I said art has always had political influences.

I didn't say every piece of art has political influences. 

One of the most Political games I've ever played is GTA V.

Which just hit 110 million units sold. 

People argue having a mostly black cast for a black panther movie was political and it is the highest grossing solo marvel movie and made more money in the US than Infinity war and there's a million other examples in the entertainment industry. It's always had political influences. 

Whenever I re watch back old 90s cartoons from my childhood I see a shit tonne of political messages I never noticed as a kid. Same with movies. And Music is probably the most political genre ever.

Art is a reflection of society, and that includes politics. And art of all mediums, should be given the right to free speech, which also means people expressing their political views. Though I think what some are responding to is the OVERT political messages constantly shoved in people's faces, and often leaning in one direction. And often times people do want to use art and especially entertainment as a means of escape, which means escape from the negativity and complexity of society and politics. So it's a tricky issue. By no means should people be censored from expressing political views or messages in art and entertainment, but at the same time, you could see why people who seek an outlet would want forms of these mediums totally free of these political bents. I often feel the same way. It's part of the appeal of watching, say, a baseball game for instance. 

Additionally, when you shove in overt political messages, you risk alienating a good chunk of your potential audience, because not everybody is going to agree with your views, so you immediately are risking repelling a certain amount of people, particularly through overt and not particularly well communicated or intelligent political statements.

My two cents..

I just had to quote this, because this post rings true in my opinion.

Yes, art can have political messages, even if the author didn't intended it. Alone in reflection of the authors views on the world it can get political. That means often this isn't even a conscious decision. But sometimes authors WANT to project a political message. This can be good if the author is skillful and can show the political message while still producing an entertaining piece of art. In other cases that goes horribly wrong and the art suffers from the attempt to deliver a political message.

Commercial art often tries explicitly to avoid politics. A german opinion piece showed how Anno 1800 explicitly tried to avoid some political stuff in history or tone it down to avoid controversy. That is for instance the topic of slavery or the topic of colonialism. That is often for commercial art that don't want such discussions to impact the sales of their games. Again, a good creator can avoid politics or some political topics and still produce a great piece of art, but the artifical removal of political hot topics can equally hurt the art, because neither the creator nor the consumer of said art can avoid to think about these political frames in many cases.

So people will always be upset about some art being too political or not political enough or showing the wrong political stance in their opinion, while others are fine. I think as long the author either not thinks about politics or see politics as a tool to improve the art, it can work out great. If politics on the other hand is starting to feel like a restriction for the creator (be it that the creator feels he HAS to show a certain political point or he has to avoid one) it can impact the art negatively.

One other point: good art allows for interpretation. Even differing or possibly even contradicting interpretations. Above Rol pointed out Mario could be seen as communist. It is equally easy to see it as capitalist propaganda, after all Mario is hunting coins, skinning racoons or cats for his suits shows that he is destroying the environment to reach his capitalist goals and crushing the competition in form of Bowser to rule the helpless consumer depicted by Peach. So if we are upset by a political message of a piece of art, we should reflect for a moment if this message is intended by the author or an interpretation by myself and if other interpretations are possible and likely.

I think you completely missed the point. People don't care if there's politics in games. At least not if the game is a new IP. The problem is that many far leftists have gotten control over already established franchises, whether it be games, movies, or comics, and are shoving modern day politics into them. These are franchises that either had no political messaging before or had such a general one that all could agree with it. This is where "keep politics out of my entertainment" came from.

It really is slowly ruining entertainment. And these attempts to do so are hardly ever really successful, especially when coupled with social media attacks against fans who disagree. Either when looked at their own sales or in comparison to previous entries in the franchise, they underperform. Sadly for some, ideology outweighs making more profit or making your entire fanbase happy.

I reject the proposition that everything is political. No it is not, unless you want to make it that way. The problem today is that extreme leftist have their problem glasses on and they MAKE everything to be about politics or problems. It's what they feed off of. If they don't find problems everywhere, people kind of forget they exist because they have nothing enjoyable to contribute. It's like they are this gang of trespassers who push their way inside any given group and start pointing at everything and making up problems. Then the original members of said group sour on them and war begins.
Most games and movies and such are not made with politics in mind and because of that, whenever a political piece comes out, it stands out like a sore thumb, because it is so ham-fisted and preachy. The end result is that such a piece fails at being art, AND it fails at being a political move, because it only turns people off. Trying to feed us our "medicine" mixed in our entertainment is not working and it just creates backlashes. If you want change, this is not the way to go about it.

I think Umberto Eco said something in the vain of art being an interpretation generating machine. This goes well with my belief in the death auf the author (and artist in general). Everyones interpretation can be as correct as the next ones. Pretty much: art is subjective.

This would mean: Yes, every single piece of art is political - for you. But saying this as an absolut truth is as incorrect as saying that not a single piece of art is political.

And if we account for the intentions of the creator, those intentions can be as manyfold and as void of politics as they come.

People don't have a problem with politics as long as it is done in an intelligent, thought provoking manner.

What the majority are taking issue with is the immature in-your-face hamfisted garbage that is being shoved down our throats disguised as art and entertainment.

Case in point:

I call that a brownie book. "What is a brownie book" you ask?

If I were an editor and that garbage was dumped on my desk, I would smear a brownie over every page and send it back to the writer with a note that reads "be happy I didn't eat it first"  ("it" being the brownie, of course)

According to Comichron, a website that tracks comics sales, issue #6 of that title shipped 5,577 copies.

I say shipped because Marvel has a big problem with over-shipping titles that don't sell.

That type of nonsense is killing the comics industry.  If you dare criticize it you are called a bigot, nazi or phobe du jour.

WE DON'T WANT THAT CRAP!

Look at the ratio on the Batwoman trailer.  Those dislikes aren't from trolls, a few may be, but the overwhelming majority are from the REAL fans of comics who found it to have an emotionally stunted take on the material.  The true trolls are the ones who brigaded the likes, the invaders with an agenda.  

Extremism is boring and doesn't sell.