By Dustin Rowles | TV | June 11, 2024 |
By Dustin Rowles | TV | June 11, 2024 |
The first movie I saw in 2016, after Donald Trump was elected, was Arrival. I remember watching it and thinking that this would be the last of its kind, that movies in the future would never be the same, and that, specifically, the United States would be depicted as the villain. We would become the Russia of the world.
But after Trump was sworn into office, I was heartened by the pushback and the way even a lot of corporations tried to distance themselves from him. I thought, if we can’t control the government, at least we can continue to control culture and that corporations would be forced to go along with us in order to continue to sell their sneakers. Over the next four years, there was a lot of lip service paid to women’s issues, to Pride, and after George Floyd, every corporation in America suddenly cared about race.
Of course, it was all bullshit. When Biden came into office, the right fought back in the culture wars, and those very same corporations that told us how much they cared about diversity were pulling their Pride displays, throwing trans people under the bus, and pulling back on all of their diversity initiatives.
It was all bullshit. It meant nothing. They don’t care.
But here’s where I disagree with Stewart, who brilliantly skewers corporate pinkwashing below, and suggests that corporations should just shut up and stop trying to take a position. I agree that corporations do not give a damn. However, I still value their efforts to pretend because it means — when an entire Target celebrates Pride instead of a tiny section — that they’re reflecting broader society’s enthusiasm for LGBTQ rights and diversity. In other words, I would much rather corporations exploit Pride initiatives than an anti-woke agenda because it means that we have more commercial power than they do.
Corporations only care about shareholders, but I want those shareholders to believe that we are more valuable to their share price than MAGA America. Peddle your bullshit to us. Blow smoke up our ass. Cater to our cultural interests. Pretend to care about me.