Sort of off-topic, but could someone eli5 why a lot of media, particularly some in Hollywood seems to skew culturally leftward?
Is it porky doing some self-depreciating humor? Because why wouldn’t these c-suite douchebags want to make more money by appealing to chuds, who make up the bulk of the consumer market and reinforces the idea that capitalism, racism, and all the unfairness in the world is justified? Seems odd for a network to be ok with media where they’re the villains.
Capitalist Realism by Mark Fischer has a good explanation for why this happens.
In short, it's ok to have some media criticism of Capitalism to diffuse any actual organizing against the system. Tabling is hard, but watching a greedy person get their just desserts is easier. Feels good without having to do anything!
All media critical of capitalism will eventually be subsumed by capitalism and sold back, capitalism's great power is to absorb critique of itself, etc etc
Look at older Pixar, Bug’s Life and Wall-e have some pretty dire warnings to the dangers of capitalism. Pokémon is a franchise that’s grown so much Pikachu could give Ronald McDonald and Mickey Mouse a run for their money as the unofficial mascot of capitalism. Literally in the first game Giovanni is a warning about the dangers of corporate greed, and Lysandre is that same warning taken up to 11.
I can’t help but think that porky either let this slip by him, or uses some self-deprecation intelligently. Oh, what are people going to do to revolt against him? Advocate to give him back discrimination AND child labor?
In addition to what others have said, I think a lot of people in Hollywood are leftwing, but lack theory. They're trying to disseminate leftwing ideas, but don't realize how entryism doesn't work. They will tiptoe around execs (who are mostly a bunch incompetent of failsons with zero media literacy) to get projects made.
One of the examples that comes to mind was Dalton Trumbo, an openly communist writer who was blacklisted during McCarthy. But he had a lot of friends in Hollywood who liked working with him, so they helped him by giving him a pseudonym on projects or coming to his defense in court.
Stanley Kubrick would help Trumbo get back in the open with Spartacus, starring Kirk Douglas. It's not like Douglas became a tankie Maoist, but he did have positive things to say about Trumbo and his writing. Douglas' son is Michael Douglas, married to Catherine Zeta Jones. Again, they aren't die-hard communists, but they at least have enough connection to a leftist to have some leftwing ideas.
tl;dr-- there used to be a bunch of commies in Hollywood until McCarthyism, but some of the sentiment is still present because LA is a small town.
Think about it economicaly, studio execs know that the boomer white racist population is not that big and pandering to them is preaching to the choir in a church full of corpses.
No matter what it makes economic sense to always pander to the younger generation to make sure you have a growing market.
George Lucas's problem is his obvious lack of talent but he was a very important landmark, by explicitly saying "hey the biggest hollywood franchise needs younger fans yesterday!".
The last 20 years is basically hollywood realizing this demographic shift, its not 1965 anymore and you absolutely can't pretend some cracker in the south is representative of the entire population or even the majority.
Demographically these crazy chud middle class whites are not more than 50% of the population, not even close in fact. It doesn't make that much sense to alienate the majority. They're the niche market instead.
While there may be the obvious economic difference and white middle class have a lot more money this doesn't matter when buying a movie ticket is not like financing a $500k home.
It makes perfect sense for media to reflect the changing US demographics and specialy the urbanization and rural vs urban division in political views.
Art leans left. The suits role is to keep that leftism from getting too overt, while raking in the money.
Another aspect: The common theme of the universe naturally leading to the resolution of injustices is a very addictive form of hopium that lulls individuals into inaction in real life. Like a lot of underdog stories. It really doesn't matter if the fictional baddies are right-wingers, so long as the content prevents everyone from doing anything about the real life baddies.
And a final aspect: Who needs to be portrayed as good when they're rich and powerful? It's mostly people who rely on other people - rather than the privileges of money - who benefit by being good. The system already protects the rich. So when many people get rich, they stop caring what others think about them. It doesn't matter for their own quality of life anymore. And then people come along and want to to make a rich studio exec a lot more money by creating a show where the rich person's likeness is a baddie? The execs know that formula sells like hot cakes - easy deal!
Sort of off-topic, but could someone eli5 why a lot of media, particularly some in Hollywood seems to skew culturally leftward?
Is it porky doing some self-depreciating humor? Because why wouldn’t these c-suite douchebags want to make more money by appealing to chuds, who make up the bulk of the consumer market and reinforces the idea that capitalism, racism, and all the unfairness in the world is justified? Seems odd for a network to be ok with media where they’re the villains.
Capitalist Realism by Mark Fischer has a good explanation for why this happens.
In short, it's ok to have some media criticism of Capitalism to diffuse any actual organizing against the system. Tabling is hard, but watching a greedy person get their just desserts is easier. Feels good without having to do anything!
That’s partially what I have assumed.
Look at older Pixar, Bug’s Life and Wall-e have some pretty dire warnings to the dangers of capitalism. Pokémon is a franchise that’s grown so much Pikachu could give Ronald McDonald and Mickey Mouse a run for their money as the unofficial mascot of capitalism. Literally in the first game Giovanni is a warning about the dangers of corporate greed, and Lysandre is that same warning taken up to 11.
I can’t help but think that porky either let this slip by him, or uses some self-deprecation intelligently. Oh, what are people going to do to revolt against him? Advocate to give him back discrimination AND child labor?
People in general recognize the problem. They just want to be told they aren't part of the problem, they're the resistance.
It’s porky putting on a rainbow top hat to make people think they’re good
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In addition to what others have said, I think a lot of people in Hollywood are leftwing, but lack theory. They're trying to disseminate leftwing ideas, but don't realize how entryism doesn't work. They will tiptoe around execs (who are mostly a bunch incompetent of failsons with zero media literacy) to get projects made.
One of the examples that comes to mind was Dalton Trumbo, an openly communist writer who was blacklisted during McCarthy. But he had a lot of friends in Hollywood who liked working with him, so they helped him by giving him a pseudonym on projects or coming to his defense in court.
Stanley Kubrick would help Trumbo get back in the open with Spartacus, starring Kirk Douglas. It's not like Douglas became a tankie Maoist, but he did have positive things to say about Trumbo and his writing. Douglas' son is Michael Douglas, married to Catherine Zeta Jones. Again, they aren't die-hard communists, but they at least have enough connection to a leftist to have some leftwing ideas.
tl;dr-- there used to be a bunch of commies in Hollywood until McCarthyism, but some of the sentiment is still present because LA is a small town.
Think about it economicaly, studio execs know that the boomer white racist population is not that big and pandering to them is preaching to the choir in a church full of corpses.
No matter what it makes economic sense to always pander to the younger generation to make sure you have a growing market.
George Lucas's problem is his obvious lack of talent but he was a very important landmark, by explicitly saying "hey the biggest hollywood franchise needs younger fans yesterday!". The last 20 years is basically hollywood realizing this demographic shift, its not 1965 anymore and you absolutely can't pretend some cracker in the south is representative of the entire population or even the majority.
Demographically these crazy chud middle class whites are not more than 50% of the population, not even close in fact. It doesn't make that much sense to alienate the majority. They're the niche market instead.
While there may be the obvious economic difference and white middle class have a lot more money this doesn't matter when buying a movie ticket is not like financing a $500k home.
It makes perfect sense for media to reflect the changing US demographics and specialy the urbanization and rural vs urban division in political views.
deleted by creator
Art leans left. The suits role is to keep that leftism from getting too overt, while raking in the money.
Another aspect: The common theme of the universe naturally leading to the resolution of injustices is a very addictive form of hopium that lulls individuals into inaction in real life. Like a lot of underdog stories. It really doesn't matter if the fictional baddies are right-wingers, so long as the content prevents everyone from doing anything about the real life baddies.
And a final aspect: Who needs to be portrayed as good when they're rich and powerful? It's mostly people who rely on other people - rather than the privileges of money - who benefit by being good. The system already protects the rich. So when many people get rich, they stop caring what others think about them. It doesn't matter for their own quality of life anymore. And then people come along and want to to make a rich studio exec a lot more money by creating a show where the rich person's likeness is a baddie? The execs know that formula sells like hot cakes - easy deal!