Last weekend I decided to read The Queen's Gambit. Yes, the book that got turned into an inaccurate miniseries by Netshits.
People praise the show for encouraging women to play chess.
Here is the thing. We do have female chess players. Since 1941, we have female Grand Masters. My tiny ass country even has three sisters who are renowned champions and the youngest one is the head coach of the national men's team now.
The idea that women/minorities/gays need fictional characters like them to prove they can do THINGS is ridiculous and so condescending. The actual, real life people did the things. Take it or leave it, they are the way they are, if you need some prettified, perfect parable character who throws sassy one-liners to get into a thing then you were never passionate about it in the first place.
Specifically, in The Queen's Gambit novel the main character, Beth does just that. She isn't doing it because someone told her she can. She gets no support that way, people either don't care or just say "ah, this is your thing, have fun".
Which is why I'm annoyed by this show in specific.
It also makes it obvious she is not great at many other things and somehow idiotic people still YAS KWEEN the character. She is an alcoholic drug addict, who only cares as long as other people serve a purpose in her chess playing.
It bothers me they can't like real people who are living, therefore changing, reacting to new situations, etc. because anything can suddenly become problematic. A human being a dynamic, but their own world views and morals are impossible to follow, so they prefer static fictional characters over real humans.
It's madness.
I think it just comes down to a mix of narcissism, including projecting themselves and their thoughts unto others; not being able to clearly differentiate between reality & fantasy; and not being able to separate politics from anything in general. Sane, healthy and non-narcissistic people are able to empathize with characters who don't look like them or think the exact same opinions they do most or all of the time. They're also sufficiently grown-up to know that reading Mein Kampf will not automatically turn you into a jackbooted goosestepping stormtrooper nor that reading Das Kapital will turn you into a frothing Internationale-singing commissar.
SJWs, on the other hand, assume that anything less than a saintly depiction of characters whose identities & beliefs they identify with, and anything less than an unrelentingly negative depiction of characters whose identities & beliefs they identify as inherently evil & wrongthink, are personal attacks on their own identity & beliefs, and must mean the author him/herself is an evil bigot. They can't comprehend that fiction doesn't have to be political all the time nor can they separate the artist from his or her work, and they also tend to be so emotionally unstable that they constantly crave validation & asspats (even from fiction) - so it's no surprise that they're not able to write compelling characters or appreciate them any more than Jack Chick could've written or appreciated a good Catholic.