Why does Star Wars have such a noticable right-wing following?

[Myradin]

just look at the anti-wokeism movement for the Sequel Trilogy's releases and some Youtube channels like Critical Drinker that promote the far-right.

I feel like there's a difference between 'anti-wokeism' in real life where there's banning books and squashing people's lives, and 'anti-wokeism' in media where one doesn't want stories about perfect flawless heroes who are boring and often devalue their former counterparts in a franchise, and then hide behind bad writing by accusing anyone who points out these issues as being sexist.

The Drinker even recommends Arcane, a show full of progressive stuff and literately starring two strong female characters who are definitely coded as romantically interested in eachother. Why? Because its actually written well and isn't prioritizing message over story.

[Tuor]

SW is about a corupt republic vs an authoritarian regime, being the free republic that doesn't apeal to everyone left winged and the authoritarian that opresses everyone right wing.

Since the original movies are actually about fighting the opressing regime, i would say its actually a center-right franchise, not a extreme right.

For me, i just enjoy watching it as it is, with political conotations.

[Kathandira]

"Following" is not the same as "fandom," imo.

Clickbait outrage YouTubers like Critical Drinker (since he was mentioned) and their viewers aren't necessarily fans of certain IP. A lot of these people are followers. They follow the outrage because being mad at things lets them fit in with other arseholes. YouTubers simply capitalise on what is apparently a very easy market to do well in.

Are some of those followers also fans? Sure. But every fandom has their own toxic elements who may truly hold shitty views, or they're also looking to fit in somewhere and outrage is by far the easiest to get into.

I find most are just horrible people following outrage.

Thumbs up to this distinction between fan and follower. Well said.

[draynay]

But every fandom has their own toxic elements who may truly hold shitty views, or they're also looking to fit in somewhere and outrage is by far the easiest to get into.

It's true, I think Star Wars fans became more "noticeable" from the way franchise actors were targeted and harassed. I'm sure most Star Wars fans are decent people, but the loudest and most horrible of them draw a lot of attention.

Star Trek has far right fans too which is even more confusing because of how progressive it has always been. These far right fans complain about the same things, like the new stuff is "too woke" while seemingly oblivious to what the franchise has been about since the beginning.

[Kralljin]

I would agree if the right wing was such a big part of any of those franchises their boycotts would not fail so miserably.

Eh, boycotts are usually instigated by a small minority, let alone one that actually follows through with it and is thus bound to fail.

One can also point at a more recent example from the left wing with Hogwarts Legacy, where some people resorted to rather nasty tactics to shame people into not playing the game.

End result was that most people people just didn't give a shit, played the game anyway and it probably gained even traction because of the Streisand effect.
The Majority simply doesn't care about these issues, that's why those boycotts fail.

What should be more concerning in those aspects is that media savy marketing might instigate those controversies / boycotts to specifically get more attention, but that's another story.

There are certain things the right wing seems to be not into nerd/geek culture, comedy to name a few it's just not their thing.

While i wouldn't consider comedy part of nerd/geek culture, i say that could change.

One of the issues that previously existed was in my view that the Rightwing / Conservative side had far too many idiots to ignore and instead make fun of centrist democrats, so any conservative comedian had simply less to work with.
While that amount has certainly not changed (arguably it has increased), it's also that many of the progressive culture war elements have become an easy target to make fun of.

For example, Dave Chapelle talked and made fun of Transgender people in a recent special and while that carried its own controversy with it, i doubt that it bombed (which i think it didn't) because of it.

Then there's the issue of that progressive positions have become more associated with "censorship" when it comes to media, such as jokes, outfits and so forth being considered "problematic".
Whereas this was more seen as a conservative position in the 80's, 90's and 00's (mostly with talk about "christian values"), it's now often the Right that frames itself as the proponent of free speech (whether that's true is another debate).

Personally, i have a hard time imagining someone such as George Carlin flying with very progressive Elements in the US nowadays, which is ironic because he quit a lucrative television job so he could do standup comedy and say whatever he wanted.

[Kathandira]

Then there's the issue of that progressive positions have become more associated with "censorship" when it comes to media, such as jokes, outfits and so forth being considered "problematic".

In regards to conservative comedians having difficulty with censorship. It is a profitable lie.

Bill Burr had a comedy special sponsored by and released on Netflix. He brought together a few controversial comedians and each did their acts. It was hilarious, and a lot of fun to watch. But the thing that was more ironically funny was that just about each of them had a joke about how they cannot tell jokes anymore because of the woke crowd.

Think about it though. Netflix is seen a the woke streaming service. They paid all the comedians and filmed the show. Additionally, a comedian telling you they cannot get a gig anymore because their jokes aren't acceptable, all the while telling said jokes, and a gig....If this irony is missed, then...I dunno...

[Endus]

Loaded question? It doesn't. Wouldn't even make sense. SW gas always been told through a liberal, and at least socially progressive, lens. It's always shitted on conservative ideologies and never slowed down to feed any right wing narrative.

I don't agree that it's a big right-wing thing, but I wanted to take issue with this claim. Look at the original trilogy with an honest eye. There are literally just two women over all three films who are named on-screen; being named in the credits or in expanded universe stuff or in later films/shows outside the OT don't count.

Two women.

One's Leia, obviously. Can you figure out the only other one?

Leia's marginally more "active" than typical damsels in distress, in the OT, but she's literally the princess waiting to be rescued by the heroes at multiple points in the story. Star Wars in the OT was not progressive with female characters. Consider too that Alien came out in '79; compare Ripley to Leia in terms of "progressive" portrayals of women in sci fi.

And that's before we get into the still-super-fucking-weird support for slavery, not just of biologicals, but pretty much all droids, who are clearly presented as thinking, sentient beings but still a slave race, with the only distinction between the Empire and Republic being how widespread the use of restraining bolts is. But the Republic would still wipe the minds of uncooperative droids. Either R2D2 and C3PO are just tools without real identities or personalities, or they're slaves and even the heroes unthinkingly support slavery. Weirdest fuckin' take in Star Wars and the only time they've addressed it in the films, they did so as a joke. Once we throw in slavery of biological people, it's even more galling.

Star Wars really isn't progressive, and basically never has been. Liberal, sure, in the absolute broadest sense, "Nazis BAD" kind of stuff. But it's way more concerned with the aesthetics than the ideological precepts.

Edit: To be clear, I'm not shitting on Star Wars for not being particularly progressive. It's not regressive for its era, either (Except for the slavery stuff, which remains super fuckin' weird). I just don't agree that it pushed social agendas forward in any really meaningful sense.

[Kralljin]

In regards to conservative comedians having difficulty with censorship. It is a profitable lie.

The other side is however that these are not without their controversy that ironically often comes from within the platform.

Netflix had its issues to deal with because of the Dave Chapelle special i talked about, had employees walking out and others even leaking metrics to the press.

Think about it though. Netflix is seen a the woke streaming service

Which is also partially based on Netflix productions race swapping characters and the likes, similiar but not directly related.

[Steelangel]

For starwars people might say they quit but I’d bet any thing the people online who complained about episode 7-9 are still crying about how woke Disney and starwars are.

I complained about 7-9 because they were just bad movies. 7 retread episode 4 worse than episode 1 did, 8 threw away plotlines and threads and 9 was playing cleanup and didn't do a great job of it.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

I complained about 7-9 because they were just bad movies. 7 retread episode 4 worse than episode 1 did, 8 threw away plotlines and threads and 9 was playing cleanup and didn't do a great job of it.

Slight correction of my other post, the people who cried about them being woke.

[Draco-Onis]

Eh, boycotts are usually instigated by a small minority, let alone one that actually follows through with it and is thus bound to fail.

One can also point at a more recent example from the left wing with Hogwarts Legacy, where some people resorted to rather nasty tactics to shame people into not playing the game.

End result was that most people people just didn't give a shit, played the game anyway and it probably gained even traction because of the Streisand effect.
The Majority simply doesn't care about these issues, that's why those boycotts fail.

What should be more concerning in those aspects is that media savy marketing might instigate those controversies / boycotts to specifically get more attention, but that's another story.

There's really no such thing as cancel culture it's a straight myth, the only thing that can cancel you is pissing off your base audience to the point where they hate you. As long as people still want to pay money you cannot be canceled.

Personally, i have a hard time imagining someone such as George Carlin flying with very progressive Elements in the US nowadays, which is ironic because he quit a lucrative television job so he could do standup comedy and say whatever he wanted.

Untrue, there's always been a line as society progresses that line gets moved we can have a debate on where it is but Carlin wouldn't for example crack jokes about the joys of raping someone or molesting kids. The premise that back in the day you could say whatever you want is a lie back in the day comedy skits had white people making fun of black people using the N word. Does that mean we should bring that back too? time moves forward it's crazy to say well back in my day so and so could say whatever they wanted. They may have pushed the limits but they never crossed certain lines.

- - - Updated - - -

Which is also partially based on Netflix productions race swapping characters and the likes, similiar but not directly related.

Let's be frank corporations are not woke most of these companies are lead by white conservatives but they aren't stupid. As much as the right wing hates to say it diversity sells better, if Hitler movies made the most money they would be making those too. They are after profit and that is what scares the right wing that their views are so out of touch that they can't make as much money as being diverse even though everyone in the higher chain is just like them.

That's the true fear of the right wing being in a minority which speaks volumes of how they think minorities are treated in this country.

[Rozz]

This is closed. Certain topics will only spiral further out of control in GenOT.