TV Guide received backlash for looking down on Pratt for holding what are essentially mainstream American values. The article, written by Kaitlin Thomas, talks about how Pratt considers himself to be from a blue-collar, working-class background, and then attempts to convince readers why that’s bad.
The piece is titled “How to Love Chris Pratt Without Hating Yourself: He’s definitely the most divisive of the Chrises.”
Twitter user @texasbusboys suggested another title in the comments section of TV Guide’s article link tweet: “Better title ‘proving I’m out of touch with average American views’ by Kaitlyn Thomas or maybe ‘I wish I was as cool as Chris Pratt’……”
The article also criticized Pratt for farming lambs. Pratt has posts expressing pride in his lamb farm and the fresh meat it provides him. The TV guide writer expresses disdain for a lifestyle that consists of hunting and raising animals that you then eat.
“Hunting and farming is how we get 100% of our meat supply. And the vast majority of us eat it. Grow up,” commented @EarnieBliss, under the Twitter article.
The magazine also criticizes for an interview he did in Men’s Fitness where Pratt said he didn’t see people with a life story like himself represented in Hollywood productions. TV Guide pulled this quote from the interview: “I think there’s room for me to tell mine, and probably an audience that would be hungry for them. The voice of the average, blue-collar American isn’t necessarily represented in Hollywood.”
TV Guide disagreed with Pratt’s assessment, not denying that he is from a blue-collar background, but minimizing his point by confining his identity to “a successful, straight white man at the heart of two major film franchises,” perhaps failing to recognize the diversity of opinions, perspectives, and experiences among straight white men, and confining Pratt to a stereotypical monolith.
“@TVGuide is basically saying if your a white Christian in this country u r a piece of trash and r irrelevant, if they didn’t already know that’s pretty much over half the population of the U.S,” wrote @jimmyevans57, under TV Guide’s article link post on Twitter.
Even in the introduction to the article series, TV Guide expresses dismissiveness to the four key Chrises.
“…the four Chrises most people talk about with regard to the rankings—Evans, Hemsworth, Pine, and Pratt—are all conventionally attractive, nondescript white guys most people can’t tell apart,” as if TV Guide was hoping for readers who also don’t fit such a mold.
