5 Comments
⭠ Return to thread

Half the "new member" decline happens in year 2018, the other half in 2019-20? No further loss in 2021? The decline-trend almost entirely predates the George Floyd Riots; as three-quarters of the calendar-time for that 2019-20 decline predates the death of George Floyd, and then the losses stop in 2021.

(This is all taking Table 10 at face value, assuming the changes tie directly to the listed year.)

The big caveat is that this is "new members," of course. How long does one keep membership once one gets inducted? For life? For a period of x years? Several years of anti-white-writer policies in Hollywood could only affect the entire stock of card-carrying Guild members by a measly few points. (As so often, bad for the b.1980s and b.1990s sets but not bad for the b.1940s and b.1950s sets.) A correction in the mid-2020s could, in principle, balance things out.

Expand full comment

The Oscars So White hashtag campaign was started (by a fired Obama Administration official who was lucky to avoid jail) in 2015.

Expand full comment

It’s also kind of daft.

Black male American actors are per capita the best in the world. They are far more visible in movies and TV than minorities with larger populations like Hispanics.

Denzel Washington really rescued Gladiator II with a nicely camp performance.

Expand full comment

I think you are technically a member for as long as you want, but you lose the actual benefits of membership if you don't get any paying writing gigs for some number of years. I was looking at a Reddit thread on this topic and it had lots of stories of people like this one writer who has 10 emmys (or was it nominations) under his belt and just moved to a studio apartment. There has always been age discrimination in the business. I'm under the impression almost no one makes an entire exclusive career of being a TV/Movie writer

Expand full comment

> There has always been age discrimination in the business

For good reason

Expand full comment