Political messaging seems to be more apparent over the past decade of movies, but were there any trends in political messaging in movies in the past? For example it seemed like all movies in the mid to late 2000s had an anti-Bush message. Also it seemed like topics related to teen/unexpected pregnancy and abortion were more prevalent in the 2000s, and the normalization of divorced parents seemed to be prominent in the 1990s (eg The Santa Clause, Liar Liar)
share“Wokeness” is the fast food bumpersticker of criticism. It is pure intellectual laziness to slap the word “woke” across something then mic drop and walk away. No, sorry that solves nothing. Why not explain the messaging in a film and how it aligns with one political agenda or another. Does it rise to level of propaganda? To what end? Why is that end detrimental to society?
shareYes it is agitprop. Its goal is to push progressive values and world view on everyone, including those that are not interested. They are forcing diversity/representation/inclusion/equity onto the entertainment industry in some misguided fight against racism and bigotry, never mind that it is stupid and counterproductive, causes nothing but division, resentment, and strife, but that is their sacred dogma, and you can't argue with someone that has been indoctrinated into a cult.
shareThere's a huge amount of mindreading going on in your argument here. I think what you don't notice is that no, there has just been a cultural shift. There's no specific intent to specifically 'indoctrinate' anyone. I could very much just propose that your idea for it to be completely restricted is also a proposal of indoctrination.
shareSome of the people who hold those ideas function like a secular cult. Their ideology is like a dogma. In the woke cult, LBGTQ people are the saints and nobles, that must be worshiped and venerated all the time. Slavery is the original sin that we must all constantly atone for. And racism is the ultimate evil that must be defeated at all cost. If you don't fully subscribe to woke orthodoxy or don't show your piety by virtue signaling endlessly, you will be fiercely attacked, branded a heretic, and excommunicated from the cult. And anyone that's not in the cult is a deplorable i.e an infidel. These people are no better than fundamentalist Christians who won't shut the fuck up about Jesus and how you need to accept him as your lord and savior, otherwise you'll burn in hell.
I have personally interacted with these people in places like Reddit, where I was banned for criticizing their ideology, they said that it was hate speech, and then permanently banned from Reddit all together for criticizing the woke moderator who banned me, they said I engaged in harassment. I encountered people with this ideology on many other platforms like Twitter, YouTube, Yahoo, and even here on MC.
These types of people have taken over H.R. departments in many companies, and this ideology is being forced on the workers of those companies through things like diversity training or sensitivity training. This ideology is also prevalent in the media and the entertainment industry, and due to the nature of those two industries, they are able to disseminate their ideology to the culture at large. And since the people who hold this ideology are zealots, their "message" comes across like propaganda, particularly agitprop.
I don't know what you expect to me to say here. This is really just a big [citation needed].
Yes, nutty hyperwoke progressive people exist. I've interacted with them. Does that mean every TV show and film is somehow written by these "hyperwoke" people? Since I know that your definition of 'woke' here is highly broad and damns media purely for having too many gay or minorities, I can't help but question your objectivity on the matter.
Like I can't disprove a negative. I have no reason to believe your analysis and observation as unquestionably true in its cultural pervasiveness.
I don't know what you expect to me to say here. This is really just a big [citation needed].
I used to read r/TumblrInAction, and have read many places like this. I'm well aware.
I also used to read FundiesSayTheDarndestThings and r/ToiletPaperUSA
Why should I regard the current nutty left as more concerning than far-right fascists who want to destroy the western way of life entirely?
Both are concerning. They are reactions to each other, in a way they are in a kind of dialectical relationship with each other, if you want to look at it through a kind of Hegelian lens. They are destroying our culture and society, while they themselves are a symptom of a disintegrating society. So you have something like a positive feedback loop, which results in a death spiral for our culture.
shareAlso, I'd question your premise that 'degeneracy' causes fascism. The oft-cited example is the Weimar Republic, and that is just historically illiterate. The Weimar Republic was troubled since the day it began and there was a whole host of reasons for the rise of the Nazis - but the economic struggles were the main driver.
shareIt's not that degeneracy causes fascism, it's that they both rise at the same time, and they are reactions to each other. Like I said, a more nuanced way to look at it is that they are in a kind of dialectical relationship, where they are trying to resolve each other. They feed of each other. In a way they are kind of like Yin and Yang. But the point is they are symptoms of a larger problem, they emerge from a disintegrating society and culture.
shareThis sounds really Americentric, because generally speaking attitudes towards LGBT people are changing positively each year. The trend is slowly in favour of gay rights, easing of censorship (Japan expected to legalise gay marriage soon, Sri Lanka and Singapore just decriminalised homosexuality). The only major examples subverting this are Hungary and Russia.
shareWell yes, I live in America, so I'm primarily talking about American culture. But most of what I said can also apply to the West as a whole.
As for gay rights expanding, this is a good thing. We don't want people's rights being infringed. They should be treated equally under the law. They should have the right to marry whomever they want just like the rest of us. However, the LGBTQ culture which is not confined to just LGBTQ people, should be kept to the fringes of society where it belongs. It should be considered weird and abnormal, which it is. It should not be promoted or encouraged let alone celebrated.
Personally I would like to see all rainbow pride flags be set on fire.
♬♩...we don't need no water, let the motherfucker burn, burn motherfucker, burn...♬♩
I'm being factitious of course, but no really they should burn.
Define "LGBTQ culture" specifically please, and without reference to political activism or shitting on cis-people or whatever. What are the components of it purely in terms of itself?
What constitutes 'celebrating' it in the context of film and TV?
Well it's not like a word that can be easily defined, cultures are obviously by their very nature difficult to define. They consist of certain practices, beliefs, styles, fashion, language, etc.
I'm not going to go through a laundry list of attributes of LGBTQ culture.
But here is a Wikipedia article that "defines" it for you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexuality_and_gender_identity-based_cultures
What constitutes 'celebrating' it in the context of film and TV?
Well it's not like a word that can be easily defined, cultures are obviously by their very nature difficult to define. They consist of certain practices, beliefs, styles, fashion, language, etc.
I'm not going to go through a laundry list of attributes of LGBTQ culture.
But here is a Wikipedia article that "defines" it for you:
Simply shoehorning them into everything by mandate is a way of celebrating them.
And promoting and normalizing the LGBTQ culture is a way of celebrating them too.
See it just comes across as quite nasty when you suggest that its artistic products should be blacklisted. Sure, hate the annoying blue-haired people that rant about cis-people or whatever - but a lot of the LGBT culture is just artistic expression. What does that have to do with you?
And why is this bad?
I'm not sure it's so clear what "mainstream" is anymore given that TLOU is an adult post-apocalyptic zombie TV show.
And cultural segregation is a pretty reactionary concept. Plenty of other subcultures bleed into TV and film. LGBT is no different.
I could just as fairly identify the right-wing currently as being comprised of conspiracy-ridden Christian dominionists who cry about 'satanism', who wish to remove all LGBT rights, implement blasphemy laws, arrest their political opponents (apparently a common position on this very forum), and implement widespread media and political censorship de facto converting the United States into a christian theocratic state that rivals Iran in civil liberties. Essentially reactionary christofascists.
Certainly this isn't remotely far away from the mantra I hear from Turning Point activists and Fox News pundits.
And you would be right. In fact the original "Wokesters" were on the right. I don't know how old you are, if you grew up in the 80's and 90's you probably remember the Moral Majority. There were all these religious zealots trying to control language, the way people dress, the media and entertainment industry. They were also big on censorship. They too functioned like a cult. Somewhere around the 2010s, there started to be a huge cultural shift. That right wing ideology started to fade, while at the same time, you had the rise of a hyper-moralizing, dogmatic, sanctimonious sectarian left (liberals), where liberal ideology transformed into something that is unrecognizable from what it was in the 00's. Before that, woke ideology was confined to the racial/gender studies departments of academia. It started to spread to academia as a whole during the 90's, that's when you had the whole Political Correctness movement, but it wasn't until 2010 that this cancer metastasized and started to infect various industries including the entertainment industry. I think the turning point in the entertainment industry was the 'Oscars so White' controversy, after that, it spread like wild fire, and eventually resulted in the diversity/inclusion/equity standards that have been imposed post 2015.
shareThere are a number of outright open fascists on this forum, and on many modern western mediaspaces online.
Should I be concerned?
Yes, you should be concerned. The rise in fascism is a reaction to the woke cultural left. However, all of this is happening in the context of a collapsing empire, a terrible economy (for the poor and working class), outsourcing of jobs, de-industrialization, and cities/towns turned into sacrifice zones; As result, you have the disintegration of society and the culture. This has lead to diseases of despair, e.g., opioid epidemic, suicide, alcoholism, cults (on the left and right), and magical thinking. Society is in a state of what Émile Durkheim called 'anomie' — a breakdown of society and the erosion of moral values. This leads to profound alienation which results in despair. When empires collapse, societies go berserk, and everything becomes absurd. This is when you have a rise in degeneracy and a reaction to that is fascism. Something similar happened during the fall of the Roman Empire.
shareBut exactly what do *you* want to do about this supposed 'rise of degeneracy' because you've intimated you're against censorship and government control over people's lives.
shareI'm absolutely against censorship and government control. I think it should be fixed socially by society itself. I'm pretty sure I laid it out in one of our previous threads, but briefly, I think the rest of society, who doesn't want Wokies nor fascists polluting our culture, should rise up and fight against it. Make these people feel unwelcome in society. Purge them out of groups, organizations, and institutions. Intimidate them, humiliate them, make them feel small and excluded. Drive them out to the fringes of society where they belong. Stop hiring writers who are woke, this way we will no longer have their ideology reflected in the media.
But primarily, we should focus on improving the economic lives of people. Get rid of income inequality, move away from capitalism, and implement libertarian democratic socialism where poverty is eliminated by raising the standards of living for everyone and giving power to the working class. Setup wealth funds so that we can implement a UBD (Universal Basic Dividend), unlike a UBI, this will not be based on taxing the working class — which causes resentment and division between poor and working people — rather, it will be based on a collective ownership of resources. The wealth fund will pay out dividends to all citizens, and it will generate money through investments. Have the government start a large project, like rebuilding our infrastructure, building housing for the homeless, build high-speed rail trains. Give people purpose by having them work towards a common goal of rebuilding America.
When you improve the lives of people, and bring society out of despair, degeneracy and fringe ideologies will start to fade away by themselves.
And what would "fight against it" mean? You sound, ironically, in favour of cancel culture. And what do we even define as 'woke artistic content' exactly? Who are we driving out specifically?
shareI already described what "fight against it" means:
"Make these people feel unwelcome in society. Purge them out of groups, organizations, and institutions. Intimidate them, humiliate them, make them feel small and excluded. Drive them out to the fringes of society where they belong. Stop hiring writers who are woke..."
You sound, ironically, in favour of cancel culture
And what do we even define as 'woke artistic content' exactly? Who are we driving out specifically?
Is The Last of Us "woke", and should be "driven out"? Should Euphoria be "driven out"? Should House of the Dragons be "driven out"?
shareI don't know about the 'Last of Us', I just started watching it, I'm only 2 episodes in. So far it doesn't look woke to me, but I remember seeing a thread here a few days ago about someone complaining that there were queers making out. I don't know if that's true or how explicit it is, but I imagine that was inserted as a way to glorify queers. So that would be woke.
Euphoria is definitely woke as fuck, and House of the Dragon is not, except for shoehorning in a minority where they don't belong in order to check a diversity box.
I don't think driving out woke writers would actually prevent shows like this from being made, rather these shows simply wouldn't have forced diversity and wouldn't be interjecting woke ideas and values.
Also, once you get rid of forced diversity, I wouldn't mind having some woke shows existing, they can be interesting too, like Euphoria, but they would be rare, and that would be nice.
I don't know about the 'Last of Us', I just started watching it, I'm only 2 episodes in. So far it doesn't look woke to me, but I remember seeing a thread here a few days ago about someone complaining that there were queers making out. I don't know if that's true or how explicit it is, but I imagine that was inserted as a way to glorify queers. So that would be woke.
So it should be "driven out"?
So Euphoria should be "driven out"?
What are the 'woke ideas' and 'values' you're specifically suggesting that Euphoria espouses exactly?
I think it should be confined to movies/shows that are specifically made for the LGBTQ community and people interested in it. I don't think it should be shoehorned into mainstream shows/movies meant for a general audience.
It generally promotes LGBTQ culture and gen-z culture, it has a kind of style that I associate with the them. Given the times we live in there's a lot of overlap between the two.
Define "general audience" shows
Why should cultures be driven out of society?
I think you'd have a hard time arguing that TLOU is marketed towards everyone. It's not for children, or people not into zombie shows. It's a mature show with blood, violence.
Because the majority of the population doesn't like them.
Honestly, [citation needed]
Reactionary Christian fascists aren't everyone.
You made the claim. The fact that "woke" shows like Sex Education, TLOU, Euphoria and Heartstopper do very well is signal enough that there's clearly no widespread aversion to this stuff.
For example, you can base it off politics; the fact that someone like Trump won was a sign that the majority of the country rejects the cultural left. And Biden ain't woke either, this is the guy who was literally for segregation. He said we should have an "orderly integration of society" otherwise his kids will grow up in a "Racial Jungle"
You made the claim. The fact that "woke" shows like Sex Education, TLOU, Euphoria and Heartstopper do very well is signal enough that there's clearly no widespread aversion to this stuff.
I think that's because if it's a good show, people are willing to overlook it, or watch the shows in spite of it. I watch Euphoria, even though I find a lot of it repulsive, it's unlikely that I'm the only one?
But here, if you want a citation so badly, I found this Gallup poll:
https://news.gallup.com/poll/275792/remained-center-right-ideologically-2019.aspx
You also make the assumption that literally only people involved in LGBT culture would want to watch anything that involves LGBT culture.
That you watch Euphoria is utterly bizarre to me.
Centre-right does not necessarily mean "I hate progressive tv shows". Also your graph shows an increase of Liberal identification, and moderate + liberal comprises a majority.
The only thing I would say is that it's a small minority of people.
You are assuming that the moderates should be combined with the liberals. Why shouldn't the moderates be combined with conservatives when it comes to wokeness? Just a few short years ago I was considered a liberal, right now I would probably fall into the moderate category at least on social issues.
If you look at the people on line who are complaining about wokeness most of them are moderates. They usually refer to themselves as "classical liberals".
Except clearly not given the viewing success of Sex Education, Euphoria and Heartstopper. And stuff like Young Royals, It's A Sin, Pose, etc.
I don't see how wanting to use private industry to essentially culturally segregate LGBT people is remotely "moderate".
Not remotely in my experience. Especially since I fully expect some of the people here would, if asked, likely claim to be "Libertarian" and then in the next breath call on government censorship to ban gay stuff on TV.
Like I said, if it's a good show that's well written, people are more likely to watch it, even if it presents a culture and values different from their own. I also think that many people are willing to watch shows that are more woke but only in small doses. I think the problem is the prevalence of wokeness rather than wokeness itself. This has certainly been my experience with wokeness. It didn't bother me at all in 2014/15, because it was new and rare. It's not until it became the norm that it started to bother me.
Well my views on gay people are pretty moderate/liberal, I only want to segregate LGBTQ culture in the media. For example, I don't mind if a movie has a character who happens to be gay, but I do mind if it has a character for the specific purpose of being gay.
Controlling media, either by private or state intimidation isn't remotely liberal
Also it's completely subjective whether or not someone is in a movie *just because* they're gay.
In my experience many "libertarians" are complete fakes and are for big government, so long as it concerns people's bedrooms.
Well no, it is objective, the people who are producing the movies know when they are doing it, only the viewers don't. That doesn't mean it's always the case though, sometimes it's obvious.
And if they deny it? And if it's not actually obvious that the character was there for that reason? Someone could easily advance the argument that the black casting in HOTD was due to making the Velaryons and Targaryens notably dissimilar enough to prevent a sea of white haired, white people who are indistinguishable. As I already have to you.
You would disagree. Who is right?
In other news, you are simply hoping for some kind of cultural change that isn't anywhere near happening. I agree that 'wokeism' exists. I do not agree with you on its supposed breadth - that is to say *what constitutes being woke*. People call *Black Sails* woke because of one plot point. People could call Severance *woke* because of a side-plot romance.
Well you as a viewer can't know for sure, but you could use your judgment. Given the state of the industry, the cultural context that HOTD is being produced in, and the sheer absurdity of making a Velaryon black, it is reasonable to assume that they did it to check a diversity box. It seems more likely than the reason you gave. But we can't know for sure.
I actually do think it's happening, some of these studios/production companies are finally slowly starting to realize that wokeness is bad for business, so some of them are starting to move away from it.
Except it could easily just be both.
Is Black Sails "woke"? Is Severance "woke"?
I haven't watched 'Black Sails', but I have watched 'Severance', and I don't consider it that woke. Yes it has a gay character, and most likely the only reason he was made gay is for representation and to check off a diversity box, but the show is great, and it doesn't feel that annoying.
As for wokeness vs. poorly written, it can be both. Just because poorly written is the primary problem doesn't mean that wokenss is not also a problem. Some shows still do poorly even if they are well written because people are not interested in the subject matter. And most people don't want to see wokeness. The studios can see this, and a few of them are starting to move away from it a little. I mean why alienate a large portion of the audience when you could create a show with no wokeness that is more likely to be very popular and make you even more money.
You've mentioned Euphoria earlier, and I agree that it is well written, but is it actually that popular? That's a genuine question because I don't know.
No evidence presented here really. Not so much that 'wokeness' is desired specifically, but that it is somehow offputting to people when it presents.
Keep in mind your definition of "woke" I would suggest, is likely not the general persons definition. People are likely thinking of in-your-face content like Velma, or some of the new Star Trek reboots, or some of the modern 'message movies'.
In addition, your opinion poll there seems to be British - and it's likely in reference to the BBC who have churned out some drivel of late.
I doubt many people would regard Irving from Severance as woke just because he's gay. Your definition goes beyond clumsy progressive messaging and into cast composition.
This is only tangentially related to our conversation, but I thought you might find this interesting too:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/06/24/lgbtq-acceptance-millennials-decline-glaad-survey/1503758001/
It appears that acceptance of the LGBTQ community is dropping, and it's dropping among young people. It's now below 50%, so it now looks like the majority of young people are not down with the rainbow flag.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/1651/gay-lesbian-rights.aspx
Gallup polling seems to show many different trends here
Interesting poll, but most of those were about rights, and I think the majority of Americans, including myself, support gay rights. Also, the majority, again, including myself, also don't find it immoral.
But it doesn't show how many people find it abnormal, or whether they want to see it on TV, or how they feel about queer culture. I suspect that when it comes to those issues you would see the majority have negative views about that.
Some of the polls that had more to do with how you feel about gays suggest that, like for example your acceptance of the gay life style, while still a majority, was only 57%, so that means that almost half of the country disapproves, despite them being generally pro gay rights and gay marriage.
Yet the continued success of directly LGBT shows, or shows that have LGBT people in them as a prominent character seem to implicitly contradict that. Every single 'woke' show that has failed has done so due to having flatout bad writing, and/or because it's excessively preachy and condescending. A trope that damages reactionary media too.
Not everyone necessarily wants to watch Pose, but I suspect that most people would not find the presence of a transgender person (ie Dark, Babylon Berlin, Alice in Borderland, The Peripheral) as automatically making it work - nor a gay character (Man in the High Castle, Severance, The Walking Dead (multiple), House of the Dragon) as making them automatically woke.
But even if a show is successful, it doesn't mean that most people are watching it or like it. For example in that article on Euphoria it says that only 6.6 million viewers watched the Finale. There is over 300 million people in America. So it could very well be the case that only a small tiny minority of mostly woke people watch that show, despite it being a success for HBO.
shareThat's live viewing, not total viewing. It also mentions that 16 million people watched the other episodes, on average.
And this will not take into account piracy, international viewers etc and the general accumulation of views long after the show has finished.
No, I agree, but still, even if the total numbers were 50 million people (excluding international numbers), then that still would only be 16% of the population. Given that liberals make up 24% of the country, that still means that it could only be really liberal people who watch it.
shareBut almost no TV will ever officially record being watched by most of the country. By your logic everything is niche, except maybe Game of Thrones.
shareI moved the thread here so it's easier to read.
But almost no TV will ever officially record being watched by most of the country. By your logic everything is niche, except maybe Game of Thrones.
Euphoria is measured at having 24.8 times the average demand of an average US show: https://tv.parrotanalytics.com/US/euphoria-hbo
If it is true that it's just US liberals that have coalesced onto Euphoria, then it is clearly a demographic worth tapping into as clearly Conservatives don't coalesce in the same way.
Also, how is Euphoria any less a "mainstream" show in the sense of being targeted at people generally than The Last of Us? Both are advertised to everyone.
If it is true that it's just US liberals that have coalesced onto Euphoria, then it is clearly a demographic worth tapping into as clearly Conservatives don't coalesce in the same way.
Also, how is Euphoria any less a "mainstream" show in the sense of being targeted at people generally than The Last of Us? Both are advertised to everyone.
Yeah, I'm not saying that it's not profitable for HBO to make this show, it's clearly very successful, but we were talking about whether the majority of the US is willing to watch a woke show, and I'm saying that the answer is likely no, because the popularity of Euphoria might still only be attracting mostly ultra-liberal viewers, and the overwhelming majority of people are not watching it, so you can't use it as evidence that the culture accepts woke shows.
Well you yourself said that 'The Last of US' is not for everybody, that it's marketed towards people who like zombie shows. The difference in my opinion is that 'The Last of US' is being marketed based on genre, where as something like Euphoria is marketed to the gen-z/woke demographic. Neither show is for everyone. So in that sense neither is mainstream. Though, I can see something like the 'The Last of US' becoming mainstream because it's so good that it rises above its genre. Kind of like the 'Dark Knight' was more than just a superhero movie. Even people who don't like superhero movies liked the 'Dark Knight'.
Also, I thought you might be interested to know that I watched the 3rd episode of 'The Last of US'. The one with the gay couple. You might be surprised to find out that I loved it. It is by far my favorite episode of the show. It was so well made, beautiful, and moving. It kind of reminded me of 'Broke Back Mountain' which I also liked back in the day. So you see I'm not completely homophobic. Though it helps that they were gay as opposed to queer, meaning they looked like normal people instead of freaks.
Except the majority of the US isn't willing to watch any specific individual show barring highly rare exceptions. Probably like Friends, and Game of Thrones.
So shows must purely be about the traditional tropes within their expected genre, and nothing else?
And so what was your problem with Severance then? You said that
Agreed, and that is precisely why you can't use it as evidence that the majority of the country accepts woke media.
I don't have a problem with 'Severance', I love 'Severance'. I just said that the gay character didn't have to be gay. The reason he was is likely because they wanted to check a diversity box. Where as in 'The Last of US' I think that them being gay actually improved the story. For example, their initial meeting would have been very different if it was a female. The fact that it was a male stranger made Bill perceive him as more of a threat, so it was more interesting to see how they end up becoming close. Having said that, I don't doubt that there was some diversity box checking here too, the difference is that it actually made the story better, so there were more reasons to do it than just checking a diversity box.
Then you can't say the "majority" of the country accepts *any media*. The reason shows are not watched by the majority is because of cultural splintering. There's too much. It doesn't mean, necessarily, that a TV show is inherently objectionable to most people based on its premise.
This is apropos of nothing, but out of curiosity, what is your background? Or as we used to ask in chat rooms back in the day: a/s/l? (age/sex/location). I understand if you don't want to disclose your location.
shareI'm 33, male, I live in England, UK.
shareBlimey, I'm 41, male, and I live in Chicago, IL US.
Cheers mate! I'm having a jolly good time. You seem like a good bloke, and so far it's been a stimulating conversation, iinnit?
So you don't mind all this woke rubbish?
So you don't mind all this woke rubbish?
I gave you my definition of woke:
"Generally it is a pejorative and an umbrella term for a constellation of ideas relating to identity and social justice. More broadly it has to do with progressive ideas or ideology. It is similar to SJW, Politically Correct, or identity politics.
My definition of Woke is (usually in the context of media):
1) The obsession with, and glorification of, identity, diversity, inclusion,
and equity to the point of absurdity.
2) Pandering to minorities.
3) Excessive veneration of LGBTQ people and minorities and denigration of white cis heterosexual males.
The Wokerati tend to be authoritarian, sanctimonious, hyper-moralizing, virtue-signaling, tribalistic, cultish and generally off-putting/repulsive to all normal human beings.
If you look and sound like you spend all your time in the racial/gender studies department of academia you are most likely woke."
What is your definition of "woke"? What does it mean to you?
Shoehorned in social commentary into the world plot to push a specific worldview. All TV shows will have this, even inadvertently as it's probably completely impossible for writers to divorce their own bias from their writing - but 'woke' programming would just where the whole show is clumsily trying to argue for a particular worldview, and worse, it would do it through strawman - setting up the villains as white or right-wing, making them one-dimensional, clueless, and then knocking them down. Being painfully unfunny and cringe often comes with it. Also lots of Mary Sues.
Just having gay people in it, or a lot of racial minorities doesn't make it 'woke' to me. It's chiefly a writing issue.
Yeah, I feel the same with all of that. The thing that happened with me — which most people don't consider — is that there is an evolution. Like if something bothers you a little at first, might eventually become the bane of your existence over time, even if it's a trivial thing. That's how it was like for me with respect to minorities and Alphabet people. I initially didn't even notice it, it just seemed normal to me as it does to you, but I remember hearing someone talking about forced diversity, and it just finally clicked for me. I was able to see it. And once you see it you can't unsee it. You start to notice it everywhere, and eventually you start to get tired of it. It then starts to bother you more and more until you grow to hate it.
So now just seeing minorities in certain shows is automatically a turn off for me. Recently for example, interracial couples started to bother me. Never had a problem with it before, but because of forced diversity, when they make a movie or show that primarily focuses on a family for example, and they are the main cast, one of the cast members must be a minority, so the way they make it work is they usually will make the couple interracial. Or if it's a single parent, they will make one of the kids a different race, implying that the person was in an interracial relationship. The most recent example is 'The Last of Us'; Joel's daughter was black, which means that he was in an interracial relationship. This has almost become a trope, I literally see it in like half of the shows I watch, and it feels so artificial. So naturally it started to bother me, and like I said before, you undergo an evolution, so you grow to hate it. And so you find yourself feeling like a racist even though you don't actually have a problem with interracial couples in the real world.
It's really fucked up.
I really don't care if a LGBT or minority character is an insert just to have one. As long as it's well written, and the worldbuilding and setting is good.
Which is the case for a lot of modern TV.
Yeah it definitely has become the status quo for now.
As for your taste, I get it, but consider what happened to me. One day diversity didn't bother and then the next day it just clicked for me, and once I saw the pattern it became really annoying. And because I have a passion for shows and movies, it really has become the bane of my existence. So what I'm saying is that if it happened to me, it could happen to you too.
I suppose you can consider me a cautionary tale.
Part of me wishes that you could see it, so that there will be more people who complain about it, but the other part hopes that you never see it, because once you do, your enjoyment of shows and movies will plummet. Seeing it is kind of a curse.
Sorry, I'm not you. We don't like the same shows, we don't have the same worldview. It's quite presumptuous to assume I will follow you.
I've never ever specifically wanted to watch TV shows focused solely around white straight people. I am more interested in setting and synopsis than the ethnic and sexual composition of those in it. I watch a ton of international drama. I have no ethnic or cultural bias.
I would also suggest that you trying to convince me to see it your way is a somewhat preachy attitude that 100% could be compared to the worst impulses of the woke or the evangelical.
Sorry, I guess I wasn't clear. I'm certainly not assuming that you're me or that we have the same taste or worldview. What I'm saying is that people evolve over time and their taste and worldview can change. So there's no reason to assume that what happened to me can't happen to you, even if it's unlikely, it is obviously possible. Just because something doesn't bother you now doesn't mean that it won't bother you in the future. Again, I'm not saying this will happen to you, just that it could happen.
I would also suggest that you trying to convince me to see it your way is a somewhat preachy attitude that 100% could be compared to the worst impulses of the woke or the evangelical.
You're right about Bush. The Iraq War was a tipping point. It pushed Hollywood totally into the camp of Democrats. By the 2010s, Hollywood was outflanking Democrats on "culture war" issues. Especially the gay crap.
But it wasn't always this way. In WW2 the industry was basically a branch of the US Military. Pretty jingoistic & traditional.
The shift got going in the 70s. Combo of a backlash against McCarthyism & discarding of the Hays Code. I think of "An Unmarried Woman", which is one of the stupidest movies I've ever seen. It's like they wanted to make divorce seem fun.
Since then, Hollywood has consistently leaned left. But they needed to keep the audience engaged. And a Hollywood product himself, Reagan knew how to turn the screws on the industry. So they teetered between subtly subversive & obnoxiously liberal.
I guess it depends on what you mean by "Wokeness" if you just mean preaching and forcing agendas than most war films made just before and during WW2 were nothing more than recruiting ads and morale boosters.
A lot of the sitcoms of the 70's and 80's were also just morality tales.
There was also the Portrait of films in the 70's.
Surprised no one has mentioned "1984". It was a warning of government censorship, thought crimes, surviellence state, disinformation governance board (aka Ministry of Truth). The left now uses it as their playbook.
shareWe live in a combination of Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World.
shareAnd Animal Farm. Oddly enough the Left like to twist those stories to make it look like they are really about Right Wing or Conservative regimes which are evil. Those stories all warn about Socialism.
shareGoldeneye could be considered the first woke James Bond movie. Pretty tame compared to today´s standards of woke though.
shareWokeness is a specific political ideology, quite separate from the other ones you mention, and it has wholly captured Hollywood, turning the entire industry into a propaganda machine for woke dogma.
Hollywood is just one component, it has totally captured academia, the media, and HR departments. It is an attack on civilisation, a mind-virus peddled by powerful, clever, evil people, and absorbed by gullible young people of little substance, living meaningless lives. It has even convinced many of these poor dupes to hack off their genitals and permanently sterilise and mutilate themselves.
However, such things cannot last. As civilisation crumbles and survival becomes paramount, wokism will be swept aside as the deranged cult it is - it’s ideal for narcissists living in pampered luxury, but cannot survive in a dangerous world. You’ll notice the developing world has no truck with the insanity of woke.
Wokism has already had its hey-day. People are sick and tired of it, and businesses that embrace it are haemorrhaging money. The good thing is that internet never forgets, and so we have a record of all the people who peddled this vile ideology.
Precisely, and Disney is just the beginning of it.
shareWhy is the Last of Us breaking HBO records: https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/episode-four-of-hbos-the-last-of-us-had-the-highest-viewing-figures-yet/
Why is Euphoria highly successful: https://variety.com/2022/tv/news/euphoria-season-2-finale-ratings-1235192015/
Why did Sex Education do really well: https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/a25939758/netflix-you-sex-education-bird-box-viewing-figures/
Why did Heartstopper do really well: https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2022/04/28/netflixs-heartstopper-is-its-highest-scoring-critic-and-audience-hit-in-ages/?sh=79c1e9ab33b6
These are all "woke" shows. Why are they doing so well?
The vast torrent of woke entertainment fails, scraping the barrel for a few examples that did OK (assuming your data is accurate) doesn’t change that. Thanks for trying.
shareI can give more examples than those TV shows. The shows I also linked also did not just "do okay". Euphoria was HBO's second most successful TV show ever. Now it's been pipped, probably, by The Last of Us.
share