Hollywood Victims
by John W. Cones

In response to those who would suggest that there are no victims for the Hollywood malfeasance cited in this author's series of books on Hollywood, the following is a fairly comprehensive list of the victims of the Hollywood-based U.S. film industry. Additional suggested Hollywood victims may be offered for inclusion in this list through the FIRM site Discussion Forum.

1. Millions of children who are exposed to violence, graphic sexual content and excessive foul language because the industry does not properly rate movies or provide adequate advance information about motion picture content.

2. Millions of parents who are fooled into spending their hard-earned money and taking their children to inappropriate movies.

3. Millions of children and adults who are exposed over a lifetime to consistent negative and stereotypical portrayals of certain populations in our diverse society. Such portrayals lead to prejudice, which in turn leads to discrimination and unnecessary conflict, adversely affecting the entire nation.

4. Millions of politicians, government officials, parents, teachers and others in positions of authority who are consistently portrayed as fools and bumbling idiots in Hollywood movies (the Hollywood anti-authority themes).

5. Millions of Arabs and Arab-Americans, African-Americans, Latinos, Women, Gays/Lesbians, German-Americans, Italian-Americans, Irish-Americans, Asian- Americans, Native Americans, Southerners and others who have been victimized by Hollywood prejudice expressed through the consistent negative and stereotypical portrayals of these populations.

6. Millions of Christians and Muslims who are also regularly portrayed in a negative and stereotypical manner in Hollywood films.

7. Thousands of large and small investors who foolishly believe that they will be treated fairly by Hollywood deal makers and accounting practices.

8. Thousands of attractive women from all over the world who are drawn to Hollywood thinking they may become movie stars, only to end up selling their bodies to survive. Some do not survive.

9. Thousands of attractive struggling actresses and actors who are booked by unscrupulous agents into foreign entertainment gigs that turn out to be nothing more than the modern-day version of a white slave trade.

10. Hundreds of small independent producers who cannot get their movies into decent theatres because they are squeezed out of the marketplace by the releases of the major studio/distributors, whose movies are not always of better quality, but who use anti-competitive business practices to gain leverage over the exhibitors.

11. Thousands of actors, actresses, directors, producers, screenwriters, composers and studio executives from all over the country who are routinely excluded from fair access to opportunities in Hollywood through nepotism, favoritism, cronyism, blacklisting and other forms of employment discrimination rampant in the Hollywood-based U.S. film industry.

12. Hundreds of actors, actresses, directors, producers, screenwriters who have tried to demand a fair accounting of film revenues and have been blacklisted for their efforts.

13. Thousands of actors, actresses, directors, producers, screenwriters who would have demanded a fair accounting from the major studio/distributors or would have taken the studios to court but for the reasonable fear of being blacklisted.

14. Thousands of actors, actresses, directors, producers, screenwriters and composers who are cheated out of good work on major films because powerful talent agents regularly exclude them from their packaged deals presented to the studios on a take it or leave it basis (a clear violation of the antitrust laws).

15. Thousands of screenwriters all across the country whose ideas or actual screenplays are stolen from them in a Hollywood system that does not provide fair protection or just compensation for either.

16. Hundreds of small independent theatres that cannot get fair access to the releases of the major studio/distributors because distribution is not conducted on a truly competitive basis.

17. The U.S. Justice Department that cannot function as it should in vigorously enforcing the U.S. antitrust laws in the film industry because of political interference originating in the White House.

18. The hundreds of Congressional politicians who do not have the courage to properly investigate Hollywood because of the millions of dollars in campaign contributions periodically directed toward their campaigns or the campaigns of their opponents.

19. Private sector film ratings and review organizations that do not have the same access to pre-screened movies as the MPAA's ratings board and whose services are overlooked by the moviegoers because the MPAA has misled the American public and its governmental representatives into thinking the MPAA ratings are adequate.

20. Hundreds of independent feature film producers whose movies are rated by the MPAA ratings board by a different and discriminatory set of standards than the films of the major studio/distributors, the member companies of the MPAA itself.

21. Thousands of independent producers and distributors from Canada and other countries whose movies are unfairly excluded from wide distribution in the U.S. and from theatrical exhibition in their own countries because the major U.S. studio/distributors dominate the screens of most foreign territories, using the same or similar unfair, unethical, unconscionable, anti-competitive, predatory and illegal business practices that they have used for some 90 years here in the U.S.

22. Independent film studios in parts of the country other than Hollywood that are placed at a competitive disadvantage by some of the same unfair, unethical, unconscionable, anti-competitive, predatory and illegal business practices of the majors.

23. Other segments of struggling film industries in the states of New York, Texas, Florida, North Carolina, Idaho, Washington, and elsewhere that cannot survive because of the business practices of the Hollywood-based major studio/distributors.

24. Moviegoers of all types who are regularly misled into thinking certain movies are worth seeing and are wrongfully separated from their money by massive and misleading Hollywood advertising.

25. Thousands of legitimate public interest discussion topics that are routinely crowded off the television news and public affairs programs by the overly aggressive promotion of the Hollywood PR machine, the most powerful ever created.

26. The expression of artists of all interests whose visions are regularly sacrificed to the commercial and other interests of the Hollywood majors.

27. The ideas of political conservatives that are routinely shunned in Hollywood movies in favor of liberal political thought.

28. The greater diversity of ideas that could be presented through this significant communications medium if the U.S. film industry were controlled by a more diverse group of people who did not constantly strive to brainwash the American public into believing that movies are merely entertainment, when the truth is that all motion pictures communicate one or more messages, and quite effectively.

29. Millions of actors, actresses, directors, producers, screenwriters, composers, distributors and others who, over the years, have foolishly devoted huge segments of their lives chasing after a career in the film business only to discover that Hollywood is not based on a merit system at all, but a tightly controlled insider's game, thus they never had a chance.

30. Hundreds of other worthy trades and professions that lose talented people to the primarily false lure of Hollywood.

31. Immigrants to the U.S. from all parts of the world except Europe, whose immigrants have been traditionally favored by Hollywood moguls throughout the nearly 100-year history of the Hollywood-based U.S. film industry.

32. All members of the many racial, religious, ethnic, cultural groups and regional groups in America whose important cultural stories cannot make it onto the screen because of the prejudices held by those who control the industry.

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