The Screen Actors Guild has likened the atmosphere to the McCarthy-era anti-Communist witch-hunts of the 1950s. It issued a statement saying that no performer should be denied work on the basis of his or her political beliefs. “Even a hint of the blacklist must never again be tolerated in this nation,” it said.
Within three hours of that statement being posted, the guild was inundated with the by now familiar deluge of hate mail. Nevertheless, the statement remains steadfastly posted on the guild’s website.