The Hallmark Channel's White Supremacist Pro-Trump Christmas Film Crusade

[benjipwns]

https://slate.com/arts/2017/12/hallmarks-21-movie-christmas-countdown-reviewed.html

At a rally in November 2015, Donald Trump heralded, “If I become president, we’re all going to be saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again, that I can tell you.” Of all his empty guarantees, the president has perhaps fulfilled none better than a counterstrike in the War on Christmas, and no battalion has fired more rooty-toot artillery for him than the Hallmark Channel. In 2017, the network is premiering 21 original Christmas movies (up from 20 last year)—42 hours of sugary, sexist, preposterously plotted, plot hole–festooned, belligerently traditional, ecstatically Caucasian cheer.

Hallmark Channel, owned by the Kansas City, Missouri–based greeting-card giant, has boomed since Trump began campaigning. In 2016, Hallmark was the only top-15 entertainment channel with double-digit ratings growth, and viewership has jumped another 16 percent this year. Meanwhile, Hallmark’s Christmas programming, which this year began before Halloween, generates more than 30 percent of its annual ad revenue and has helped Hallmark become the season’s highest-rated cable network among women aged 25–54. More than 70 million Americans watched Hallmark Channel Christmas movies last year.

After watching a few of Hallmark’s Countdown to Christmas films, the network’s burgeoning red-state appeal comes into focus. As much as these movies offer giddy, predictable escapes from Trumpian chaos, they all depict a fantasy world in which America has been Made Great Again. Real and fictional heartland small towns with names such as Evergreen and Cookie Jar are as thriving as their own small businesses, and even a high school art teacher (played by Trump supporter and the face of Hallmark, Candace Cameron Bure) can afford a lavishly renovated Colonial home. They brim with white heterosexuals who exclusively, emphatically, and endlessly bellow “Merry Christmas” to every lumberjack and labradoodle they pass. They’re centered on beauty-pageant heroines and strong-jawed heroes with white-nationalist haircuts. There are occasional sightings of Christmas sweater–wearing black people, but they exist only to cheer on the dreams of the white leads, and everyone on Trump’s naughty list—Muslims, gay people, feminists—has never crossed the snowcapped green-screen mountains to taint these quaint Christmas villages. “Santa Just Is White” seems to be etched into every Hallmark movie’s town seal.

And what some call sexism, Hallmarkland calls family values. CEO Bill Abbott has said that Hallmark Channel aims to build a “safe space” in a TV market that has gone “past the point of edgy.”

Of 136 Christmas movies Crown Media (which operates Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies & Mysteries) has produced to date, nearly all feature white leads. Regarding diversity, their executive vice president of programming, Michelle Vicary, told Bloomberg Businessweek last year, “Um … we are taking a look at that.” Of this year’s 21 films, only Enchanted Christmas stars minority love interests, Latinos Alexa and Carlos PenaVega. (Even interethnicity relationships, it seems, are too taboo in 2017.)

The tropes, as mind-melting as they are mesmerizing, permeate casting, dialogue, pacing, set decoration, and mannerisms—as omnipresent as the fake snow that, upon closer inspection, appears to just be clumped-together fake cobwebs. Here’s a lethal drinking game: Take a shot of peppermint schnapps every time a female lead stumbles her speech or bumps into a nutcracker when she encounters the blandly handsome Old Navy mannequin of a male lead, as the besotted damsels do in Marry Me at Christmas, Miss Christmas, Switched for Christmas, Sharing Christmas, Christmas at the Holly Lodge, and The Mistletoe Inn. Swig some eggnog every time said male lead droolingly points to overhanging mistletoe, as happens this year (so far) in The Mistletoe Inn and as we’ve seen before in (to name a few) The Mistletoe Promise, Under the Mistletoe, Mistletoe Over Manhattan, Moonlight & Mistletoe, A Christmas Kiss, and A Christmas Kiss II. And pour a hot toddy down your pants every time a character urges the female lead to abandon her career in the Big Liberal City to restore traditions and family in her hometown, as women are directed to do this year alone in Enchanted Christmas, Switched for Christmas, and Christmas in Evergreen.

Also, in every Hallmark Christmas movie, the opioid epidemic has given way to Christmas Fever. This malady is unnamed and treated as joyful in Hallmarkland, but it culminates in a contagious psychosis in which everyone sees Christmas as the lifeblood of human existence.

The Christmas-down-your-throat bombast, holly-jolly sexism, the characters’ zaniness and unyielding impulsiveness—it’s all very Trumpian behavior. Hallmark Christmas movies channel and normalize a world in which the president can insult China, the press, Hillary Clinton, and the prime minister of the United Kingdom, and share anti-Muslim propaganda all in one day, and the very next proclaim to follow Jesus’ example of “respect for the sacred dignity of every person everywhere in the world,” as he did at the National Christmas Tree Lighting, which the Hallmark Channel broadcast exclusively.

In 2018, another year into the MAGA vortex, Crown Media will grow from 33 to 36 original Christmas movies. “The one thing we never hear from our viewers is that they have had enough!” Vicary noted. She added, with a familiar bravado, “Hallmark owns Christmas on TV.”

Greg M. 4 days ago
This is kind of weird. My wife loves these movies, watches this channel so much during the Christmas season, and I never tire of making fun of them (and tease her).

But when this guy makes fun of them it offends me.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

bobbobato 4 days ago
Hi, I'm actor Troy McLure. You may remember me from such as films as Enchanted Christmas, Christmas in Evergreen, and A Christmas Kiss II: Christmas Ape goes to Summer Camp.

[close]

spoiler (click to show/hide)

One more thing
You depend on Slate for sharp, distinctive coverage of the latest developments in politics and culture. Now we need to ask for your support.

Our work is more urgent than ever and is reaching more readers—but online advertising revenues don’t fully cover our costs, and we don’t have print subscribers to help keep us afloat. So we need your help. If you think Slate’s work matters, become a Slate Plus member. You’ll get exclusive members-only content and a suite of great benefits—and you’ll help secure Slate’s future.

[close]

[Olivia Wilde Homo]

Must be a slow day over at Slate

[jakefromstatefarm]

Brehs you should watch Christmas Crush, it’s on Netflix

[Eel O'Brian]

Must be a slow day over at Slate

every day is a slow day when your business is dying

[Brehvolution]

Personally, I can't wait until this shit is over so Hallmark can go back to showing reruns of The Middle from 9-11 PM. 

[jorma]

Santa is super white - even the beard - and he lives in his own village just outside Rovaniemi, Finland.

Are these facts controversial where you guys live?

[ToxicAdam]

I like the one where the wholesome girl has to pick between two guys. One is an asshole, city-slicker businessman and the other is the 'aw shucks' country boy with a heart of gold.

Something happens in the third act where you don't think they (her and the country boy) will get together, but a Christmas Miracle happens and they get together in the end.

 

[jorma]

I like the one where the wholesome girl has to pick between two guys. One is an asshole, city-slicker businessman and the other is the 'aw shucks' country boy with a heart of gold.

Something happens in the third act where you don't think they (her and the country boy) will get together, but a Christmas Miracle happens and they get together in the end.

I saw that one when i was visiting mom last week. But that one wasn't racist, it was shown on netflix instead of hallmark.

[nachobro]

wow spoilers, thanks assholes