The Pentagon has criticised Netflix for producing what it called 'woke garbage' following the release of the hit gay military drama Boots. The show, based on Greg Cope White's memoir The Pink Marine, follows a closeted teenager who enlists in the US Marine Corps in the 1990s.
Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson said in a statement: 'Under president Trump and secretary [Pete] Hegseth, the US military is getting back to restoring the warrior ethos. Our standards across the board are elite, uniform, and sex neutral because the weight of a rucksack or a human being doesn't care if you're a man, a woman, gay, or straight.' Wilson added that the Pentagon would not compromise standards to 'satisfy an ideological agenda', accusing Netflix of feeding 'woke garbage' to its audience.
Boots is currently the sixth-most-watched show globally on Netflix. The Guardian's Stuart Heritage called it 'incredibly powerful', while The Hollywood Reporter noted it was 'critical of the military's 1990s-era anti-gay policies' yet 'also respectful of the military in many ways'. Lead actor Miles Heizer, who is gay, said the show's relevance to current events was 'upsetting'.
The criticism follows a broader backlash against Netflix's diverse content. Earlier this month, Elon Musk urged users to cancel subscriptions over a transgender character in the animated series Dead End: Paranormal Park. The trans voice actor for the character, Zach Barack, responded that the show had 'saved lives'.
In June, US defence secretary Pete Hegseth ordered the navy to remove the name of gay activist Harvey Milk from a ship, citing a need to 're-establish the warrior culture'. Screenwriter Dustin Lance Black called Hegseth 'small and petty', while actor Sean Penn also criticised the move.
