Pentagon and CIA shaped thousands of Hollywood movies into effective propaganda

Done well, it can be a vehicle for criticising one's own culture in a constructive way. Done poorly, it can be a vehicle for oikophobia and gatekeeping, a means of distinguishing oneself from the naively patriotic proletariate.

EDIT: I mean that the category “liberal democracy” is not meant as some kind of praise. That’s just what they/we call them.

Propaganda != opinion that you disagree with

Hollywood films allegedly being "woke propaganda", which was the claim which started this "what do you mean by woke?" subthread. Films which glorify guns are categorically not examples of Hollywood anti-gun propaganda; if they are any sort of propaganda at all, as opposed to just stuff that sells, they are clearly very non-'woke' pro-gun propaganda.

> I don't think it's necessarily an example of that although for some people perhaps it is. But the fact that Hollywood has excluded such people from such roles and then they take a specific role that was developed by a white man and put a black woman into it "because it's time", and make a big noise about how wonderful they are for doing such a thing is near the epitome of insincerity and hypocrisy in my opinion. I don't have a problem with them deviating from a checklist of skin color, genitalia, and sexual preferences for traditional roles like this (are all the previous 007s the same height, same hair color, same eye color?), I have a problem with them endlessly going on about how wonderful they are, how all those other people are racist and sexist, for us only to find out that hey it's not the redneck from West Virginia who has been writing and producing and acting in these exclusionary Bond movies all these years. Turns out it was Hollywood all along. And the "fix" they congratulate themselves for is not to actually put effort into develop characters and roles and stories that different people have the opportunity to make their own and different audiences can build a following with. They just do the cheap "this character is now a black woman" thing. I realize not everybody sees it that way, but that's my opinion and I don't see how it's invalid or based on bigotry

Do I think Hollywood not casting certain people was a Hollywood decision? Yes. Do I think they deserve massive congratulations for casting Lashana Lynch? No. And if you want to argue the black 007 character wasn't actually that great or big a deal, fine. I'd largely agree with you on both points.

But for many years prior to Lashana Lynch being cast, there were people insisting that the idea of a black 007 was "woke propaganda or "political correctness gone mad" that should be opposed. I think it's something of a heroic stretch to suggest that their real objection of the anti-'woke' crowd to the casting of a black 007 was that Hollywood ought to have done it much earlier.

The only recent and decent "IT guy" series was Mr. Robot and the differences from any other field are obvious. The main "IT guy"-character is presented as socially dysfunctional. The supporting IT-people are tiny little gears turning in their cubicles.

Military - always fighting in the harshest condition, against the toughest enemies, saving the world.

Lawyers - good looking people, living a lavish lifestyle in corner offices of New York skyscrapers, having the cool monologues that wow the courtroom.

Doctors - brilliant but otherwise normal people facing very difficult decisions every day, making brilliant decisions to save life after life, and dealing with loss.

Spies - absolutely superhuman skills and knowledge, constantly capable of turning the tide of any way with a single person concentrated effort. (The more you go towards the "military/spy" side of things, the more likely it becomes about superhumans.)

IT focused movies/characters are probably just not attractive to the wider audience. Or at least nobody really proved that they can be. So even in Mr. Robot didn't focus on the hacking as much as on the larger plot. It simply made a very realistic point of that hacking.