafides, were suspicious of why the Washington Post published a video, which showed Trump saying he can grab women "by the pussy" without consent because he is famous, two days before a presidential debate.

"The media’s attempt at throwing up stories to take the attention away from the real issues is a disservice to the American people," Vafides said, referring to the Washington Post and BuzzFeed News stories.

Barbara Hamilton, another Trump supporter, conceded the Teen USA story gave her pause about the candidate.

“I might look at him a little differently,” Hamilton said, if the story were true. “They should make sure that he’s got security around him around women.”

Barbara Hamilton resting outside the rally entrance.

Dino Grandoni / Buzzfeed News

Hamilton added that she wouldn’t let a female family member compete in a pageant where older men are allowed in the dressing room. But that doesn’t change her vote.

“I just do not like Hillary at all,” she said. “Like Trump has said, she’s been in office for 30 years and she’s very corrupt.”

The crowd in Ocala on Wednesday.

Gerardo Mora / Getty Images

Holt, the flag-waving Trump diehard, said that she wouldn’t let her 17-year-old daughter participate in such a pageant, either. She added that she might change the way she felt about Trump if she spoke with a former beauty queen in person.

“I think he probably did it,” Holt said. “But we have a choice: We have Hillary or him. I vote him.”

LINK: More Women Say Donald Trump Touched Them Inappropriately

LINK: Teen Beauty Queens Say Trump Walked In On Them Changing

When Jeb Bush himself was in the opening sketch.

The former Republican presidential candidate played an Uber driver in the bit that opened the Emmys ceremony, advising the evening's host, Jimmy Kimmel, on being a nominee. "If you run a positive campaign, the voters ultimately will make the right choice," Bush joked with Kimmel. Bush was contrasting his own Republican primary campaign with Trump's ongoing campaign.

ABC

When Kimmel blamed producer Mark Burnett for Trump's rise.

The comedian said that if it weren't for reality television, Trump would currently be "rubbing up against his wife, Malaria, while she pretended to be asleep," mispronouncing Melania, Trump's wife's name. Burnett was the creator of The Apprentice and The Celebrity Apprentice, two reality TV series that starred the bombastic Republican presidential candidate. "Thanks to Mark Burnett, we don't have to watch reality shows anymore," Kimmel said. "We're living in one."

Valerie Macon / AFP / Getty Images

When Kate McKinnon thanked Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in her speech.

Twice! McKinnon won Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy for Saturday Night Live. Clinton is among McKinnon's best-known impressions on SNL.

Kevin Winter / Getty Images

When Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy winner Julia Louis-Dreyfus used her acceptance speech as an "opportunity to personally apologize for the current political climate."

"I think that Veep has torn down the wall between comedy and politics. Our show started out as a political satire, but it now feels more like a sobering documentary. So I certainly do promise to rebuild that wall and make Mexico pay for it."

At the end, Louis-Dreyfus was referencing Trump's campaign promise to build a giant wall on the US–Mexico border and to demand that Mexico pay for it. (Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto said he explicitly told Trump that Mexico will do no such thing.)

Kevin Winter / Getty Images

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This moment between Emilia Clarke and Matt LeBlanc on the Emmys red carpet began innocently enough: They traded inanities about who was the bigger fan of whom.

Clarke, who is nominated for an Emmy for her leading role on Game of Thrones, was very gracious.

E!

Then, E! cut to LeBlanc and host Jason Kennedy, who asked him whether he was a "big fan of Game of Thrones."

E!

"Yeah, I saw the first season, and I kind of fell out of touch with it," LeBlanc said. "I guess that's when she started getting naked, so I need to catch up."

E!

He laughed...

E!

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Nate Parker accepts the Audience Award for The Birth of a Nation at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival on January 30, 2016 in Park City, Utah.

Andrew Toth / Getty Images

In the furious bidding war that immediately followed the premiere of The Birth of a Nation at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival in January, it is likely that no one thought to investigate the background of the acclaimed film's director and star Nate Parker, sources have told BuzzFeed News.

The reemergence of a 1999 rape charge against Parker and the film's co-writer Jean Celestin from their days at Penn State University — initiated by an interview Parker gave to Deadline on Aug. 12 — have resulted in a flurry of news stories about the case, which may damage audiences' perception of the film months before it opens in theaters. Fox Searchlight acquired the movie for $17.5 million at Sundance, a record-breaking deal for the festival, and yet its executives reportedly did not know about the allegations against Parker and Celestin until after the deal was completed.

At Sundance, films from unknown and untested filmmakers routinely become overnight sensations. According to multiple sources, it would be unusual for distribution companies hoping to acquire the hottest film at the fest to consider the personal past of up-and-comers like first-time director Parker.

"They showed the movie in the afternoon and at night everyone was in the guy's condo trying to get the movie,” an executive with knowledge of the bidding for The Birth of a Nation told BuzzFeed News on Wednesday. Netflix, Paramount, Sony, Entertainment Studios, and the Weinstein Company all reportedly vied to pick up The Birth of a Nation after its Jan. 25 bow. According to the source, stepping away from a heated acquisition negotiation in order to investigate Parker’s background would not have been at the top of anyone’s mind. "I can't even imagine that someone would have thought about doing something like that,” said the exec.

Reps for Fox Searchlight declined to comment for this story beyond the statement released on Friday: "Fox Searchlight is aware of the incident that occurred while Nate Parker was at Penn State. We also know that he was found innocent and cleared of all charges. We stand behind Nate and are proud to help bring this important and powerful story to the screen."

A second source at an independent film company said that he also did not know about the rape allegations leveled against Parker prior to The Birth of a Nation’s Sundance premiere, but he was aware of "negative light" surrounding the actor "through some of his comments about the gay community,” which he referred to a “red flag.” It wouldn’t necessarily have mattered even if executives had known about the allegations, the source said, especially considering that Parker was found not guilty.

“When you've got 12 hours from the [opening] of that film to get that movie, and there's a bunch of other people trying to get their movie and are willing to throw in things that are going to make their offers more attractive — whether that's more money, an increased commitment to a release, an awards campaign — it's certainly possible that people will be, like, 'Well, I don't care what you've done in the past, we'll release it,’" the source said.

“It’s incumbent upon all of us in the industry to do more detailed checking.”

That attitude, however, may be changing. “If we're involved in a high stakes negotiation involving tens of millions of dollars and I was aware of [Parker’s] past, it would affect me,” said a top executive from a rival independent film company. Unlike Fox Searchlight — which is owned by 21st Century Fox — most independent film companies are not under the umbrella of a multi-national corporation and cannot absorb the financial failure of a film purchased for as much as Searchlight spent to acquire The Birth of a Nation. “If you misstep on a big bet like that, it can be devastating,” the exec continued.

While Fox Searchlight is reportedly still moving forward with its promotional campaign for the film, the allegations against Parker and Celestin have almost certainly made some kind of impact on the film’s commercial potential when it opens nationwide on Oct. 7. That impact could sway film companies to vet the filmmakers and actors in indie movies more closely prior to spending millions to buy them.

“It's incumbent upon all of us in the industry to do more detailed checking,” said the top exec. “It's not like we're going to be conducting FBI background checks at 3 in the morning while we're bidding against somebody for a movie. But the stakes are very high, and the dangers are real, and this is really serious stuff.”

Another executive, however, wasn't so sure that the fallout from Parker and Celestin’s past could change bidding practices in the future, saying, "Ask me on Oct. 8."

Here’s What You Need To Know About The Rape Accusations Against Nate Parker

Des Willie / The Ink Factory / AMC

From the first installment of AMC’s six-episode spy caper The Night Manager, Angela Burr (Olivia Colman), a British intelligence operative, has been pregnant and working. Men around her are occasionally paternalistic, and she checks them immediately. The show never dwells on her pregnant status, it’s just a fact.

The insignificance of her pregnancy — which was written into the show to accommodate Colman’s real-life pregnancy — is quietly groundbreaking.

Stereotypes tell us that a pregnancy makes a woman fragile, and the growing fetus must take precedence over every other aspect of her life; Colman’s Angela doesn’t give a shit about the stereotypes. The audience first meets the character pre-pregnancy. She’s “headstrong” and a swift, urgent worker who’s hell-bent on taking down illegal arms dealer Richard Roper (Hugh Laurie). After a time jump in the first episode, Angela is quite visibly pregnant. And it’s beside the point. She still simply wants to nail a criminal to the wall.

Bucking the pop culture image of a dainty, expectant woman who has to focus on nesting, she keeps at her life’s work, pregnancy notwithstanding. In the second episode, her old CIA friend Joel (David Harewood) appears surprised that she never mentioned the pregnancy to him. She shrugs it off — she never mentioned it, it seems, because she feels she has more noteworthy things going on. As she tells her operative Jonathan Pine (Tom Hiddleston), “I’ve spent 10 years of my life” going after Richard Roper. A little bun in the oven is not going to slow her down.

The series is remarkably equitable in its treatment of Angela. She’s presented as sexually desirable — Joel makes it clear he's attracted to her. When she’s questioned about the amount of time she’s devoting to work, she says that her husband defers to her judgment on an appropriate schedule during a pregnancy (she is, after all, the one who’s pregnant). When Joel patronizes her — “When was the last time you got some rest? Why don’t you go home, get some sleep?” — she pulls away from him, making sure he sees she’s offended.

After her enforcement agency is technically shut down, a co-worker tells her, “Go home, Angela. Have your baby. Be a teacher’s wife.” Her indirect response is to double down on her crusade, at one point referring to her pregnancy as a “perfect cover.” Shortly thereafter, as she’s trapped, hiding in a bathroom and fearing for her life, she touches her belly in a way that suggests she is also afraid for her unborn child’s life. But, despite the flash of concern for the baby, she continues to place herself in harm’s way in pursuit of her bigger goal: She ably shoots a man in the leg to save another woman, and she waits to ambush Roper. Her momentary maternal flinch doesn’t preclude her last act in the miniseries from veering sharply away from the motherly ideal: When Roper is finally caught, she does nothing to prevent him from being assaulted by his disgruntled associates. “He deserves it,” she says with a cruel smile.

Through a decade of unwavering persistence, Angela Burr successfully coordinates the toppling of an arms dealer, and she happens to do it while she’s pregnant. Much like in real life, she is not magically transformed by the experience of carrying a child — on the contrary, she remains as focused on her objectives as ever. Her own existence trumps the unborn baby’s, again and again. She is not subsumed by pregnancy, and she rejects all attempts by others to determine what is right for her and her baby. The world may tell her that pregnant people should be more careful, but all Angela heard them say was mother knows best.

Mitch Jenkins / BBC / The Ink Factory / Mitch Jenkins

When Ava DuVernay fielded a question about mansplaining during a panel on Saturday, she said she still gets dismissed or treated differently because of her race and her gender.

DuVernay at the 2015 Sundance Institute Celebration Benefit on June 2, 2015 in Culver City, California.

"It's every day," said the director of 2014's Selma and the upcoming OWN series Queen Sugar. "I think that's the case for so many of us."

Jason Merritt / Getty Images

But, at Radiant J Productions' Cinefemales festival in Santa Monica, California on Saturday, the acclaimed filmmaker had some straightforward advice for dealing with mansplaining: "If you want to see this person again, you have to, as we say, check them."

DuVernay at the Selma press conference during the 65th Berlin International Film Festival on February 10, 2015 in Berlin, Germany.

Pascal Le Segretain / Getty Images

Take pity on mansplainers.

DuVernay during The Fast Company Innovation Festival in November 2015 in New York City.

"You find that a lot of times it's coming from a place of ignorance more than arrogance," DuVernay told the audience. "So many men have been trained to do that, so I have empathy for that as well. That determines the severity of the check."

Brad Barket / Getty Images for Fast Company

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Lena Waithe at the Netflix panel May 14.

Eric Charbonneau/Netflix

A dozen women who work in front of the camera and behind the scenes on various series for Netflix discussed their work during the Rebels and Rule Breakers Luncheon in Beverly Hills on Saturday. It was there that Lena Waithe revealed that playing Denise on Master of None has yielded a few perks — including adoring direct messages on social networks from strangers.

Waithe, whose work on Aziz Ansari's show made her the stuff of thousands of gay lady dreams, was asked by the panel moderator how her newfound fame has affected her. "Talent definitely gets you better hotel rooms, the checks are nicer," the self-described "soft stud" said. "Followers on Instagram, definitely a lot of Caucasian straight women in the DMs." She added, "I can't go into a Trader Joe's or any place where there's more than one hipster."

Co-sponsored by Women in Film and SAG-AFTRA and moderated by New York Magazine/Vulture Hollywood editor Stacey Wilson Hunt, the Netflix event featured Jessica Jones' Krysten Ritter, Chelsea's Chelsea Handler, Laura Prepon of Orange Is the New Black, and Marta Kauffman, the co-creator of Friends and Grace and Frankie, among others.

Waithe has been celebrated by the queer female community for the authenticity of her character, who was originally written as a straight white woman; she previously told AfterEllen she would sometimes suggest changes to Denise for the sake of that honesty, particularly because there were no lesbian writers on the show.

Later in the panel, Waithe advised women against being polite: "Especially with women, when people tell you to be polite, you are easily taken advantage of. You are often ignored and silenced. I think for me, I always would rather be someone that people remember as a person that stood her ground and demanded someone's respect, rather than someone walk away and say, 'Oh, she was always polite.'"

Netflix / Via afterellen.com

America Ferrera at the 11th Annual Global Women's Rights Awards at the Directors Guild of America.

Alberto E. Rodriguez / Getty Images

America Ferrera was one of four women to win the Feminist Majority Foundation's Eleanor Roosevelt Award for Global Women's Rights on Monday night in Los Angeles. During her acceptance speech, the actor-producer made a point of thanking a woman she looked up to, one of the women to introduce the Ugly Betty and Superstore star.

"It makes it all the more surreal to be awarded this by one of the only role models I had growing up who looked like me, Dolores Huerta,” Ferrera said, facing the iconic civil rights activist and United Farm Workers co-founder onstage at the Director’s Guild of America headquarters. “To grow up a tiny Latina in California with an outsize dream that nobody really saw as possible for me — to open my textbook and to see you was so incredibly impacting in ways that you will never know."

Because of her activism and her high profile as a Latina role model, Ferrera was honored at the May 9 ceremony along with executive director of U.N. Women and U.N. Under-Secretary Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka; actor-producer and abortion rights activist Amy Brenneman; and recently elected Flint Mayor Karen Weaver. Each recipient explained feminist activism from their varying perspectives. Lakshmi Puri, who accepted the award on behalf of Mlambo-Ngcuka, discussed global movements on equal pay for equal work, women's unpaid care burden, and the fight against child marriage, among other issues. Brenneman spoke on her public disclosure of an abortion she does not regret, and her continued involvement in the fight to keep the procedure safe and accessible in the U.S. Weaver has been reckoning with the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, caused by gross mismanagement that she later in the evening implied was criminal.

Ferrera, who produces NBC's Superstore in addition to starring in it, focused her acceptance speech on role models.

The very first film I did, Real Women Have Curves, received a response from so many — not just women, not just Latinas, all kinds of people from around the world who saw themselves. And I realized what I already knew as a young person, the power of seeing ourselves, being shown ourselves, being shown our own potential as women, as human beings, as people of color, as people from disadvantaged backgrounds. It was life-changing, to know that what I love to do and the talent that I had so desperately wanted to express had the potential to be a tool. A tool for helping other people find their voices. It was then that I went from wanting to be a famous, successful actress to wanting my work to matter. ... It's not easy out there for most of us who don't look like the one thing you are supposed to look like in this industry. To find roles that honor our intelligence and our humanity and our passion, and our real-life roles. When you find them, it really is a gift, and when you find people who are willing to also dedicate their time and their lives and their careers to creating those types of images, not just for us, but for our children, it's such a gift to know them and to work with them. ... I was moderating a conversation once among young women, and there was something that a young girl said that has really stayed with me. She stood up and she asked one of our panelists — she was in junior high — and she said, "I was on the chess team. I was really good. But I was the only girl on the chess team, and it felt hard to be there, so I quit." And I haven't been able to shake that. Because if we can't get our young girls to stay in the room for the chess team, how are we gonna get them to stay in the room to be leaders in business, leaders in politics, leaders in medicine, leaders in science? We have a really big job to do, and part of that is creating role models. Creating people that our young women and young men can look up to and say, "I can be that."

During a panel discussion later in the evening, apparent Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump was discussed in terms of presenting children poor role models. "We have young children coming home from school; kindergarteners, coming home from school being told by their fellow kindergarteners, 'My mom says that when Donald Trump becomes president, he's gonna deport you and your family,'" Ferrera said. "It's not happening in a vacuum. We are teaching a young generation what it means to be American."

Ferrera, who is a celebrity spokesperson for voter mobilization nonprofit Voto Latino, also addressed DREAMers (undocumented people who came to the U.S. as minors) in the forthcoming national election. The Obama administration's policy of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) allows DREAMers to apply for a renewable work permit and exemption from deportation. Ferrera notes that in the fight for policies to help DREAMers and their families, many have come forward and publicly identified as undocumented and, thus, there is an enormous amount at stake if the policies don't survive in the next administration: "These young people now have given the government their names, their addresses, and fear retaliation. And so we have to do our best to make sure that that is not the case. ... Someone asked me outside, on the step and repeat, 'Does this frighten you? Everything that's happening, does it frighten you?' More than anything, it saddens me. I was born and raised to be so grateful that I lived in a country where my ideas meant that I belonged, and what we're seeing now is that we're being told that's not the case, that no matter how much you want to be American, no matter how hard you want to work, no matter how much you have to contribute, the color of your skin, where you were born, the language you speak make you undesirable."

"When you talk about the immigration issue, immigration is a feminist issue as well, and we need to start thinking about it as such," she said.

Greg Berlanti at the AWD Awards at The Paley Center for Media.

Matt Winkelmeyer / Getty Images / Via Michael Bulbenko / Alliance of Women Directors

Arrow co-creator Greg Berlanti was honored at the Alliance of Women Directors Awards and Benefit on Friday in Beverly Hills, and he implicitly called on men to do more to increase the number of female directors working in television.

Berlanti was honored for his track record of hiring women to direct his shows; he currently has six on the air — Arrow, The Flash, The Mysteries of Laura, Blindspot, Supergirl, and D.C.'s Legends of Tomorrow. The other AWD honorees — Empire showrunner Ilene Chaiken, film director Jen McGowan, and Chiara Tilesi and Albert Berger of the film production company We Do It Together — were mostly women, but the clear message of the evening was that women need more men to step up.

Berlanti said that after three years of conscious improvement, half of the upcoming season of Arrow will be directed by women and people of color, and he noted that his other shows are "not very far behind." He said the reason it took several years to improve directing gender and race parity on Arrow is that networks and studios usually have "a catch-22": Directors must have worked on similar shows to get approved. In his speech, he asked, "If women were getting less opportunities, how were they ever supposed to get the opportunities that would get them approved?"

Berlanti, who was a writer and executive producer on the ABC drama Brothers & Sisters, took it upon himself to create those opportunities. "With Brothers & Sisters, the show was successful enough, and the main leads were mostly women, so myself and the other producers were able to begin to make the case to hire more and more female directors," he said. Berlanti was inspired by all the women who had helped him in his career, including "many, many, many female television executives at Warner Brothers, all of whom were hired by Peter Roth, ... who helped me craft these shows through the years."

Berlanti said that directors lists seem as if they're "from a different era" because they're "all white dudes." "I'm a white dude — it's not like I have a big problem with white dudes, but it just seemed really odd to me," he noted. Earlier in the evening, he told BuzzFeed News that other male producers "probably think, Is this my burden? Should I worry about this? And it kind of is. It is your burden. You'll learn that it actually ends up making the show better, and it's really smart business."

And, as McGowan had said earlier while accepting her AWD Breakout Award, "If you are not personally contributing to the solution, you are part of the problem."

Anna Serner

Marie-Therese Karlberg / Via filminstitutet.se

Anna Serner, CEO of the Swedish Film Institute, began insisting shortly after her appointment in 2011 that the SFI reach some serious gender parity goals with the films it decides to fund. With the support and cooperation of the commissioners who work for her, today there is now a near-even split among male and female directors, screenwriters, and producers whose projects are backed by the Stockholm-based group.

On April 25, Serner was on hand to deliver a lecture to an audience of mostly New York Film Academy students in Burbank, California, during which she tore apart the excuses for gender inequality used by executives in both the Swedish film industry and Hollywood. Her castigations seemed all too relevant: Just last week, TheWrap reported that Fox and Paramount have not hired a single woman to direct their respective slates of more than 20 upcoming movies.

“Male and female producers come to me, and they say, 'You know, Anna, it's only young men coming up showing [me] their portfolios,'” Serner said. “And it's like, Yeah, that's probably true. But if you want the best films, you should probably start looking for the women and not be so lazy, sitting and waiting for them, because otherwise, you won't get the best ones. Because otherwise, you will just have to get the ones [that know to show up], and that's not good enough.

“Then the producer gets really mad with me, actually. But that's the truth.”

Sweden produces far fewer films than the U.S.: Though SFI, a government-affiliated organization, is a significant source of financing, it greenlights only about 15 narrative films per year. But, like in the U.S., Swedish financial gatekeepers have also deflected responsibility for gender gaps in hiring. She said after the SFI announced in 2012 it was aggressively seeking female filmmakers, the qualified female filmmakers whom producers had previously said they could not locate began to materialize: “Suddenly, the producers and production companies found a lot of women.”

Part of the gender disparity problem, she said, is that women are discouraged from pursuing bigger creative roles starting in film school. Until they were specifically summoned, many filmmakers hadn’t considered that they could get funding. Additionally, producers who were previously inclined to put more trust in male directors began to work with female directors in the wake of SFI’s public appeal.

The institute doesn’t have a male or female quota, Serner said — individual commissioners decide which projects they like and then make the case for why those projects should receive funding. There aren’t separate male and female wallets at SFI, as it were; rather, the institute measures its gender ratio every month, and constantly keeps the targets in mind when making evaluations for new projects, maintaining a continuous vigil for unconscious bias.

“What [the SFI commissioners] do is that they usually come and are in love with a male project. … And they say, 'Oh, this is a fantastic project,” Serner said. “And then when you start digging into it, you realize it's usually not that fantastic. Usually no film project is that fantastic. ... So you start digging into that, and you realize [that] the male projects are usually not that good, and then you dig into the female projects the same way, and you realize they are not usually that bad. They actually start to become interesting.”

Combined, the public query for more film works by women, an increased scrutiny of all project proposals, and accountability found in the monthly data crunch have worked to achieve parity for SFI’s slate of films, she said.

In fact, SFI-backed female filmmakers have found remarkable success at the top film festivals, including winning two Crystal Bears at the prestigious Berlinale this year. Serner said, “When you look at this, you can say, 'Do we have maybe a problem with competence with male directors?'”

Brennan (Emily Deschanel) and Booth (David Boreanaz).

Patrick McElhenney / FOX

In this week’s muddled episode of Bones, forensic anthropologist Brennan (Emily Deschanel) and her team investigate the murder of the male founder of men’s rights group Men Now. Although the series centers on a female murder-solving scientific genius, the feminists the victim feuded with are presented in the episode as more frightening and violent than the men’s rights activists themselves, despite one male activist advocating rape in the show, and the threats and murders spawned by the real-life men’s rights movement.

Instead of focusing on the hateful rhetoric of the male activists, Bones introduces a series of contemptible women starting with a vapid narcissist and ending with an iron-wielding murderess. “The Murder of the Meninist,” as the April 21 installment is titled, seems to argue that men’s rights activists — who say in the episode that a woman who dresses “like a slut” deserves to be raped — make some valid points.

Brennan is a character who, viewers have been told for 11 seasons, values reason and “objective truth” over what she perceives as dogma. Thus, it’s in her character that the scientist would agree with some of the MRA objectives — if an idea sounds logical to her, she will concur, no matter the source. It’s one thing that she agrees with the MRAs’ contention that women should be eligible for the draft and fathers should have equal custody of children in a divorce. What’s troubling, though, is the parade of nasty female stereotypes who clearly serve to explain the existence of MRAs in the first place. Because Men Now’s mission isn’t just about military service and child care — it’s also about how women are stupid bitches.

The first witness brought to the FBI is a vapid clerk at an auto parts store where the victim was a customer. She peppers her speech with “like” and we are cued to disdain her thanks to Special Agent Aubrey’s (John Boyd) rolling eyes. She giggles and describes the dead man’s disrespectful treatment of her: “The guy was a major wang. No, seriously, he was, like, our rudest customer ever — he used to always talk down to me cause I’m a girl, like I couldn’t possibly know anything about multi-port fuel injectors just cause I have a hoo-ha.” But then she asks Aubrey, “Do you mind if I take a selfie with you?” She takes two, and Aubrey scoffs. Yes, the victim treated this woman as if she was stupid, but Bones demonstrates that she is. So, can you blame him?

Next enters the victim’s materialistic ex-wife, who complains that her “cheap son of a bitch” ex-husband tried to reduce his alimony payments. “I really see you’re strapped for cash,” FBI Special Agent Booth (David Boreanaz) says sarcastically, surveying her large home.

When Booth and Brennan visit the victim’s office, a woman who works at Men Now informs them that female activists are a threat to their safety. “I cannot tell you how many times some feminazi shattered their windshields or keyed their cars,” Karen Walters (Lilli Birdsell) says. She said these acts happened so frequently that Paul Walters (David Shatraw) and the victim took to driving jalopies (a doctor later even admits to pummeling the victim’s car with a tire iron). Karen subsequently says that she wrote a speech about seeing the error of their ways that the employees of Men Now could recite to women during these conflicts: “That was a line that we would use whenever we had run-ins with angry feminists,” she said, describing the lie as “a lot less painful than having your face smashed in.” They were so afraid for their physical safety and they had so many confrontations with “angry feminists” that they were forced to prepare a contingency lie to protect themselves.

But outside of television, it’s typically women in that violent situation with angry men’s rights activists. For example, the Christian Science Monitor reported this month that video game developer Brianna Wu has to employ a security detail and was once forced to flee her home because of the unending barrage of graphic, specific threats she receives from “the Manosphere” due to the “Gamergate” and MRA movement.

Bones, however, would have you believe that men are right to be fearful of feminists.

Patrick McElhenney / FOX

Clearly revolted, Booth reads aloud the tweets of one feminist activist, in which she calls for the victim’s death; and when the woman who tweeted these vile things is approached by Booth and Brennan at a protest, she jumps to conclusions about why they’re there and willfully distorts the truth to further her own wage gap agenda. Because in the world of Bones, both MRAs and feminists are full of vitriol and fanatical nonsense. Women really do receive unfair preferential treatment — which we learn when Brennan punches a suspect for suggesting she needs a muzzle, with no fear of punishment. “If a male FBI consultant broke a suspect’s jaw, I imagine he’d be sitting in a jail cell by now,” says an incredulous intern.

And then there’s the little matter of the reveal that the victim’s wife killed him, with a hot iron no less, as if to align her with the imaginary feminist struggle to destroy men. Rather than seriously criticize the men’s rights movement, the show legitimizes it by doubly victimizing the men’s rights activist whose death sets the plot into motion: First, we learn he had been the victim of domestic violence at the hands of his then-wife and, second, we learn he was almost certainly murdered by that ex-wife.

Coupled with the conclusion of the mystery is the fact that the female characters in “The Murder of the Meninist” are stupid, greedy, conniving, and prone to violence, which gives still more legitimacy to the MRAs: Not only did they make some good points, but their ultimate point was correct too. It turns out lots of women are just as bad as they say, and the victim’s ex-wife really was a murderous harpy!

Throughout the episode, some characters investigating the case do pay lip service to the idea that MRAs are dangerous, misogynistic idealogues, although they repeatedly sway into disturbing calls for violence against them — another suggestion that the MRAs are right and they’re victims, too.

Brennan has the last word on the case: When Booth suggests that women unfairly receive more lenient treatment when they’re on trial for murder, she replies, “It’s bias like that which fuels the men’s rights movement.” So, ultimately, the show is saying that until women stop getting unfair preferential treatment in certain spheres, the men’s rights movement will continue.

Of course Brennan would see some of the MRAs’ points — it’s in her nature. And the show clearly wants to complicate the narrative around this movement: There is a stigma around male victims of domestic violence, and some women are, in fact, bad, dangerous people, and these are both potentially fruitful topics to explore. But instead of presenting a nuanced take on what men might be upset about, “The Murder of the Meninist” pulls a contrarian stunt by setting the viewer up to hate the victim, and then proving he was right about everything.

And, in an episode where Brennan aligns herself with feminism, it’s deeply disappointing to see her blame "women’s privileges" for the existence of MRAs when the more elegant explanation for their existence is "misogyny."