I was reminded, for no particular reason*, of the time some web comics person called Will Eisner a 'mediocre white man'

* That's a lie

The reason to care about it is not to worry about Eisner's place in history, it's already secured. Nor is it because he's some perfect figure, far from it; it's BECAUSE Eisner and his work has issues and this criticism misses them all by a mile.

You can talk about the racism in The Spirit.
You can talk about the sort of aspiring mid-list respectability that characterizes the rut of most of his later work
You can talk about the terrible pacing in The Plot.
Saying 'mediocre white man' addresses none of these things

It's a bad form of criticism, a lazy form of criticism. And the way it's thrown about online seems to often cheapen the important and necessary discussion about the way we formulate canon in favour of 'this person sucks IMO'

There are a lot of valid criticisms to be thrown at the Coen Brothers* - including about their engagement with race, their female characters and many other issues.
They are probably my favourite living directors - but no one is perfect.

* Ah... That is who we were talking about.

Remember that absolutely dumb take last month / twenty years ago about how 'there are no female led Coen brothers films'?
Not only is it bad, it means that instead of talking about ACTUAL issues with their work we are talking about imaginary ones.

Criticism isn't easy, as opposed to many believe, to engage with a text means to go beyond good / bad.
You gotta work at it, even on this dumb platform. If you are just shooting your shit how am I meant to take you seriously?