There has been much debate in Star Wars circles over the last few months about the SJW politics being injected into the Star Wars cinematic universe. While I do not agree their use within Star Wars narratives, there is a bigger issue at hand – SJW Star Wars is content that large parts of the fanbase reject and will not pay for.
SJWs have a knack of injecting their beliefs into popular cultural platforms in an effort to ham-fistedly project their politics into society as they are seemingly unable to create anything of their own that will gain an audience. This is due to their fear of making a wrong step and falling outside their own rapidly shifting belief systems. If they do so in a pre-existing property like Star Wars it is easy to point the finger of blame elsewhere – the fans.
The lack of creativity from the SJW community stems from its inability to listen and its inflexible approach to a broad range of issues in society due to this fear. SJWs are often intentionally divisive, labeling anyone that is not within their ideological auspices a range of derogative names to try and gain a moral superiority even though there is no basis for such actions (see video below).
The only problem with this divisiveness is that it whittles down their communities in small niches that will not pay the bills for major content producers such as Disney.
In recent times we have seen progressive shows such as Sense8 on Netflix be cancelled.
Sense8 was an amazingly produced show and one with a strong theme of diversity that started well but then soon found it was left with a small core audience that was unable to financially sustain the series.
Netflix’s vice president Cindy Holland explained that “at some point if you don’t have the viewership showing up to justify the expense of the series, you’re going to want to end it”.
Now, of course, Netflix later committed to ending the series with a 2-hour special but only as a goodwill gesture. There is no financial future for such a creation.
This example highlights why Disney should tread carefully with their SJW political agenda. Firstly they will never satisfy this ideological audience segment with minor lip service, and secondly, there is not a large enough audience to worry about this sector from a financial viewpoint.
Disney is better off to create new properties tailored to this audience than to augment existing popular properties; turn existing strong fan bases against the very thing they love – in this case, Star Wars.
By mixing the two Disney has let the brand descend into chaos between two groups – Star Wars fans that believe in the ideology of the traditional Star Wars narrative – the hero’s journey; and SJW Star Wars (labelled by the earlier group as Soy Wars) who will abuse any aspect of traditional Star Wars fandom which does not agree with this new ideology and labelling any criticism as racist or sexist – this attitude extends to the key staff of Disney Star Wars, namely Kathleen Kennedy, Rian Johnson, JJ Abrams, and Pablo Hidalgo to name a few and supportive media outlets.
This conflict I think was best explained in recent YouTube video by Alex Becker on his YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ULbkqAuo48
Disney paid 4.05 Billion Dollars for a flagship brand.
Why did they pay this? Because it had an instant audience to draw upon – an audience that spends big and that hold Star Wars and its values as a part of their worldview.
When you create content that conflicts so harshly with this worldview, and then treat the discontent of your loyal customers with complete contempt and favour a low-value ideological preference, only one outcome is possible – a highly devalued audience compared to the one you paid for.
It is time for Disney too think long and hard about Star Wars and embrace the fans of Star Wars once again. It’s time to refocus on Star Wars core values as Kathleen Kennedy and her cohort have taken the brand down a path that is not financially prudent.
Disney simply needs to ask themselves a few questions.
Q: Are we still making Star Wars fans for kids?
If so, then why are SJW politics applicable to a demographic of 5-12 year-old kids?
If not, then why haven’t we (Disney) created any original content strongly focused on SJW values if there is such an audience for it?
The answers are seemingly [1] No it’s not for kids, and [2] there is no financial imperative when we can simply implant it within existing popular properties that can carry them.
Well, good luck with that Disney / Lucasfilm!
The force is not female, male, gay, straight, droid, Gungan or Mandalorian … it’s not an X or Y chromosome!
The force used to be an energy field created by all living things binds the galaxy together. Star Wars was already at forefront of diversity with strong female characters Leia, Mon Mothma, Ahsoka Tano, Padme Amidala, Aurra Sing, Hera Syndulla and Sabine Wren to name but a few. Add to this Kannan Jarrus and the aforementioned Hera Syndulla – they were a couple in the Star Wars Rebels storyline long before any discussions around pansexuality. There was no discussion or labels required just good story telling.
The magic of Star Wars is found by young children naive to the complications of the world. Let’s keep it that way.