The do‘s and don’ts of watchdog liberalism lower journalism standards.
The mad obsession with identity politics controls entertainment-industry trade media, especially coverage of the Oscar nominations. It brings to light the Sovietization of pop culture.
Does The Wrap’s bylined Kristen Lopez march to the orders of her hyper-liberal boss, publisher Sharon Waxman (formerly of the New York Times)? Or maybe Lopez typifies media apparatchiks? Functionaries of Biden-era wokeness also show their obedience at the Los Angeles Times, the Hollywood Reporter, and Variety.
Consider Lopez’s article “Oscars Diversity Report: 2024 Nominations Show Strides in Native and Black Representation,” normalizing the demand for quotas that, post-Obama, have overturned merit as a criterion. The trade press is committed to race and gender (so-called strides) as if marking a favored idea of social progress.
The Wrap repeats that annoying “making history” claim, then cites laughable landmarks: “an improvement in representation, with women, Black actors and actresses, and LGBTQ creatives included.” It specifies “LGBTQ representation, with Colman Domingo (Best Actor nominee for Rustin) and Jodie Foster (Best Supporting Actress nominee for Nyad) becoming the first time two performers who are openly LGBTQ [have been] nominated for playing gay characters.” Implicitly, playing heterosexuals is no longer permissible.
The Hollywood Reporter tracks the same social information like a government agency: “Seven of the 20 acting nominees are people of the global majority, spread across all four races.” But that’s not good enough. The Wrap wraps up its “Diversity Report” with a lament: “As happens nearly every year, there were zero nominations for those representing the disabled community.”
Journalists like Lopez and Waxman pride themselves on watchdog liberalism, which has turned into Diversity Inclusion Equity (DIE) mania. Fake News reporters support political platforms similarly through the inaccurate description of social disasters as “humanitarian crises” rather than the result of political and economic planning.
These are the trade media’s do’s and don’ts. The goal is to use journalism, reporting, and analysis to make industry thinking and public expectations conform. Lopez never mentions artistic excellence or merit — “representation” is the only concern.
At the Los Angeles Times, Mary McNamara broadcasts political bias in her article “Shocking Oscar Snubs for Barbie’s Greta Gerwig and Margot Robbie Just Prove the Movie’s Point.” Did Barbie have a point or was it just pampering/exploiting juvenile feminism?
Entertainment-beat reporters now insist on turning readers and everyone else into peasants, kowtowing to DIE mandates. Thus, Lopez’s ridiculous formulation of an Oscar statistical oddity:
Look at the numbers within all four acting categories, 7 out of 20 nominees are BIPOC, the same number as last year. There were also no people of color in the directing nominations. A reminder that it’s been six years since a Black director was nominated for Best Director (Spike Lee for BlackKklansmen) and Black women have yet to be nominated in the category.
Is there a sillier term in journalism than “BIPOC”?
Never mind that BlackKklansman was a dreadful movie. Variety’s “Oscar Diversity 2024” article also made risible distinctions: “This marks the first time a Black lead actor was nominated alongside a supporting actor from the same film (it’s happened previously for actor and supporting actress, or actress and supporting actress).” Forcing the Academy to look over its shoulders and make sure that representation is properly adhered to is not how equality works; it’s how communism operates. As Lopez warns, “for the most part, women did ok this year, even if Greta Gerwig was shut out for Best Director.”
Journalism this rotten fronts for favored-party status. It’s essentially elitism, as in the doltish IndieWire headline “Greta Gerwig Isn’t Nominated for Best Director, but Justine Triet Is.” Gerwigism updates the media’s longtime coddling of Noah Baumbach (Gerwig’s husband and screenwriting partner and the son of a former Village Voice film critic) as if he was Hunter Biden. Barbie has borne plastic journalism.
Movies shouldn’t be monitored to achieve political objectives. Our culture becomes synthetic when filmmakers are promoted for their identity, not their artistry. Variety, The Wrap, the Hollywood Reporter, the Los Angeles Times, and others goose-step to the Daily Worker, Izvestia, or Pravda.