LILLEY: Dumping Don Cherry hurting HNIC ratings - "Cherry was fired after 35 years on Coach’s Corner after comments about people not wearing poppies on Remembrance Day that some claimed were racist. Speaking about how he sees fewer people wearing poppies in the lead up to Remembrance Day, Cherry went on a rant... Cherry was long-hated by people who never bothered to watch him, or hockey at all. People who simply didn’t like what Cherry said campaigned for years to see him removed from the airwaves and with his poppy comments, they achieved their goal."
Come hell or high fever, the Academy Awards show will go on — live and in-person - "During a pandemic, the list of essential workers is long. It includes, but is not limited to, schoolteachers, firefighters, farm workers, grocery store clerks and truck drivers. But Oscar nominees? Are Glenn Close and Anthony Hopkins “essential”? Should the list include script doctors as well as ER nurses? That seems to be the thinking of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which this week announced that Oscar nominees and their guests will qualify as essential workers when attending the Academy Awards... It made waves last month when organizers announced that Zoom attendance was not an option, even though many nominees would have to travel from Britain or even further afield to attend in person. This after the highlight of the Golden Globes was watching Jodie Foster accept her acting prize from her couch, clad in chic pajamas and curled up next to her wife and her dog... the decision by the Academy to make this year’s event look as normal as possible, come hell or high fever, feels less like hope and more like hubris. The April 25 show will no doubt be a glamorous affair, and surely some of the winners will mention the ongoing pain of the pandemic in their acceptance speeches. But any such remarks will be between effusive thanks lobbed at their essential team of producers, publicists and assistants. And if you’re an out-of-work hair stylist waiting for a vaccination and counting the days until lockdown ends, hearing praise for an “essential worker” who does basically the same thing, that’s going to sting."
Oscars: Masks Not Required When Cameras Roll, But Required During Commercial Breaks - "The move comes amid President Joe Biden’s public and persistent appeal that Americans wear masks “until everyone is in fact vaccinated” — which is a modified request of his original plea of 100 days."
WATCH: Oscars attendees wear masks despite being vaccinated and tested
Morning Brew ☕️ on Twitter - "Oscars viewership through the years 2014: 43.7 million 2015: 37.3 million 2016: 34.4 million 2017: 32.9 million 2018: 26.5 million 2019: 29.6 million 2020: 23.6 million 2021: 9.8 million"
Academy Award Nominations: Preachy Winners & Dull Movies -- and What Happened to 'Hamilton'? - "This year, there’s not one entertaining film among the Academy’s eight Best Picture nominees. Three potential explanations: Hollywood has given up on the idea of entertaining viewers; the COVID year of American movies was completely bereft of pleasure; or the idea of entertainment has been, to use the Obama–Bernie Sanders threat, “fundamentally transformed.” Now movies are only about indoctrination and self-congratulation; the man behind the curtain says, Pay no attention to freedom, liberty, your bill of rights, or fun. After the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ recent “diversity initiatives” changed its membership rolls, it seems that all the voters just want to have their biases confirmed. Selecting such contraptions as The Father, Judas and the Black Messiah, Mank, Minari, Nomadland, Promising Young Woman, Sound of Metal, and The Trial of the Chicago 7 out of all the releases in 2020 is the end result of the Academy’s cultural engineering. It ratifies how the industry has altered — mutilated — its sense of aesthetic quality, merely to fit the times. At first, that Best Picture list looks politicized — like a race and gender-studies reading list. It doesn’t look amusing. Instead, it lacks broad attraction and the promise of a good time that used to be proven by the fact of popularity. One 2020 release is conspicuously absent from the list: Hamilton. Yes, even Disney’s streaming presentation of the overrated Broadway musical Hamilton, intended to rock last summer’s July 4th celebrations, had indicated a nod toward entertainment and the notion of wide, if specious, appeal. But the dismissal of Hamilton — the hallowed show conceived to celebrate “hope and change” politics — proves the almost tangible failure of that movement. Hailed as the cultural event of the era, it failed to have a lasting impact. You could argue that many of the nominees show the obvious influence of Hamilton’s facile presentation of history and politics, but none are compelling, and none have proved culturally galvanizing. I’m not displeased by Hamilton’s shut-out; it was minimally cinematic (repeating the stage production’s proscenium perspective and the mishmash of nontraditional equity casting that yet was guilty of left-wing racial bias). Those jumpy non-melodies and knotty rhymes you hear in Hamilton are not rap music but dog whistles. It communicates to those who don’t like hip-hop but feel hip when they hop to the commands of the mainstream media that celebrated Hamilton and its Obama-era politics. (John Bolton’s memoir viciously alluded to Hamilton’s romanticized political vengeance.) In the past, film adaptations of such Broadway hits as West Side Story, The Sound of Music, Funny Girl, Hello, Dolly!, Fiddler on the Roof, even the cynical Cabaret, once united our cultural identity, and, as a result, all were Oscar-nominated. The Academy’s rebuff of Hamilton has revealed that the show’s cultural status was not insuperable; it was always simply a means of progressives’ self-intoxication. It entertained no one outside of Broadway and editorial-page writers. That Hamilton’s Tony Award–winning co-star Leslie Odom Jr. got an Oscar nomination for a different film (impersonating Sam Cooke in the miserable One Night in Miami) certifies that Hamilton lacked real star power (creator Lin-Manuel Miranda sucked up all the publicity, yet his whiney-voiced characterization left viewers cold)... And yet, none of the Academy’s eight Best Picture nominees rival the “legendary” impression that Hamilton made. Each soon-to-be forgotten film offers a passive-aggressive reorganization of American principles into sentimental sermons about class, race and sex, as if progressives have finally convinced everyone to think alike, but without joy, satisfaction, or social harmony in return — just self-righteousness and misery, well symbolized by Frances McDormand’s grim visage in Nomadland. Not a single film is uplifting; but neither was Hamilton, which surely is the reason it flopped. This year’s Oscar nominees all flop. They’re anti-populist non-entertainments. Fact is, the Academy’s choices show that the film industry no longer cares about any sort of popularity, not even in Hamilton’s elitist, pseudo-populist fashion"
Oscars Ratings Tank Massively - "the New York Times data found that “minute-by-minute post-show ratings analysis indicated that ‘vast swaths’ of people turned off their televisions when celebrities started to opine on politics.” Of course, this year was no different with Hollywood elites injecting progressive politics into as many lines as possible... Hollywood isn’t exactly a brand that can afford to tell half of the country it’s racist, yet it does so anyway."
The Oscars - so where did the fun go? - "Even Anthony Hopkins, who deservedly took Best Actor for his terrifying performance in The Father, managed to be “asleep in Wales” so he didn’t have to give an acceptance speech. My guess is 83-year-old Hopkins would have very little tolerance for the kind of virtue-signalling his younger colleagues go in for. Things were great as long as the stars remembered people loved them because a/they look fabulous and b/they’re in showbusiness. Now, they think they’re in the show-and-tell business. Every award, every excruciating utterance, indicates that the speaker is a green, social justice warrior instead of a pampered Beverly Hills princeling whose agent negotiates furiously for the biggest, gas-guzzling trailer. Chloe Zhao’s Nomadland is a hauntingly sad and beautiful study of the flotsam and jetsam caused by the 2008 recession. I admired it hugely but, as Best Picture, it’s hardly box office. Signs that the Academy knew it was in trouble came last year when it proposed a new category of Best Popular Movie – an embarrassing admission that the shortlisted films are big on diversity and short on mass-market appeal... In recent years, my favourite part of the Oscars has been the In Memoriam section. All those clips from great movies starring the graceful dead, transporting you to a golden era of Hollywood when Grace Kelly walked in the door and all heaven broke loose. On Sunday night, they even managed to ruin that pleasure, giving the names of the recently deceased with only a still photograph. If Hollywood doesn’t find a way to quit lecturing and give pleasure to people again – Kiss Kiss Bang Bang – it’s cinema that will be dying."
Disney Feels ‘Hard Impact’ of Disastrous Oscars Ratings as ABC Faces Advertiser Uncertainty - "Millions of Americans who have grown weary of left-wing lectures from celebrities decided against watching this year’s Academy Awards, helping to send ratings for the ABC telecast plummeting to their lowest level in modern history. Now the Walt Disney Co., which owns ABC, is acknowledging the “hard impact” the disastrous broadcast has had on the company... The 93rd Academy Awards telecast on ABC drew just 10.4 million viewers, a drop of more than 50 percent from the previous year’s record low. The annual broadcast has seen its viewership decline steadily since 2014, when it attracted 43.7 million viewers. The ratings collapse could hurt Disney’s ability to command top dollar from advertisers on Hollywood’s biggest night. Deadline reported ABC is asking advertisers to pay $2 million and more for 30-second commercials on Oscar night. Disney has reportedly suggested that all corporate “sponsorships” will be reviewed... the company reported disappointing quarterly results, with subscriptions for its Disney+ streaming service falling below Wall Street’s expectations. The news caused Disney stock to sink 4 percent."
Oh Just Nickelodeon Indoctrinating Our Kids About "Environmental Racism" - "Of course, the cowards won't let anyone reply to the tweet"
Nolte: CBSViacom's Child-Grooming Campaign (via Nickelodeon) Isn't Going So Well for Ratings - "Nickelodeon, a cable network that used to entertain children and is now aggressively looking to prematurely sexualize them, is facing a well-deserved ratings collapse... What had regularly been a top-rated cable network pre-grooming can now barely attract a third of its audience from 2017. In July of 2017, Nickelodeon was averaging around 1.2 million viewers per week. Since February of this year, the channel has not been able to push its average viewership over 400,000. Last month, the numbers crashed as low as just 328,000."
Unwoke is the jobs board that helps companies avoid accidentally hiring radical activists - "“Let the woke go broke” – the Unwoke platform says at one point in its pitch game posted on its website. It’s certainly one way to try to sloganeer away from the need to focus back from performative politics that end up making actual talent in their chosen field ousted and even unemployable, all due to their real or perceived ideological transgressions – that all too often have nothing to do with these people’s professional credentials or skills that they bring to the table. The idea is that if “woke” employers continue to hire and prefer employees who check the ideological and performative boxes – they will soon end up with a sub-par professional workforce, because many actually competent workers will have been driven out, sometimes on no more than a heated whim.Well, the Unwoke platform’s bottom line message seems to be to correct for this.“Hire thinkers. Not activists. Hire courageous, free thinking and freedom loving individuals. Not ideologues whose only agenda is to weaponize your brand and business to further a radical cause”... The idea is to provide a platform connecting employers and job seekers, in this current niche – yet sadly growing every day – those who might have been left jobless, unemployable, or simply perhaps overwhelmed with what they see as morally corrupt practices in their “woke” workplace to which they no longer wish to contribute, and which they thus decide to escape from... The point seems to be not to actively challenge the “woke” competition – as it gets quagmired in a hell of its own making.Those ever moving-goalposts of what’s acceptable and embraced by the lords of the “cancel culture” – who simultaneously continue to lose practical and pragmatic, skilled talent that can actually get the job done."
Of course the media hate it
Daily Question | 10/06/2020 | YouGov - "Do you think commercial and retail brands should or should not take a side on political issues?
They should 19%
They should not 56%
Don't know 25%"
This could explain get woke, go broke
Doctor Who Ratings Drop; Loses Over A Million Fans - "Doctor Who ratings continue to drop as Sunday's episode is the worst ever for Jodie Whittaker and Chris Chibnall."
Get woke, go broke
Sports Industry Facing Negative Image In Gallup Poll - "The sports industry now has a negative image, on balance, among Americans as a whole, with 30 percent viewing the industry positively and 40 percent negatively, for minus-10 percent negative rating... 'Democrats’ view of the sports industry has not changed significantly in the past year, while Republicans’ has slipped from a +11 net-positive score in 2019 to a net -35 today, and independents’ from +26 to -10.'"
What a speedy fall from grace - even among independents
David Hookstead on Twitter - "Tucker Carlson's TV ratings continue to dominate the NBA. His Thursday night show had 3.65 million viewers. Two NBA primetime Thursday games COMBINED for only 2.6 million viewers. It's a ratings massacre. The NBA can't touch Tucker."
Mini AOC on Twitter - "The NBA finally achieved equality. They have the same ratings as the WNBA."
A&E Has Lost Half Its Viewers Since Dropping ‘Live PD’ - WSJ - "Ratings for A&E Network have plummeted since it canceled the hit police reality show “Live PD” on June 10, a sign of how much the network relies on law-enforcement programming... A&E, co-owned by the Walt Disney Co. and Hearst Corp., dropped “Live PD” in the wake of the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer."
Ratings Crash for NBA, MLB After Protest-Filled Debuts - "With both baseball and basketball draped in all sorts of Black Lives Matter and social justice symbolism for their opening games, a substantially smaller number of fans tuned-in to the rest of the week’s games... baseball can’t blame the coronavirus. The virus didn’t stop people from watching Tom Brady golf with Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson back in May."
Jonathan Isaac’s Jersey Sales Have Skyrocketed After He Became First NBA Player To Stand For National Anthem In Season Restart - "Just a few days ago Jonathan Isaac was a relatively unknown player on the Orlando Magic but he has become a fan favorite among a certain section of the population nearly overnight.On Friday, Isaac became the first NBA player to stand for the national anthem during the NBA’s season restart in Orlando. Isaac also chose to not wear a Black Lives Matter shirt during the anthem as well... As of Sunday, Isaac has the second best-selling jersey on the NBA’s website behind only LeBron James."
NBA ratings continue to plummet as viewers tune out prime Christmas matchups
New poll says NBA ratings have plunged because of racial justice protests - "A Harris poll seemed to back his claims, reporting that 38 percent of nearly 2,000 people chose "The league has become too political" when given 10 choices on why they are watching less basketball. "Boring without fans" said another 28 percent, while 19 percent said it was the NBA’s association with China."
NBA will stop pushing BLM message on the court after ratings plummet - "Adam Silver, the commissioner of the NBA, had during past months insisted in promoting a pro Black Lives Matter to support the leagues overwhelmingly African American players."
Clay Travis on Twitter - "The NBA never said no to the players. They okayed everything — political messages on jerseys, kneeling for the national anthem, political messages on the court itself — and it still wasn’t enough. And now their business doesn’t exist. Lesson: you can’t ever be woke enough."
Panic Time: NBA Fast-Approaching Historic Ratings Lows
NBA Semifinals Viewership Crashes Double-Digits from 2019
New Affirmative Action Program Forces NBA Teams To Sign More Pudgy White Guys | The Babylon Bee - "The NBA announced Friday that for the upcoming basketball season, the league will be assigning an "adversity score" to overweight white dudes to help more of them get signed with professional basketball teams."
NFL ratings plummet for season opener—fans boo players' moment of silence for social justice
Escape The Echo Chamber - Posts | Facebook - "The NFL is in a bind. They know that being overtly political will cost them viewership. Ratings dropped 20% when the kneeling became widespread. They are in the entertainment and diversion business. They also know that apublic disagreement with their stars will kill sales as well. So the NFL has agreed to add “End Racism” and “It Takes All of Us” to the end zones for at least the first week. Does anyone believe that a KKK member or Nation of Islam member will view “end racism” in the end zone and suddenly decide they’ve been wrong about race? Of course not. The messages give the appearance of doing something meaningful, without actually accomplishing anything. Meanwhile there are a few NFL players that meet with police and get involved in disadvantaged neighborhoods to improve lives. They do make a difference. Ironically, the NFL and other sports leagues counter racism by engaging people from all walks of life into a common tribe where everyone is joined together in rooting for their favorite team."
Meme - "Who excited for this new thing?" - Producer
"YAY!" - 3 fans (1 is a silent SJW)
"I don't like this thing. It is problematic." - SJW
"Okay I'll remove the bad stuff." - Producer
"Okay here is the new and improved thing." - Producer
"We don't like this." - 3 fans
"Why did you had that thing removed?" - 3 fans
"LOL I'M NOT TAKING YOUR TOYS AWAY. GO TOUCH GRASS YOU PATHETIC MANCHILD." - SJW
"Let's find other fun thing." - 3 fans
"Hey my fun thing came out. Are you gonna buy it?" - Producer
"No." - SJW
'Y: The Last Man' Gets Cancelled After First Season - ""We had a gender diverse team of brilliant artists, led by women at almost every corner of our production… It is the most collaborative, creatively fulfilling and beautiful thing I have ever been a part of. We don’t want it to end.”... the series was primarily handled by a creative team of women with all the episodes being directed by female directors."
Along with Coins This Christmas, Salvation Army Wants White Donors to Offer a 'Sincere Apology' for Their Racism - "It’s part of a push by the Christian charitable organization to embrace the ideas of Black Lives Matter, an activist group working to, among other things, “dismantle white privilege” and “disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure.” The Salvation Army’s Alexandria-based leadership has created an “International Social Justice Commission” which has developed and released a “resource” to educate its white donors, volunteers and employees called Let’s Talk about Racism. It asserts Christianity is institutionally racist, calling for white Christians to repent and offer “a sincere apology” to blacks for being “antagonistic.. to black people or the culture, values and interests of the black community.” “Many have come to believe that we live in a post-racial society, but racism is very real for our brothers and sisters who are refused jobs and housing, denied basic rights and brutalized and oppressed simply because of the color of their skin,” one lesson explains. “There is an urgent need for Christians to evaluate racist attitudes and practices in light of our faith, and to live faithfully in today’s world.” In an accompanying Study Guide on Racism, Salvation Army authors explain that all whites are racist, even if they don’t realize it. “The subtle nature of racism is such that people who are not consciously racist easily function with the privileges, empowerment and benefits of the dominant ethnicity, thus unintentionally perpetuating injustice,” it says. “Sunday school curriculum that only uses white photography and imagery” is an example given that perpetuates injustice. “We must stop denying the existence of individual and systemic/ institutional racism. They exist, and are still at work to keep White Americans in power,” the lesson says. “These systems give privileges to white people” Let’s Talk about Racism pushes arguments identical to those of leading “Critical Race Theory” purveyors Robin DiAngelo and Henry Rogers (a.k.a. Ibram Kendi), whose work is recommended by Salvation Army authors... Proponents of “Critical Race Theory” don’t believe whites, Asians or Hispanics can avoid being prejudiced against blacks. They want them to demonstrate what they call “anti-racism” in favor of blacks, helping to establish lower standards for them than they do members of other racial groups, or making cash “reparation” payments to blacks as compensation for alleged previous racism."
Salvation Army's Donors Withdraw Support in Response to Racial 'Wokeness' Initiative - "That's troublesome for those who note The Salvation Army has been a leader in confronting racism long before the rest of the country and over five decades before the civil rights movement. And they're asking why then should members of an organization built by the Christian faith to actually assist people of all races in need, be repentant of behavior they never perpetuated?... "In my estimation, CRT is a Trojan horse taking in well-intentioned Christian enterprises that—because they care about justice and oppose oppression—naively promote the most serious threat to biblical Christianity I have seen in 50 years," wrote Christian apologist and radio talk show host Greg Koukl in a Facebook post earlier this month. Entitled An Open Letter to The Salvation Army, Koukl prefaces the post by informing TSA that he is terminating his monthly donations and directing them to another organization. Koukl is also the founder and president of the Stand to Reason, a non-profit religious organization that "trains Christians to think more clearly about their faith and to make an even-handed defense for classical Christianity."... General Brian Peddle, CEO of The Salvation Army announced the initiative in February through a video in which he said "it examines racism through the lens of scripture, church and world history and guides gracious discussions about overcoming the damage racism has inflicted upon our world and yes, on our Salvation Army." "As we anticipate having courageous conversations about race please join me in working toward a world in which all people feel included, valued and loved on Earth just as they are in heaven," Peddle stated in the one-minute video... Xu questioned why the traditionally a-political Salvation Army would begin to promote such political and racial ideologies to begin with, which led him to organize a petition, co-written by Salvation Army captains and sponsored through Color Us United. It asks those to "stand against the insertion of politically charged racial ideologies into The Salvation Army's good work." The appeal, calling for a revocation of the "Let's Talk About Racism" curriculum, currently has 12,200 signatures from members and donors rejecting what they consider a "woke script."... "Repentance solely for the fact that you're white, we don't think that's very productive," Xu told Newsweek, who also noted that 60 percent of those served by The Salvation Army are from ethnic minority communities. That's a statistic he told Newsweek he discovered by talking to Commissioner and TSA National Commander Kenneth G. Hodder. "Here's the thing with the SA that's so crazy—these people spend their entire lives serving the poor," said Xu. "There is absolutely no reason to even suggest or insinuate repentance for their supposed complicity in racism." Xu noted that after he spoke to Hodder about his concerns and current petition, the extensive "Let's Talk About Racism" guide (along with its diversity, equity and inclusion trainings) was moved from the first page of The Salvation Army's International Social Justice Commission site to a less visible page. In a November 4 Facebook post by Koukl, he noted it was now listed as a guide on the site's "Resources" page... there are those inside the organization that are finding it challenging to accept the incongruence between the organization's new initiative and its historically non-political stance. "As so many oppose this within and without our ranks, why are we clinging onto it so tightly?" wrote active officer Captain Charles DeJesus of the Salvation Army's western territory, in a public Facebook post that he has since taken down. In it, DeJesus, who is Black, asked Salvation Army leaders and influencers to get the organization back to being apolitical... Newsweek talked to other donors, who are at the very least questioning the Salvation Army's entree into "woke" territory with some, like Koukl, going so far as to pull their support entirely. One such concerned donor is a longtime former chairman of the organization's advisory board and current national board advisory member Mary Theroux".
The true beauty of it is that all this self-flagellation still won't stop liberals condemning them, so they are doubly screwed
'The situation is dire'; Salvation Army facing toy, donation shortage ahead of holidays - ""There are many reasons why both financial and toy donations are down this year, not the least of which is likely pandemic fatigue and concerns about employment and the future," said Colonel Cindy Foley of the NW Salvation Army Division... Not only is the nonprofit organization short on donations, they also are in desperate need of bell ringers to staff the red kettles seen at businesses around the country.
Weird how in 2020 during the pandemic they weren't in as much trouble
Nolte: 'In the Heights' Is Hollywood's Umpteenth Woke Box Office Fail - "even Hispanics don’t want to see movies that celebrate being Hispanic. That’s not entertaining. That’s homework. Dear Racist Hollywood: Hispanics are just like the rest of us, so what they’re looking for at the movies is entertainment, not a lecture. And a promotion campaign that basically said, You’re going to love this movie because skin tone!, was — let me be generous — just a tad condescending. I’ve spent two-thirds of my life with a Mexican immigrant who loves her culture and traditions, but Because Brown is not enough to sucker her into watching a lecture."
Kimmel, Colbert, Fallon Ratings Plummet for Four Months Straight Among Key Youth Demographic - "In a sign of their declining popularity, late-night comedians Jimmy Kimmel, Stephen Colbert, and Jimmy Fallon have seen their ratings plummet for more than four months straight, as viewers in the coveted 18-49 year old demographic are tuning out consistently compared to last year... The across-the-board ratings decline signals trouble for the three major networks as they continue to use their late-night shows to push a radical left-wing agenda while demonizing conservatives. CBS’ The Late Show host Stephen Colbert recently attacked the Supreme Court in anticipation of its abortion ruling that could overturn Roe v. Wade. ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel has used his show to prop up Dr. Anthony Fauci, recently smearing the government official’s critics as “scumbags” and “screwballs.” NBC’s Tonight Show attempted to bury online versions of last year’s gushing interview with then-New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) and host Jimmy Fallon, after the governor resigned in disgrace in August. CBS’ The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has reigned supreme for five consecutive seasons as the most-watched of the three major late-night shows. But the networks are now facing growing competition from Fox News’ Gutfeld!, which offers a right-leaning answer to mainstream late-night comedy."