Unfortunately, it's all very much the same thing. There is an incredibly dispiriting totalizing impulse in modern discourse that means that politics is linked to every single element of society - film, music, technology, friendship, etc. This impulse is not unique to the current moment - it waxes and wanes throughout history - but it is currently at a high point that most of us haven't seen in our lifetime. It's a tremendously complex phenomenon and this isn't the place to try and pick it apart. The impulse often works surreptitiously - most people don't make constant political judgements about every piece of media, but they act largely unthinkingly on unexamined tribal instincts, a vague sense of which pieces of culture are "for them" or "against them." As I've said before, it's a very bad thing that we can make a fairly accurate guess as to how someone votes based on what they think about Star Wars.
All of this is quite upsetting if we think about it, so there is a very natural impulse to deny it, ignore it, downplay it, pretend that things are the way they've always been and that it's impossible they could ever change. That totalizing element means that when someone acknowledges one uncomfortable reality - say, that there is a network of bad faith actors effectively attacking largely harmless media products in pursuit of wealth and power - it can begin to force questions about seemingly much more vital issues. The overwhelming urge to ignore anything that might occasion such questions, however, is a major reason we no longer have even a rudimentary shared reality to use as the starting point for building the kind of agreements and compromises that let a society function.
In short, dislike Star Wars all you want - I strongly disliked Obi-Wan, loathed Rise of Skywalker, and was disappointed by Mandalorian Season 3 - but base your opinions on the actual media text and don't try to downplay a coordinated hate campaign that is linked to much, much broader issues in modern society.
deadline.com
www.forbes.com
