As IF Times

Source: The Creator Of ‘Blackish’ Doesn’t Want To Talk About Diversity

Finally, someone gets it.  Hollywood is the font of what eventually becomes the pop in pop culture.  They’ve always enjoyed the role of being shapers of opinions and creators of reality out of mostly fantasy.  From the early days, TV shows portrayed the idyllic American family in shows such as Leave It To Beaver, My Three Sons and Father Knows Best to name a few.  Much of the narrative and accepted norms of American culture were shaped by such shows.

In reality, the squeaky clean lives portrayed by most of these Wasp-y scenarios likely didn’t necessarily reflect the experience of the average viewer.  Westerns were also a big part of pop culture in those days and undoubtedly they were also stylized romantic depictions of the cowboy life.  But in most cases, the stories revolved around characters and situations linked to otherwise normal people.  Characters exhibited many of the bedrock values of American culture; unimpeachable honesty, strength, resilience and bravery.  Those values came to represent Americans worldwide regardless of the actual reality.  People globally embraced these ‘American values’ portrayed in entertainment because there was an aspirational aspect about them and likely different than their native experiences.

Somewhere along the way in recent years, the stories took a back seat to the background as the hurty feely sensitive crowd started to require characters that aligned with some idealized quotient of demographic representation.   In efforts to eradicate perceived stereotypes of races, the pendulum has swung to the other extreme.  As an example, it’s hard to find any cop show on television today which doesn’t feature a black supervising officer.  When and if  Asians are portrayed at all, they are typically doctors or Kung Fu experts…or both.

When stories specifically revolve around the day to day angst about being a minority, the entertainment value collapses and the show resembles a social studies class at Berkeley.  Nobody enjoys a sanctimonious lecture disguised as  entertainment…think Al Gore and Michael Moore. More importantly, one note shows are boring…think Al Gore and Michael Moore.

Far from being inclusive, the balkanization of race as portrayed by socially ‘responsible’ television shows serves only to exaggerate differences in people rather than to portray their stories as…just stories.  The obsessive need to be inclusive ironically creates more division as stereotypes become reinforced and caricatured, probably the opposite of the intent.    The laudable aspect of American culture as portrayed by entertainment was that color and race were not explicitly played up.  They were about themes and about “us” as in the royal “us” which includes everyone. Now it’s popular to showcase “us” and “them” with the implication that the audience will identify with a featured clique.  This is not entertainment and it is not art.  It is the dulling of the edge of creativity that artists are always railing for.  They are forcing stories to be told only through a certain acceptable prism.  It’s as if someone were forced to submit a financial report via the medium of interpretive dance.  We don’t want lectures. We want entertainment.

Source: Donald Trump’s treatment of a crying baby reveals his total lack of empathy | Jonathan Freedland | Opinion | The Guardian

The word of the day is now faux.  Not to be confused with the Vietnamese soup, pho, which is savory and delectable.   No, I mean faux as in the affected outrage, angst and furor directed at The Donald for any and all of his utterances, which is definitely un-savory.  Like jackals baying and snapping at a presumptive victim, the popular media are circling Trump looking to exploit any possible weakness to tear him apart.

It’s like a large scale version of junior high girls whereby any and every utterance of the bullied victim is subject to ridicule and taunting.  Of course this is delicious irony since Trump is also no stranger to puerile insults.  Name calling now passes as witty debate during this election cycle.  But for those with naïve and already made up minds, faux outrage can make an indelible impression on their views.

We recall the last election when Mitt Romney set tongues a cluckin’ with his revelation of placing the family dog on the car roof during road trips, Beverly Hillbillies style.  The wailing from the PETA crowd was like keening at an Irish funeral.  Unlike eating a dog, which is acceptable if you one day become President, roofing a dog is beyond the pale.  So, Romney antagonized the dog crowd and was painted as an insensitive rich guy.  Romney didn’t address the incidents directly since it was too ridiculous to answer for.  The Donald ain’t takin’ any of that.

The recent ‘trumped up’ incident involving  Khizr Khan, father of the hero veteran stirred predictable media outrage at Trump because his retort was ‘insulting’.  While Trump did not in fact disparage the heroism of the son, he made an oblique remark about the ability of the Muslim wife to make comment, which would not be unusual for Muslims.  So the cascade of ‘racist’, ‘shameful’, ‘intemperate’, yada yada yada condemnations from media and pundits alike, rained upon Trump like expletives at a rap concert.  Meanwhile the mother of an American killed in Benghazi was criticized for grandstanding when she spoke of her son’s heroism.  Clint Eastwood spoke for many when he today said, “The pussy generation needs to just ‘f**king get over it”  Eloquently and succinctly said; the oppression of politically correct speech may finally be coming to an end; which is the primary reason for Trump’s ascendancy to popularity.

The faux indignation for anything connected to Trump would have more validity if not for the Orwellianly labelled Progressives’ penchant for ascribing anything not aligned with their worldviews as being evil and malevolent. Meanwhile, they tie themselves up in Gordian knots explaining the illogical positions of their culture warriors; for example, John Kerry’s assertion that air conditioners are a bigger threat to mankind than ISIS.  Laugh out loud stuff from over there. Can’t wait to see what Trump will do next to set the left off in sputtering faux rage.  He can tell them they fight like 12 year old girls.