By Marisa Herman | Thursday, 15 June 2023 | NEWSMAX
As consumer-driven boycotts to “woke” marketing campaigns and controversial merchandise send stocks spiraling for several major corporations, the backlash to progressive politics has attracted entrepreneurs looking to capitalize on the movement’s momentum.
With major American brands facing activist pressure to embrace leftist political views, conservatives have seen an opening to fight back against the diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives that have become embedded in nearly every facet of day-to-day life.
Atlanta-based marketing and branding expert David Johnson said that businesses promoting products that have nothing to do with politics are “looking smart and cashing in on it.”
He said that beyond simply avoiding their own backlash, companies are successfully “poking fun” and “ridiculing” their rivals’ retreat, with those brands “looking foolish for ever getting involved” in the culture wars.
“When you can ridicule the other side, that’s when you can score points,” Johnson said.
Movie critic James Carrick recently launched a movie review website – “Worth it or Woke?” – to combat the “woke” themes infiltrating many modern films, as studios put activism over acting.
“Ultimately, I’d like to become the go-to source for movie reviews for conservatives,” he said.
Carrick’s site promises “real movie and show reviews for real people who live in the real world.”
“Don’t rely on the woke mob to help you find what to watch,” states the site, which classifies movies into three categories: woke, woke-ish, and non-woke.
Carrick, a movie enthusiast with degrees in theater and philosophy, got the idea to create his review site after he realized he was going out to the movies less frequently during the last few years and noticed that studios seemed to have prioritized diversity efforts over actual theatrical production in many flicks.
He started by analyzing a disparity that often developed between professional critics’ views of films and the general audience’s reception to them, soon identifying that “any time there was a movie that promoted leftist ideology” the critics would hail it as making “brave choices” and give it a glowing score – even if the narrative or overall product didn’t merit the rating.
Carrick said it didn’t take long to realize that the critics didn’t appear to be rating films based on the actual merits, while the public was “complaining about all this activism in movies.”
Two of his most recent write-ups were scathing reviews of the live-action remake of Disney’s classic “The Little Mermaid” and the same studio’s “Peter Pan & Wendy,” a retelling of the popular James Barrie novel.
“From the creative vacuum that is modern Disney… The Little Mermaid sacrifices all of the charm and fun of the original in the name of personal politics and photo-realistic fish,” he wrote of the new release, which he gave a score of 38 out of 100. “It boasts wooden and flat performances, glacial pacing, forced and unnatural dialogue, and questionable CGI.”
While the underwater film was criticized for casting Black actress Halle Bailey as Ariel, who was white in the cartoon version, Carrick said his issues with the film go beyond the “race swapping.”
While it was “pretty obvious” that Disney’s decision to cast Bailey in the role was a “political choice,” he said her performance was “lacking” and was “barely two-dimensional.”
When it comes to the new take on 1953’s Peter Pan, Carrick said the “magic and excitement” just isn’t there.
The film featured Black actress Yara Shahidi as Tinker Bell and introduced females into the crew of the Lost Boys. Still, Carrick rated the film slightly higher than “The Little Mermaid,” awarding it a 47 out of 100.
Carrick noted that a film doesn’t only receive a low score if it is “woke.”
He said the newest film in the Transformers series, “Rise of the Beasts,” was only marked as “woke-ish,” but still got a bad score because it was a “terrible movie.”
Sometimes, he said he even will recommend a “woke-ish” movie that may have “some eye-rolling moments” but overall is still “really good.”
Last month, he said the new site had 200,000 views.
The anti-“woke” movement is also entering the SPAC arena.
Axios reports that earlier this year Colombier Acquisition Corp. agreed to merge with PublicSq, an online marketplace for companies in what it dubs “the patriot economy.”
PublicSq boasts that it’s “America’s Marketplace” and defines itself as being aligned with the values of patriotic businesses and consumers. A majority of PublicSq’s merchants promote “American-made products.”
As consumers began boycotting Bud Light and Target over their recent disastrous progressive marketing campaigns, the platform said its membership has skyrocketed.
During the week of May 23, PublicSq’s consumer member base reportedly increased by more than 300,000 and its membership grew by more than 40% in a single week. The platform has amassed more than 1 million consumer members since its nationwide launch on July 4, 2022.
It also reached the No. 2 spot for a shopping app in Apple’s App Store last month, outranking Target, Amazon, and Walmart.
While PublicSq may be experiencing a windfall, a report from Yale’s School of Management said groups looking to build a “parallel economy” geared to conservatives are “financially floundering.”
The report noted that the index fund provider, the American Conservative Values ETF, received media attention over its boycott of Target for “pandering to the woke agenda.” The provider stated that its boycott will ensure “Target stock’s long-term performance will suffer.”
But while Target’s stock has taken a hit, The Yale report highlights that the fund’s total holdings of Target add up to just $100,000 – equivalent to the revenue that Target nets every 20 seconds.
The report said other companies the fund has boycotted – including Apple, Microsoft, Delta Airlines, American Airlines, Disney, Walmart, Coca-Cola, Salesforce, and JPMorgan – have performed just fine despite being targeted.
It notes that Delta is up 10% this year, American is up 15%, Microsoft and Apple are both up over 40%, and Salesforce is up 60%. Meanwhile, ACVF is underperforming the S&P 500 by over 2% this year, through June 1.
Even though AVCF may be struggling, it isn’t the only asset-management firm in the game.
Entrepreneur and GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy has seen success in his anti-“woke” investment company Strive Asset Management.
The new firm was set up to compete with BlackRock and other groups. The difference? It wouldn’t ask companies it invested in to push any political agenda.
In just three months, The New Yorker reported that Strive had more than $500 million in investment assets.
While Strive claims to offer competitive fees for anyone who has their money in exchange-traded funds or ETFs, however, the Yale report said the fees are much higher than its competition. It noted that BlackRock ETFs typically charge around 0.03% fees, while Strive’s fees come in at 0.41% and ACVF’s at a 0.75% fee.
The report also noted the struggles that some conservative-backed media ventures have faced.
Former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform has struggled to make money, with its SPAC shares plummeting.
The acquiring SPAC, Digital World Acquisition Corp., once touted a $3 billion market cap with outside investors originally committing $1 billion to support the merger. On Tuesday, the stock barely hovered around $13.