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Martin Fey| For The Bulletin

Republicans often grouse about Hollywood and news media hostility toward conservative views, and the penchant of both institutions for caricaturing conservatives as racists. But the phenomenon is nothing new.

From 1971 to 1979, Norman Lears popular sitcom All in the Family revolved around the small-mindedness, ethnocentrism, jingoism, homophobia and racism of family patriarch Archie Bunker, who in almost every episode was given a liberal lesson. It was a great creation, but Archies offensive language and addiction to stereotypes would never get past Hollywoods woke censors today, nor would Lears choice to make him a sometimes-likeable character despite his copious flaws. It has been said that preaching is fatal to art, but Lear preached liberalism without browbeating his audience. Conservatives and liberals both tuned in for nearly a decade, and then to many years of reruns.

Today there is no subtle preaching in Hollywood, no effort at understanding opposing points of view. A similar sitcom today would portray Archie as pure evil, a scheming white supremacist rather than an unthreatening ignoramus. Hollywood 2021 is close to the reverse of it in the 1950s, when communists, former communists and socialists were blacklisted. Now its conservatives and Republicans in Hollywood who work in fear, muzzled by the threat of an informal blacklisting that harms careers and breaks long relationships.

A few occasionally speak out, though usually gently. Tim Allen, star of the sitcom Last Man Standing, is one of them. In one frank moment he told comedian Jimmy Kimmel on air that being a non-liberal in Hollywood is risky. You get beat up if I dont believe what everybody believes, he said. This is like 30s Germany. Although Last Man Standing was the second highest rated sitcom in 2017, ABC decided to cancel it. Many fans angrily attributed that decision to Allens political views, although the anger subsided when the Fox network picked up the show the next season.

Stacey Dash, an African American/Latina actress best known for her leading role in Clueless, put it this way:

Because Im black Im supposed to therefor be a Democrat, which is absurd, she said. They (Democrats) are supposed to be the party of tolerance, but I dont see any tolerance.

Stars who are aging out of the industry, like Clint Eastwood, Kelsey Grammer and John Voight, are more likely to speak honestly about their political views, but they never show any intolerance toward their liberal counterparts. Instead, they usually invoke libertarian ideas and the desire that people be willing to hear both sides. Occasionally they go out on a limb. Voight called Donald Trump the greatest president since Lincoln, a statement that no doubt took him completely off the cocktail circuit.

The Trump presidency brought the Hollywood leftists to new heights of viscousness, even threats of violence. The same people who in 2020 condemned Trump for refusing to accept his election loss and accused him of fomenting insurrection were apoplectic after his 2016 win. They led the so-called Resistance movement, which rejected Trumps legitimacy and began the anti-Trump hysteria that marred his entire presidency.

It is expected that actors and musicians will be openly liberal and anti-conservative, but the Trump era dragged many of them to slathering lows. Wrestler actor Mickey Rourke and Orange is the New Black actress Lea Delaria chose baseball bats as their preferred weapon for a Trump beat-down. Musician Marilyn Manson and comedian Kathy Griffin created Trump decapitation images. Madonna told thousands at a DC womens march that she had thought a lot about blowing up the White House, and actor Robert DeNiro, still a tough guy in his aging decrepitude, was joined by rapper Everlast in preferring to simply punch Trump in the face.

Most Americans, fortunately, can separate Hollywood fantasy from reality. But there is another class of script readers who have been far more damaging the icons of the mainstream news media. Except for Fox News on cable and the airwaves of talk radio, the media spoke in lockstep and with the same vocabulary through every one of the false narratives brought to bear on Trump. It started with the falsehood that he extolled Nazis and white supremacists after the Charlottesville VA tragedy, a vicious lie that the unreported full text of his remarks should have long ago put to rest. Then there was the Russia collusion lie, based on documents the FBI knew to be fraudulent and discredited by the nearly three-year Mueller probe that Democrats simply rejected. The supposedly reliable intelligence sources that said Russia had offered terrorists bounties for Americans killed in Afghanistan, and that Trump had done nothing to stop them, turned out to be mendacious. Then there was the false story that Trump had peaceful protestors gassed in Lafayette Park near the White House so he could stage a photo op. The inspector general found that the Park Service gave the order because a fence contractor had a job to do. While the lies were circulating Trump was vilified as a dictator, a racist and a traitor. By the time the truth was out, few were paying attention.

Hollywood, music and the media have done more damage in the past five years to American institutions than any presidency in history. Unfortunately for those industries, trust in them was one of the casualties.

Martin Fey is a member of the Quiet Corner Tea Party Patriots.

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View from the Right: Hollywood, music and the media have damaged American institutions - Norwich Bulletin