THE AMC PROJECT: RATED R: REPUBLICANS IN HOLLYWOOD

AMCTV.com ^ | 9/2/2004 | AMCTV.com

[BattleFlag]

Deserved or not, Hollywood has a left-wing reputation. But could Hollywood be more conservative than we think? This is the question award-winning documentary filmmaker and former Democratic speechwriter Jesse Moss tries to answer in this special AMC Project. He examines recent phenomena, such as Arnold Schwarzenegger's election to California's highest office, Mel Gibson's unapologetically Christian hit The Passion of The Christ, and the debates over "patriotism" spawned by the war in Iraq. Tune in and find out if Hollywood is primed for a right-wing resurgence. Tuesday, September 14 at 10PM ET/PT.

[BattleFlag]

I don't watch alot of "commercial" TV but I happened to be catching Dune on AMC and saw a promo ad for this documentary.

As it was made by a former democratic speechwriter I have reservations about whether or not there will be a slant.

But one could argue that merely broaching the subject is a positive thing, unless it's an unabashed hit piece.

I guess we will see.

[kaktuskid]

AMC has turned to crap ever since they stuck ads in the middle of the movies!

[colorado tanker]

I agree. Besides the commercials they started showing a lot of movies that don't fit my definition of a "classic."

[Dr. Frank fan]

You have to understand how left-wing logic works.

If you are making a claim about the general, broad pattern of something, such as "the media tilts left", then a lefty can debunk that claim by finding 1, 2, 3, ... up to, oh, let's say, at most, 7 counterexamples. A finite number of counterexamples is always enough to disprove a conservative's claim of general tilt.

For example they can say "Fox News" and often that's enough. Or they can point to some column published in a Laramie, Wyoming newspaper. This counter-argument concludes by smirking and saying "see! what liberal media?" A convenient shorthand is to link to one non-liberal-tilted column/story, or even just a story that contains negative news about a Democrat, and say "here's an example of the So-Called Liberal Media". They've even abbreviated it (SCLM) which is very clever.

For example, what follows constitutes a valid lefty counter-argument to the notion that the media tilts liberal:

"Here's the SCLM in action folks!!"

And that's that. For the master at this kind of "argument", I highly recommend the web-log of Oliver Willis, who seems to specialize in it. For example (I'm not making this up!) I just checked over there and here's his latest post, in its entirety:

---
"Liberal Media"
Submitted by Oliver Willis on Thu, 09/02/2004 - 3:35pm.
Bush's war-on-terror flip received far less coverage than Heinz Kerry's "shove it" comment
*Sigh*
---

(The original contribution of the author, Oliver Willis, to this post, of course, is "*Sigh*".)

So, I assume the same rules will apply here for the Hollywood case: the general claim "Hollywood leans left" can be refuted simply by listing some (a finite # of) people in Hollywood who don't. Since they can point to Schwarzenegger, Gibson, Bruce Willis, Kurt Russell, James Woods, Bo Derek, and (well I'm running out of names off the top of my head) a few more examples of known Hollywood folks who aren't out and out lefties, that will be enough to disprove the whole notion.

I'm just telling you this so you can be prepared.

[BattleFlag]

" I'm just telling you this so you can be prepared."

I am prepared, mainly because I have no expectations, I understand it could go either way with an infinite number of points in between.

It could be a documentary, which unlike the fiction of jabba the moore presents reality as found by the film maker. Or, it could be that the film maker started out to "prove" a preconcieved idea. Which again could run the gamut from "proving" there is no left wing bias in Hollywood to "proving" that conservatism is a rising tide there.

The trust that moore has betrayed in everything he has ever done to varying degrees is that he will be allied to the truth and present as best he can, a picture of reality.

But 100% impartiality is impossible because what is or isn't reality is still filtered through the perceptions of one person.

So we shall see.

[Awestruck]

Like the hit piece that Bravo did on Mel Gibson? I'm just grateful that more conservatives are "coming out" in Hollywood.

[fuzzy122]

"I'm just grateful that more conservatives are "coming out" in Hollywood."

Are they a "protected class" now, like gays?

Stay Strong,
Fuzzy122

[Awestruck]

LOL..they should be!

[goldstategop]

Chuck Norris has come out with his new autobiography, Against All Odds. Yes, he's a conservative, a Christian and a supporter of President Bush. He took time out from his Walker show to campaign for the President in his first gubernatorial run in 1998. He has never been shy about expressing his views. Too bad we can't have him run for President because he'd be great to have. Oh well.

[goldstategop]

LOL. Meant 1994.