Little known fact: Disney has no problem with genocide, as long as ignoring it doesn’t get in the way of making a profit.
This past weekend, the live action re-make of 1998’s Mulan premiered to the absolutely predictable applause of the critics. But what frosts me is not the film itself, or the story portrayed, neither of which I could care less about. Rather, it’s where it was filmed, and the credits given, and specifically the “thank you’s” at the end.
The producers thank, among others, the publicity department of the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang, as well as the Turpan Municipality Public Security Bureau.
Just in case you’ve missed this piece of underplayed news over the last three years, Xinjiang is the home of the Uyghurs, a Turkic Muslim minority that is in the process of being exterminated through forced labor, forced sterilization, and brutal suppression of their culture. The “publicity department” (read: propaganda unit) of the CCP is the source of much of the disinformation and lies about the genocide. The “public security bureau” has been implicated in the running of concentration camps.
But hey, they helped facilitate the making of a Disney movie, so it’s all good, right?
It’s not even as though they could feign ignorance. The story of the Uyghur genocide has been in the news, if not given nearly enough attention, for over three years now. And according to Shawn Zhang on Twitter, “Suppose Mulan crew arrived at Turpan airport, and took highway G312 to Shanshan desert where they filmed, they could see at least 7 re-education camps.” (Be sure to read his whole thread.)
Now imagine this scenario:
It’s 1940. The Walt Disney Company, after deciding to make its first live-action film, sets it in Bavaria. Filming is done in Munich and Augsburg. On the road between locations, the crew passes the town of Dachau. In the credits, they thank the publicity department of the Bavarian Nazi Party and the Munich Gestapo for their help and cooperation.
Yeah, that’s not really imaginable, because Americans of all political persuasions would have been united in condemning Disney for cooperating with evil in order to make money off a movie. But this is 2020, and everyone from the NBA to Nike to Apple to KFC to Walmart to Boeing is profiting off of cooperation with, and covering for, a genocidal government that is a threat to both the economic and political health of the entire world.
Oh, and they’re persecuting Christians in ever-increasing numbers as well. But what’s a little persecution and genocide among friends and business partners, huh?
