Blacklists are back and Hollywood’s got ’em: When long time Hollywood filmmakers Cary Solomon and Chuck Konzelman decided to make the film Unplanned, telling the story of a woman who went from being Planned Parenthood clinic director supporting abortion to an avid advocate for the unborn, they did so under assumed names, and discovered themselves fighting an aggressive effort both in Hollywood and in social media to suppress the film once released.

Multiple cable networks, such as Lifetime, Hallmark Channel, HGTV, USA Network, Food Network, The Travel Channel, refused to carry commercials promoting the film. Multiple theater owners received death threats and harassment prior to screenings, with a few cancelling the screenings out of fear for themselves and their families.

And then there was the usual Twitter censorship.

Twitter destroyed the movie’s promotional account on the Friday night of the opening weekend, Konzelman said. Film marketing involves building the intensity for the night of the opening weekend, Konzelman explained. On that night Twitter cut off the account feed completely so when it was partially restored the next morning only a hundredth of the followers was shown.

“We had, you know, 200,000-plus followers, we went to under 2,000, and the star of our movie, Ashley Bratcher, and the subject of our movie, Abby Johnson, were both unable to follow their own movie [on Twitter],” Konzelman continued.

Twitter, as it always does, claimed their actions were “a mistake”, but isn’t strange that almost all these so-called mistakes always happen against conservative outlets and always at the worst possible time. How accidental!

This hostility however did not begin with the film’s release. Because of their fear of sabotage and violence, the filmmakers had to make the film outside California and do it with high security and secrecy.

They had a legitimate concern that some people could interfere with their work and try to damage their premises and equipment so they had a special team of operatives to protect their work, Solomon said.

The project was carried out under an assumed name and “people only knew that it was a faith and values friendly project but they didn’t know what it was,” Konzelman said, adding that people in town were praying for them.

This kind of intolerance in Hollywood however is not the exception that proves the rule, but it is the rule. According to the interview of these filmmakers at the link above (merely repeating what many other conservatives in Hollywood have been saying for years), the monolithic leftist culture of Hollywood works not only to blacklist any conservative artists, it successfully stifles the creative spirit of anyone who remains, no matter what their politics.

“Any creative spirit you have is crushed by Hollywood because they take the attitude that if you don’t think like [them], if you’re not an automaton, if you’re not a machine that thinks the way [they] want morally, spiritually, or in any other way, [they] don’t need you [and] will destroy you or crush you. So you’re fighting, you’re constantly swimming upstream,” Solomon said.

“Your heart gets rended when you can’t create if you’re a creative person; you need to create. A painter needs to paint but you can’t paint what you don’t believe,” he added.

In addition, “there’s a tremendous darkness in Hollywood that people don’t know,” Solomon said. “If the people actually knew what was going on behind the scenes in Hollywood … they would burn down the studios.”

When I was in the movie business my experience was much the same, though twenty years ago there were no death threats or violence, only strong hostility and a sense if I didn’t shut up I would be blackballed. Rather than shut up, I became a science journalist and eventually created this website so that no one could silence me.

To their credit Solomon and Konzelman instead went underground to make the films they wanted to make, and have refused to let Hollywood’s intolerance stifle them. We need more people like them, because the only way we can end this intolerance is to overwhelm it with dissenting opinions and actions that are loud and ceaseless.

Salmar Community Association board member Chris Papworth confirmed on Thursday, July 4, that the board has agreed to pull the movie’s five-day run, which was set to begin on July 12 at the Salmar Classic. He said the difficult decision to cancel the film was made out of concern for the personal safety for Salmar Theatres management, who had received personal threats via social media.

“…[These threats included] an effort to dox employees or, specifically, the general manager, by releasing their personal information on social media and then encouraging people to go after them as the one responsible for some heinous act. We just aren’t prepared for those levels of hostility towards our general manager.”

I want to once again note the irrational level of hate and anger coming from the leftwing community (which is generally pro-abortion). Their disagreement with the political position of the film now apparently justifies violence and personal threats.

None of this will end well. Eventually the left’s hate and anger is not going to be satisfied with verbal threats or minor physical attacks. It is eventually going to compel them to acts of murder, because mere verbal threats and minor physical attacks will not be getting them what the want, emotionally. Only by killing their enemies can they satisfy that irrational hatred.