There hasn’t been this extreme of a culture divide like this in America since the Civil Rights Movement. Morality lies at the center of chaos. Whether you’re Pro-life or for a woman’s right to choose, there are certain issues that neither side will waver from because those issues are hardwired into the brain as if they were genetically predisposed to it. That snowballs into an inherent hatred towards the opposition regardless of new evidence that’s discovered because, let’s face it, most people would rather drown than admit they were wrong.
Conservative talk show anchors coined this “Hollywood elitists” term sometime, ironically, during the 2016 General Election. Ironic, considering, now-President Donald Trump was a television star and conservatives golden boy was always former President Ronald Reagan, coincidentally, a former actor.
It wasn’t long ago that conservative anchors on Fox News would ignore celebrity activists because they just didn’t see them as a legitimate threat. But maybe it’s the emergence of Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert at Comedy Central is when a shift started.
Stewart and Colbert were an essential part of a movement of exposing idiocy and hypocrisy that largely exists in the GOP party and Fox News
Stephen Colbert’s character on The Colbert Report was a mockery amalgamation of delusional commentators like Glen Beck or Rush Limbaugh but the character was specifically aimed at Bill O’Reilly. Their cult following grew to enormous heights, which some could argue that it at least had a small part in election of our first black commander-in-chief, President Barack Obama.
But with the emergence of social media as a prominent back-and-forth discourse – particularly with the explosion of Twitter – these celebrities threaten conservative anchors’ values and their base constantly ridiculed – deservedly so – when their hypocrisy is exposed. So they retaliate by throwing around umbrella terms like “Hollywood elitists” as a way to communicate to their viewers that these celebrities condescend to you, they think they’re above you.
But there is something much more innate. A deeper-seated issue that lies at the core. It’s jealousy.
It’s not the fame that they envy; it’s the gift they have of being artistry. These pundits think they can do what they do.
Did you know Sean Hannity produced a movie recently?
On his show, Hannity shamelessly bragged about a movie he executive produced and helped finance called “Let There Be Light.” What’s worse is that he makes a sizable cameo. Yeah, he had to literally buy his way into a role. He audaciously claimed in an interview the Washington Times, “I’d say 98 percent of people who watch it cry,” a comment that reeks of desperation and validation.
Norman Reedus told Jimmy Fallon last year during an interview on The Tonight Show told a shocking story about how Hannity fawned over comedian Dave Chappelle one night. “When I first met Dave. Sean Hannity kept sending over tequila shots,” Reedus claimed. “He ran into Dave and I guess he geeked out on Dave and just kept sending the table tequila shots all night. It was so weird. And it became, like, a running thing.”
Chappelle tends to lean towards the free speech spectrum with his comedy so it’s a little shocking to hear that a conservative talk show host would put him on a pedestal like that when he criticizes his friends and colleagues on a nightly basis.
Steve Bannon was the Senior Editor at Breitbart News before he took on a senior advisor to President Trump. After he resigned, Bannon resumed his role. Although they consistently mock celebrities who express their outrage on Twitter, Bannon was a filmmaker himself, a bad one at that. George Clooney can attest to that.
“I like picking fights. I like that Breitbart News wants to have my head. I’d be ashamed 10 years from now if those weaselly little putzes, whose voices are getting a lot higher every week as this presidency starts to look worse and worse weren’t still [after me],” Clooney said earlier this year. “Steve Bannon is a failed f—ing screenwriter, and if you’ve ever read [his] screenplay, it’s unbelievable. Now, if he’d somehow managed miraculously to get that thing produced, he’d still be in Hollywood, still making movies and licking my ass to get me to do one of his stupid-ass screenplays.”
Creator and producer of NCIS: New Orleans and The Librarians once tweeted an interesting story about Dana Loesch, an NRA spokeswoman, who became infamous during the CNN Townhall debate about gun control after the Parkland High School massacre.
Dana Loesch came to me 10yrs ago pitching a sitcom starring herself: “A hot young mom who does far right radio show.” Said her age & looks would make 1 side hate her & 1 love her so everyone would watch. Was obsessed w the potential fame & money. I turned her down.
— Paul Guyot (@Fizzhogg) February 22, 2018
These are the same people that perpetuate a “stay out of politics” message. But they unequivocally believe in their heart of hearts that they were destined to be a star. There is nothing more pitiful than attacking those that are power players in an industry that you are desperately trying to break into.
As James Franco says in The Interview to his producer, Seth Rogen, “They hate us cause they ain’t us.”