The internet has been buzzing with excitement since the trailer of The Little Mermaid dropped. Adorable videos of young Black girls in awe as they see Black Ariel have taken the internet by storm.
Sadly, there have also been stories of those who disapprove of the casting choice, some going as far as to use A.I. to make Ariel white.
Now, a new video has surfaced, this one featuring The Daily Wire host Matt Walsh disputing the casting of the fictional fairy tale character because of...science.
In the video, Walsh stated:
"Also, by the way, with The Little Mermaid – can we also just mention that, from a scientific perspective, it doesn't make a lot of sense to have someone with darker skin who lives deep in the ocean."
"I mean, if anything, not only should the Little Mermaid be pale, she should, actually, be translucent."
"If you look at deep sea creatures, they're, like, translucent. They have no, kind of, pigmentation whatsoever."
"And they're just, like, these horrifying -- they look like skeletons floating around in the ocean."
"That's what the Little Mermaid should look like. She should be totally pale and skeletal where you can see her skull through her face.
Walsh then finished with:
"And that would actually be a version of The Little Mermaid that I would watch."
You can watch the video below.
As you can imagine, Twitter users had plenty to say.
Some Twitter users came to Walsh's defense, saying he was clearly kidding.
Walsh himself later posted a follow-up tweet:
Kidding or not, Walsh should have been more sensitive to the controversy surrounding the new Ariel's race. The fact that his "scientific" argument was allegedly in jest doesn't mean it wasn't racist. As Douglas Adams said, “If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands.”
The Little Mermaid is set to be released in May 2023.
