CEO of the Walt Disney Company, Bob Iger, recently addressed criticism about Disney and its insistence on woke programming in its entertainment offerings. Disney garnered a reputation for inserting itself into some of the most controversial aspects of the culture war in the West.
Iger noted that, first and foremost, Disney’s job is to “entertain” audiences and not to propagate a “woke” agenda, which he believes is being used too “liberally” without sufficient meaning. He emphasized that incorporating a politically charged narrative into Disney’s content is not the company’s number one priority.
“I’ve been preaching this for a long time at the company before I left and since I came back that our No. 1 goal is to entertain. I think, like, the term woke is thrown around rather liberally, no pun intended in that regard. I think a lot of people don’t even understand really what it means,” Iger said. “The bottom line is that infusing messaging as a sort of No. 1 priority in our films and TV shows is not what we’re up to. They need to be entertaining.”
However, Iger followed up these initial remarks, stating that Disney does strive to make a “positive impact” on the world, attempting to highlight the need for diversity and inclusiveness. The CEO then doubled down, maintaining that Disney’s first order of business in entertainment.
“Where the Disney company can have a positive impact on the world, whether it’s fostering acceptance and understanding of people of all different types, great,” he said, continuing that “generally speaking, we need to be an entertainment-first company. And I’ve worked really hard to do that.”
The chief executive claimed that he is working to ensure “everybody’s aligned on what our priorities are,” in that the entertainment giant is attempting to reach “a very, very diverse audience.” Moreover, Iger suggests Disney is working to get back to the company’s “roots.”
Iger claimed that to reach audiences across different demographics and sufficiently entertain them, Disney would have to tailor its content in a specific manner. “And on one hand, in order to do that, the stories you tell have to really reflect the audience that you’re trying to reach. But that audience, because they are so diverse, really first and foremost, they want to be entertained,” he said.
Despite the seemingly incessant push for diversity and other initiatives conservative audiences would consider to be “woke,” Iger acknowledged that this could turn away some consumers. He suggested that Disney is performing a balancing act between the interests of specific diverse demographics and the “broader audience.” He stated, “And sometimes they can be turned off by certain things. And we just have to be more sensitive to the interests of a broad audience. It’s not easy. You can’t please everybody all the time.”
Iger was also questioned about billionaire Elon Musk’s attempt to go after Disney via his “anti-woke campaign.” Iger claimed that he is not phased by Musk’s comments, asserting, “People have been coming after me and the company for years, and it’s just that I don’t get distracted by those things.”
Featured image: nagi usano from Tokyo, Japan, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bob_Iger_2019_Disney_Legends_Awards_Ceremony_D23_EXPO_2019_(51440493471).jpg
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