We should always remember that during the McCarthy hearings and the Communist witch hunts, Hollywood studios willingly complied. They fired creatives, blacklisted them, greylisted them, and destroyed their livelihoods, sometimes on the back of nothing but vague rumors (or hanging around with the "wrong" people or having the "wrong" names). Creatives also capitulated: Elia Kazan and Sterling Hayden famously named names, and spent the rest of their careers asking for forgiveness. (Note also that the attack on Hollywood Communists, or anyone suspected of being one or of holding "radical" opinions, came after a number of unionizing efforts and successes. Sound familiar?)
Hollywood capitulated to censorship. The Hayes Code was not a legally binding document; it was not law. The studios happily self-censored so they could continue to sell their product to the masses.
What the Trump Administration is doing, and the way that especially the powers-that-be in Hollywood and in other creative industries are reacting, has happened before. And in five or ten years' time, they will try to pretend it never happened.
