I could have predicted just from the headline that the answer would point a finger at the ubiquitous explanation, 'white racism.' Even if that conclusion is cloaked in pseudo-clinical language, it's almost always the answer for any kind of problem, perceived or real, among the races.
''Studio executives believe white audiences prefer to see white characters, while black audiences want to see black characters, so they increasingly make films for each demographic.
Are they being too cynical? Newly published research suggests the answer is, sadly, no. But it also suggests this troubling tendency may largely be the effect of the studios’ all-too-effective marketing strategies.
In short, white moviegoers seem convinced that films with black stars are not made for them.''
Why do the nameless studio executives 'believe' that Whites prefer to see White characters, and more importantly, why do they perceive this possibility as 'sad', or a 'troubling tendency?' They give no indication that they see the black preference for black characters as 'sad' or 'troubling.'
The bias is glaring here, but what else is new?
They say that White audiences, noting the presence of black characters in a movie, conclude that the movie is 'not for them' and the studio execs and the politically correct crowd generally find this sad and troubling.
For years I've read hand-wringing stories in the mainstream media about how blacks feel excluded and marginalized by the lack (as they perceive it) of black faces in advertising, movies, and TV shows. The clamor began years ago for more blacks in the media and in all walks of life: we were told, repeatedly, that black kids learn better when taught by people who 'look like them.' And that is considered normal and healthy. Somehow, though, for Whites to prefer those like themselves, it is 'troubling.' Troubling for whom, and why? The liberals always act as though their opinions and biases are incontestable fact, while the opinions of White people generally are biased and invalid.
Personally I don't consume movies of recent vintage; if I watch movies at all, I prefer movies from the pre-PC era, as do others I know. I shy away from movies with black characters, especially in the lead roles, because their presence is a 100 percent guarantee tht the movie will be Politically Correct, aimed at 'correcting' my wrong ideas and assumed biases. I don't like to watch movies that treat me as the enemy, and which are meant to manipulate my thoughts or emotions, or to sway me by subtle and subliminal, or not-so-subtle means. This is what black-oriented movies do -- and let's be honest. People like me don't avoid these movies because we 'assume they are not meant for us.'
I've noted here before that I used to think that. I used to think that all the commercials with prominently-featured blacks and minorities generally were meant to lure black or other minority customers. And I wondered why such commercials would be shown on 'typical White' programs, or channels with nearly all-White audiences, like the country music channels. Then it finally dawned on me. The commercials with all the sage and savvy and hip and well-dressed and dominant black people were not meant for black audiences at all: they were aimed at those 'typical White people' out there, White folks with lots of troubling attitudes, White people who had still not been effectively 'politically corrected.' The idea is not to sell products to black people, the idea is to sell multiculturalism, diversity, and minority dominance to recalcitrant White people. So I realized I am the target audience for these things; they want to transform my 'sad' attitudes, my 'troubling' preference and affinity for people who are like me and my family.
And do you know what? The message-laden movies, TV shows, commercials, and all the rest -- they work. Look how profoundly this country has changed in the last 4 or 5 decades. Of course to one segment of the population, to the 20 percent or so who are liberal zealots, this transformation is to be applauded, and it has encouraged them to keep pushing, pushing, for more change. So they work overtime at producing attitude-changing 'entertainment'. It is actually propaganda wrapped up in a shiny wrapper to attract the young and the impressionable, but many of its targets do not perceive that. If it's new and flashy and glitzy and 'edgy' and over-the-top, they eat it up and ask for more, oblivious to the fact that they are being manipulated.
The sheer artificiality, the falseness, of the preachy 'diverse' movies is the most indigestible part of it for me. The casting of blacks in ludicrously incongruous roles is too much to take, for example a black actor as the Norse god Thor, or almost as bad, a black actress as Guinevere. And yet many people see nothing weird or dissonant in this. Read comments or reviews of the Thor movie, and note how very few people even mention the incongruity in the casting. Are people, at least the post-moderns, in some sort of trance? Have they really ceased noticing things like that? I shake my head at that obliviousness on the part of many White people. I truly wonder if there is some kind of subliminal messaging added to much of the mass media's offerings to create this curious mindset. But to the movie makers and the multicultists, this racial obliviousness on the part of some Whites is a desired result. That's the whole point.
But as for me, I just cannot take the constant 'visual lying' as I call it that is much of today's mass media: blacks cast in roles which belie real life patterns, blacks and other minorities shown in a glowing, flattering light, while Whites (or at least White men) are seen as inept, awkward, geeky, childlike, and weak. How can people tolerate such lying with images? How can anyone reconcile that with anything they encounter in the real world? Personally I can't stand falsehoods and manipulation, and so where movies are concerned, I 'don't touch the stuff.'
And the fact that I have had considerable experience of ''diversity'' and multiculturalism makes me unable to suspend disbelief and pretend that the falsity of what is on the screen is even possible.
When you come right down to it, we all, if we are healthy, have a natural affinity for our own, for the familiar, for the comfortable, for whatever reminds us of home and friends and family. The exotic and the starkly different may hold a fascination for some, but it wears out its welcome quickly. And given that our current order of things compels us to live and move and have our being in a 'diverse' environment, we want to seek solace in what we know, and what is natural for us.
But the social engineers can't sleep of a night unless they are working to change human nature, or at least the nature of White people. And it is encouraging to me that they seem to be getting a little frustrated and desperate at not bringing us all to heel just yet.
