I think I was on board with Hollywood for a hot second in regards to showcasing our differences but at some point it started feeling like they are beating us over the head with it. On Board in the sense that for a small amount of time it was a refreshing change. At what point though does it go from showcasing our differences or being different/ entertaining to trying to depict some false reality perhaps in an attempt to change reality or push an agenda? Should movies be used in that way? At what point do the oppressors become the oppressed? How many movies in a row of showcasing men as being weak and dumb? Especially the White Heterosexual Man.
There remain vast, vast numbers of movies showcasing the glories of the White Heterosexual Man in the past and even the present (Superhero movies? Fast and the Furious? 90% of romantic comedies?). They remain well-represented in the most lucrative sorts of films being made today. Even if every movie made in Hollywood, tomorrow, was changed to focus on some other group, it would take quite a long time-decades and decades-before the pendulum truly swung the other way and there were more movies depicting anyone else over white heterosexual males.
Although there are clearly Movies With An Agenda being made, by people of all skin colors, sexualities, belief systems, etc. (and there have been agenda movies made throughout all of Hollywood history, though the Hays Code and residual influences did a lot to sand off the hard edges in all American media for a long time), I do not believe that just because movies are being made with different perspectives and focusing on different groups of people that there inherently is an agenda. It IS true, however, that demographics in this country are changing, and will continue to do so. While some people may be shifting over to feed their agendas, I think the actual answer for most people is more cynical-they're just following the money. The same thing they've always done.
I do think the idiot male lead problem has been with us for longer than my own lifetime and isn't especially worse off now than in the past. Married...With Children (made before my lifetime) and The Simpsons really seemed to open the floodgates on that. But there are still plenty of resourceful males on TV and in film, as I mentioned above. I think there's a market for both types of depictions.
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There may have been stereotypes before but it was more based on what the reality was at the time with the main goal being to entertain. Not influenced by any social or political agendas.
But there were literal agendas enforced via things like the Hays Code and the National Legion of Decency for
decades. This is not a quality judgment by any means-great art can be found in every era of media-but agendas were and have always been part of the equation. Every era's media is a reflection of the values and mores of the time period in which they were made, sometimes better hidden to modern eyes than others. You might find one era or depiction of values preferable to another, but agendas have driven ALL eras of media-what is depicted and how; who gets to be included and how; so on and so forth. It's always been with us and it always will be.
