Christianity in Hollywood

Producers throughout Hollywood are starting to tailor some of their films to "Christian" audiences, cleaning up the language and peppering the scripts and plotlines with Christian themes and allusions. See the following NYTimes Article.

Is this wrong? Is this restraining, intolerant, or against the First Amendment? Is this favoring one religion or forcing others to change their tastes because of a large group of people imposing their beliefs on others?

None of the above arguments have any merit. What is going on is the market simply responding to people's tastes. This has nothing to do with the First Amendment, which is a public government restraint. It is about private tastes and market forces. If people don't want to pay to see movies that takes the name of God in vain or see religious imagery defamed, they have every right to ignore those movies and support other movie makers who will avoid these things. It's the free market at work.

Is there pressure to make movies these days that present Christian values? You bet. Good for them. "Christians" want certain things and they are willing to pay for them. It is not forcing anything on anyone. It is merely supplanting another value system that currently rules the big screen. Just because the earlier value system valued immorality, sexual abandon and athiesm doesn't make it any more "open" or less imposing. It's just as much a thematic element and cultural agenda as the new trends.

I personally don't like the "Jesus Rocks" references, or some of the other ways Evangelicals are pressuring Hollywood to portray modern-day Christianity, but I think my recourse is not in calling them "intolerant," "unamerican" or "suppressive." Instead, I should put my money where my mouth is and support organizations and go to movies that represent my tastes. Nor do I think Hollywood has any real clue as to what Christianity really stands for. They are just responding to where people are putting their money, and I have no problem with that.

Refreshingly, the NYtimes article doesn't frame the new trends as an issue of "suppression" or cultural imposition and describes it simply as what it is, movie-makers trying to learn their audience. I bring up these arguments merely as anticipatory repudiations of ridiculous rhetoric that really have nothing to do with reality. But, I guarantee you they will be raised, and some people will actually listen to them.