Over at the Z Blog, the Z Man documents how Conservatives are as mired in a market cargo cult as the Left is in the sway of the woke cult.
One reason Hollywood has no fear of going broke is they know most people will find a way to look past the propaganda. They can pack a superhero movie with a lot of propaganda, as long as they also pack in the special effects. The people rushing off to see this stuff are too culturally illiterate to catch the messaging anyway. Even if they do see it, they happily filter it out so they can enjoy the explosions and cartoon fight scenes that are the main draw off these shows.
Another reason why getting woke will not make Hollywood broke is that the big studios can use their ownership of billion-dollar IPs as collateral on all the loans they could want. Recent years have shown us how big you have to be to be too big to fail, and it’s the point where you own Mickey Mouse and Yoda.
This has always been the paradox of marketism. The people who preach the power of the marketplace never look up to notice that the market does not work like their libertarian textbooks claim. The cereal aisle at your local market is not a bizarre full of vendors demanding your attention. It is a couple of cereal makers, one main link in the supply chain and strategically planned shelf space. Your decision was made for you long before you discovered the joy of Cap’n Crunch®.
Think about it. Conservatives and Libertarians sell the free market as a wide open field of endless choices, but you don’t get to decide which choices go on offer. The options, decreasing as they are now, have been set before you ever show up. That’s not unlimited choice. It’s the illusion of choice. Power players with commanding positions over the market always have more say than you do.
A truth of life is that all societies are hierarchical. Democracy and capitalism are very clever ways for the elites to drug the masses into thinking they have a say in how society is managed. There is always someone in charge of every human group and America is no different. Those people have embraced this weird religion we call wokeness and they intend to impose it on society. The marketplace is not going to magically protect you from this madness.
When all the people in charge of the cartels that run every industry share the same totalitarian religion, you will have no other options because they will make sure to bar alternatives from the market. That’s why Gab still has to operate in the shadows for the most part without an app comparable to its competitors’. The political version of this gatekeeping is why Americans are still limited to picking between two wings of the same uniparty at the ballot box.
Before these cultural pogroms launched thirty years ago, the typical right-winger was sure all he needed to do is vote harder and buy the right brand of cereal. Despite their rhetoric, the typical left-winger also bought into the myth of democracy and the marketplace. They thought the will of the people mattered to the decision makers.
The Bernie Bros learned otherwise the hard way. Twice. On the other hand, too many Trump voters appear to need the same lesson.
When the game is rigged, the only winning move is not to play.
Now, that’s not to say there’s not point to building and supporting alternatives. Gab is growing by leaps and bounds. It’s just that most normies haven’t heard of it. Likewise, few readers know that newpub is now bigger than the Big Four publishers.
What this implies is that embracing alternatives means joining a parallel, underground market. The great divorce is underway, but instead of dividing North and South, this time it will sift all aspects of life, everywhere–even in online markets.
An awesome anime in novel form. Buy it now!
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It was pointed out to me recently that the US has a fascist economy—a merging of government and corporate interests—not a free market economy, and that’s been the case since at least the 1930s. I’ve so far been unable to find a good counterargument.
Z Man makes that argument as well, if memory serves.
It’s been decades since I read it, but I recall Paul Johnson in his book “Modern Times” describing the WW2 US as “war socialism” which never really went away after the war.
It’s kind of fascinating watching how far people can get buried in the cult. For example if facebook asks the government who they should censor, and the government tells them in no uncertain terms who they better censor if they no what’s good for them, people will still defend it on the basis of “it’s not the government censoring you, it’s a private entity.”
The only difference between the mainstream left and right on this issue is that the left only defends it when the censorship breaks their way, while the right will defend it even when (maybe especially when) they are getting screwed by it.
The rainbow brand logos remind me of a trip down a prestigious street in Chapel Hill, NC, during “Pride Month.” A male friend and I were walking to a pizza joint, and we sometimes tried to identify the various pervert flags that were flying from all of the street lights.
The pizza joint itself was run by Italian Catholics who sponsored the UNC Newman Center, so a crucifix naturally hung above the entrance to the kitchen. Upon seeing it, I turned to my friend and remarked, “You see that? This is the only place on Franklin Street we’ll Jesus.” We followed with the sign of the cross before we grabbed our menus.
This is the Way.
Brian
Benjamin Cheah has made an identical point about creating a parallel economy due to governmental expelling the unvaccinated.
He advocates building up your talent stack, finding like minded people who can help out and so on.
xavier
One of things you have to remember is that every movie is its own economic enterprise. So even if it fails completely, the studio behind it is protected because it gets the lion’s share of whatever ticket sales the movie generates in the first few weeks. The people who lose are the banks and other institutional investors who put up the money in the first place. Since everyone in Hollywood is playing with other people’s money, it’s almost impossible for them to really lose
“Recent years have shown us how big you have to be to be too big to fail, and it’s the point where you own Mickey Mouse and Yoda”
One the few things I agree with Keyenes on is that “the market can remain irrational longer than you can stay solvent.” Or, to paraphrase: Disney’s woke supply can outlast your hopium supply.
This is why I always compare pop-cult addiction to an abusive relationship. When you finally make a clean break you stop caring whether your abuser goes on to massive success or destroys himself by his own malice because you are to busy being grateful for no longer being punched in the face.
I liken a lot of what is currently happening in Hollywood to cocaine dealers indulging in their own supply. Contrary to popular conception, that isn’t what brought down any of the bigwigs back in the day. Bigger outside forces conspiring against them did, much like the New York mafia families. They would still be around today otherwise.
But what happens when you ARE the biggest force and there isn’t anyone to step down on you? This is what we’re seeing today.
I am on fire for this movement. The husband, however, is all for
*ahem* all for Amazon shopping, because it’s convenient and gets free shipping and all explanation is to no avail: he’s Gen X and seems quite incapable of disbelieving the core ideas of advertisements (the apolitical ones, at least.) So for now Don’t Give Money To People Who Hate You is confined to my discretionary spending only. Has anyone emerged from a similar situation?
Your husband is married to Amazon for the convenience, not for the moral high ground. It seems like you’re throwing pearls at a swine.
He is emphatically not a swine in most areas of the Christian life, but it does seem he is in this one. Even the notion that driving to a store and getting the stuff the same day would be more convenient and less costly doesn’t seem to help. Sigh.