Taking a stand when you have no legs to stand on is actually sort of impressive.

Hollywood’s continued issues with China are both an ongoing problem and not liable to go away any time soon. Partly because of how mired the industry is in the communist regime but also how unwilling the studios are to rock the boat with the Chi-coms as they are endearing themselves to the oppressive leadership in order to pocket more of the millions from their burgeoning film industry. 

Disney has been under severe fire over its recently released title ”Mulan’’, the live-action remake it relented on releasing theatrically, due to Covid challenges in the marketplace. Once it was offered for sale on the Disney-Plus streaming platform a controversy flared; it was discovered the company was thanking the Turpan Public Security Bureau in the closing credits. The TPSB is a militant authority arm of the Chi-com government, one known for hostilities and human rights abuses against the communities of Muslim Uighurs in the Xinjiang region on the Mainland.

This was enough of a concern for the British Parliament members to write a letter of concern to the Disney company, looking for an explanation as to why they had worked hand in hand with this abusive authority. In response to this letter, one of Disney’s top executives responded with a public letter of their own. Sean Bailey, president of the Disney film division explained their position.

“There are regulations that must be followed by all foreign film production companies wanting to operate in China. These companies are not allowed to operate independently and must partner with a Chinese production company which is responsible for securing all film permits. The decision to film in each of these locations was made by the film’s producers to film in the interest of authenticity, and was in no way influenced or dictated by state or local Chinese officials,”

In other words, it just couldn’t be helped, according to the studio. Except — it could. As a means of further excuse-making the claim was that the footage making it into the final cut was only amounting to 78 seconds of screen time. Since the majority of principal photography took place in New Zealand it seems rather reasonable that just over one minute of footage could have been shot on location there as well.

In truth, what took place was the need to have a Chinese partnering production company, in order for the movie to both be allowed into the Chinese film marketplace, and to qualify Disney for a greater percentage of the box office. For this they sacrificed both human rights goodwill and international anger over working with the oppressive Chi-com regime.

Making this decision more outlandish is that last summer then-CEO of Disney Bob Iger came out with an announcement that it would be a deep concern for the company to continue filming in the state of Georgia, all due to the passing of a heartbeat abortion law in that state. So Disney was willing to show more concern and reticence over a legally passed legislation by the voters in a US state than in working together with a human rights abusing police force operating on behalf of a communist dictatorship in a hostile and competitive nation.

This is emblematic of all of the issues involved with Hollywood’s incestuous relationship with the communist regime. The willingness to slander and shame a democratically operating US state while defending work with a hostile nation is revelatory.