I’ve Gotta Say, Obomna Knows How To Find Good Content

This year I’ve watched 2 films and a show all produced by Higher Ground Productions. Founded by the Obama’s, the production company produces various medias for Netflix to tell powerful stories that entertain, inform, and inspire—while elevating new and diverse voices in the entertainment industry.

The first film I saw was Crip Camp which looked at how disabled teenagers met at Camp Jened became fierce disability rights activists. It was a touching film and it was amazing at all the fighting they had to do to not only secure rights, but ensure that they’ve been enforced¹. Some even partook in the “Capitol Crawl” in 1990 where they had to walk up the inaccessible capitol steps.

The second film I watched from them was American Factory which looked at what happened when Chinese glass maker Fuyao takes over an abandoned car factory.

The third thing I watched was The G Work with Adam Conover. By the Adam known for ruining everything, Adam looks into how ghe federal government works to better people’s lives (or not). I expected it to be very propaganda-ish given that it was produced by the Obama’s who moderated over their presidential terms but he doesn’t hesitate to critisize aspects of the federal government. It was pretty shallow, but the last episode on change was really good.

In short, while it’s hard to make change on the federal level, there’s a lot you can do at the local level since it arguably has a bigger effect on people’s lives. The federal government is set up to make change difficult wheras the local levels make things very easy. Local government is typically overlooked, meaning that a lot of local positions run unopposed.

While I enjoy how well produced this media is and it’s refreshing not to have so much partisanship, I don’t know if the higher ground works if your opponents are batshit insane mouth frothing lunatics with a hyperfixation on 1% of the population. Still, his stuff is very much worth watching.