Discovery+ is the most recent model going through backlash as disgruntled social media customers are sad with a documentary it produced speculating about Abraham Lincoln’s sexuality.
A string of main manufacturers—together with Bud Light beer, Hershey’s chocolate, Fox News and Target—have been the goal of boycott campaigns in latest months over their collaboration with LGBTQ+ people or their perceived “wokeness.”
Conservatives have now taken to Twitter to specific their anger on the newest model, Discovery+, over an episode of the streamer’s collection, The Book of Queer.
Getty Images North America/Scott Dudelson
Titled What They Didn’t Teach Us About Abraham Lincoln, the episode explores the long-held principle that the sixteenth American president was both homosexual or bisexual.
In the seven-minute episode, actors recreate the narration as specialists weigh in on the subject. The present makes use of data from the 2005 ebook The Intimate World of Abraham Lincoln by C.A. Tripp to again up its claims.
The episode, which was first printed for Pride Month in 2022, has now resurfaced as some extent of ire for conservatives.
“For Pride, Discovery+ is promoting 8 minutes of revisionist history inspired by Queer Theory. Their claim: Abraham Lincoln was a flaming Queer, didn’t love his wife & had 4 male lovers. The amount of historical inaccuracies they report to fit the Woke narrative is staggering,” wrote one consumer on Twitter who shared the episode in a tweet that has been seen round 168,000 occasions.
For Pride, Discovery+ is selling 8 minutes of revisionist historical past impressed by Queer Theory.
Their declare: Abraham Lincoln was a flaming Queer, didn’t love his spouse & had 4 male lovers.
The quantity of historic inaccuracies they report to suit the Woke narrative is staggering. pic.twitter.com/s4QZvAwEad
— Mythinformed (@MythinformedMKE) June 6, 2023
“Discovery has become trash,” wrote one other particular person.
And a 3rd added: “This discovery + is absolutely unbelievable garbage propaganda 👇this has gotten way way out of hand.”
Research into Lincoln’s sexuality began within the early twentieth century after a Lincoln biography by Carl Sandburg printed in 1926 described his relationship with Joshua Fry Speed as “a streak of lavender, and spots soft as May violets.”
Many years later, Tripp asserted in his ebook that Lincoln could have had as much as 4 male lovers, together with sharing a mattress with David Derickson, the captain of his bodyguards.
Tripp uncovered letters between Lincoln and Speed that reportedly prompt the lads shared an intimate relationship.
However, different lecturers have disputed the theories, citing the usage of language on the time or it being commonplace for males to share a mattress.
“He was not very fond of girls, as he seemed to me,” Lincoln’s stepmother, Sarah Bush Lincoln, advised a pal.
Lincoln married Mary Todd in 1842 after changing into engaged in 1840. The pair had 4 sons, Robert, Edward, William, and Thomas. Some lecturers have mentioned this doesn’t essentially disprove the theories about his sexuality, as it might have been crucial or anticipated of him to marry, particularly as Lincoln was looking for public workplace.
Academics have additionally acknowledged there is no such thing as a definitive proof to recommend Lincoln was not straight, however Professor Scott Thompson, from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, advised The Guardian in any other case in 2004.
“Make no mistake – Abe Lincoln was gay,” Thompson mentioned.
The British newspaper famous that Harvard professor and Lincoln biographer David Donald has mentioned there is no such thing as a definitive proof of Lincoln having had affairs with males.