If “Hollywood continues down this road” toward political correctness, writes China’s Global Times, “it will dig its own grave and destroy its reputation one day.”
One day? Many might say that that the destruction of Hollywood’s current reputation would be an improvement. But China’s admonishment, published Monday, speaks volumes about many things — woke culture’s and the Western Left’s (short) future among them.
Unbeknownst to many, and in the sense in which kids would sometimes use the word, Beijing “owns” Hollywood. That is, Beijing’s powerful State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) actually succeeds in censoring many of our movies, using the threat that if producers don’t make their flicks China-friendly, they’ll be denied access to the nation’s lucrative market. It’s the NBA phenomenon — “No Boldness Anywhere” (except Beijing).
As for the current chastisement, the Global Times, which operates at China’s government’s pleasure, writes:
The hashtag “how serious is the involution in Hollywood due to political correctness” began trending on Chinese social media on Monday. British writer J. K. Rowling’s recent suffering, Disney’s live action Snow White, the gay superhero in Marvel films… The batch of operations for political correctness in Hollywood has been satirized by many Chinese netizens, and if Hollywood continues down this road, it will dig its own grave and destroy its reputation one day.
The newest “joke” for most Chinese netizens came after Rowling did not appear for celebrations at the 20th anniversary of the film Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. Yes, this is ironic: a writer who created the great IP was expelled by those who adapted her work.… Another series of changes that made most Chinese netizens’ jaws drop is that the live action adaptations of Disney’s classic works The Little Mermaid and Snow White have changed the protagonists from “white” to “black” and “Latino mixed race.” The more interesting part is that Gal Gadot, the bewitching woman who is in line with the beauty of white people, is going to play the evil queen in Snow White.
Calling this a bit “weird,” the Times then asks, “How much are DC Comics and Marvel Studios willing to bet on political correctness?” (Well, the West has bet its future on it, so why wouldn’t the popular-culture purveyors bet their market?)
Breitbart adds to the story, writing that the
scathing article comes as Beijing is blocking more Hollywood blockbusters from being released in Chinese cinemas in a bid to boost the domestic movie industry. Movies including Disney-Marvel’s Black Widow, The Eternals, and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings still do not have release dates in China at press time.
China has surpassed the U.S. as the largest movie market in the world, thanks in large part to the coronavirus pandemic. The top two biggest grossing movies worldwide this year are both from China: the Korean War epic The Battle at Lake Changjin — which promotes anti-American sentiment while lionizing Communist dictator Mao Zedong — and the time-traveling comedy Hi, Mom.
The larger story, however, concerns the — to use a favored leftist word — “sustainability” of modern liberalism.
Consider: Breitbart points out that the 2018 movie “Bohemian Rhapsody was censored upon its Chinese release, with scenes of gay intimacy and drug use excised from the movie.” Earlier this year, Beijing unveiled a program designed to enhance teen boys’ masculinity and just a couple of months ago announced that broadcasters must “resolutely put an end to [showcasing] sissy men” on television.
By the way, is anyone going to “cancel” China for using the un-woke term “sissy”? China is canceling us.
But, hey, it’s a rogue nation, right? Sure — but its anti-political correctness stance is quite mainstream globally.
For example, the Times mentions that the recently released Marvel Studios film Eternals has been banned in many countries because it features the first homosexual superhero kiss. Then, Russian leader Vladimir Putin slammed America’s woke ideology last month and called youth “transgenderism” a “crime against humanity.” In the past he’d opined likewise and even railed against the West’s rampant moral relativism (I guess that, uh, worked for him?).
The Sexual Devolution doesn’t play any better in the Islamic world, which constitutes almost a quarter of humanity. It’s frowned upon in most of Africa, too, while South Americans are generally lukewarm. What’s its future?
Then there’s the Left’s sacred pillar of immigration. It’s only opposed by those knuckle-draggers in Hungary and Poland, right? Just ask the libs’ admired Dalai Lama. He told the BBC in 2019 that “Europe is for Europeans” and “ultimately … [migrants] should be returned to their homelands.”
Ouch. Are they going to cancel the Lama?
(Im)migration is an obsession only of suicidal Western nations. Yet as it makes Europe more Muslim and the United States more Hispanic and Asian and a bit more African, what will be wokeness’ prospects?
In fact, while Salon gleefully proclaimed in 2016, “This is the end of marriage, capitalism and God. Finally!” research shows that the world is even poised to become more religious during the next few decades, bucking the West’s secular trend.
Reality: “Woke values” are notoriously the domain of effete, wealthy white libs — who, via immigration and their own low birthrates, are canceling themselves. And the future belongs to those who show up for it, as columnist Mark Steyn has put it.
The point is that when you kill virtue, the old Western glories, you don’t get perpetual celebration of your chosen vice. You get China. Tranny becomes tyranny.
Do you still, wokesters, think you’re “on the right side of history”?
