I stopped watching the Oscars years ago. Now, to be honest, I also stopped going to the movies years ago. The last time I considered going to a movie theater was after the release of "The Young Messiah" (2016), but it left the local theater by the time I tried to see it (I later licensed the movie via Google) I'm probably not representative of the target audience; I'm a huge fan of musicals, but for all practical purposes, that era ended in the mid-60's with "The Sound of Music". I recall going to see "Titanic" while on site in California in 1998 for Oracle Consulting.
I recall the first time politics popped its ugly head at the Oscars in my memories as a young man: 1973. Marlon Brando, a politically active actor, refused to attend the ceremony, sending Native American Sacheen Littlefeather to read a politically motivated speech rejecting the award, ranting over industry mistreatment of Native Americans. In my salad days, I was in fact more socially liberal and empathetic to those who faced unjust discrimination; I have at least two Native Americans in my paternal family tree (3 generations higher). (My mom says I inherited my cheekbones from my late Cherokee great-grandmother.) The Academy, not thrilled with rejection of its highest award, limited Littlefeather's reading of Brando's lengthy industry rant, later reprinted in full by the Gray Lady.
I personally disliked even my Catholic college presumptuously shoving multicultural nonsense down my throat. I had to read Castaneda about peyote and the teachings on Don Juan; I was required to attend a lecture by a then largely unknown Alex Haley well before "Roots" became a cultural phenomenon. But I was born and raised in an integrated military. My best friend in fifth grade was black. I had Latino friends all through high school and college in Texas. I initially had a religious vocation for the Roman Catholic priesthood (I served daily mass before going to high school and led the base altar boys) One incident I've retold over the life of the blog was as a residential undergraduate at OLL in San Antonio. OLL had been a women's college that turned coed in the years preceding my admission, then about two-thirds coed. I was going to eat lunch by myself when a Latina at a coed table invited me over to eat with them. "Well, this is different..." I thought to myself. No sooner than I was seated than the coed in question asked, "Ron, we heard you treat girls just like the guys." I did not expect that and nearly choked on my food. "Gee, I hope not. I'm attracted to girls." It may be because with a Mom and 4 little sisters, they weren't about to take any crap from me, and my Dad was a role model who always treated my Mom and sisters with love and respect. Oh, the folks would disagree from time to time, but it never escalated. In fact, I remember one Christmas visit I came out of my room to find them in the middle of the living room kissing each other, totally lost in the moment, oblivious to my presence. As a middle-aged bachelor, I found it utterly sweet and charming.
I didn't need to be indoctrinated to treat others respectfully as peers, regardless of individual differences, including race or ethnicity or gender. I've had managers or project leads who were female, black, Latino, Native American or Asian; I've worked with a number of immigrants or natives from over 6 foreign countries, including a multi-month stay in Brazil (yes, I picked up enough Portuguese to get by). I've dated black and Latina women. My 3 closest friends over my adult years have been a Baptist, a Jew, and a Hindu. I made a campus visit (on site job interview) to a Protestant college in the Salt Lake City area. At one project client site in the Provo UT area, I had to cope with a zealous client DBA who relentlessly tried to convert me to Mormonism, challenging my professionalism.
Going back to the original point, I didn't necessarily disagree with Brando's rant or his right under the Constitution to express his opinion; it has more to do with the time and place. When I watch an entertainment special I expect to be entertained, not to be lectured to. I am not going to go into a litany of political moments at the Oscars; Vogue has a good summary here: I particularly remember Vanessa Redgrave, a phenomenally talented actress, who was unhappy with Israel, but other rants involved Vietnam, the Gulf War, equal pay, voting rights, AIDS, abortion rights, China, climate change, dolphins, and gay rights, nearly all of them from a leftist perspective (which I generally don't share).
It's not just cinema; a similar thing has been true with music. More notoriously recently was country singer Taylor Swift's support for Dem candidates. Familiar readers may know I was a huge Bruce Springsteen fan; I bought nearly every album he released since the 70's, even his indulgent, boring, acoustic ones--until he came out in-your-face Dem. I think the last thing I bought of his was "The Rising". As a fan, I might have been interested in what his political opinions, but as a former Dem who left the party over a number of reasons, mostly against the dominant progressive wing, I felt Bruce had abandoned maybe half of his fans who didn't share his politics.
I don't recall when exactly I stopped watching--it seems like a decade ago. The political nonsense was the key reason but also I don't think I had seen any of the nominated films or the acting performances. What am I supposed to do, root for the actors I recognize, like the perennially nominated Meryl Streep?
I was on Twitter Oscar night when the Will Smith/ Chris Rock incident quickly dominated the hot trends. I wouldn't say it was obvious to most Twitter users that Will Smith assaulted Chris Rock. A number of users thought the moment was scripted like a pro wrestling match where the opponent staggers from a blow not even making contact. But, as others have noted, Rock isn't that good an actor. Rock was genuinely stunned and remarked to those present, "Will Smith just smacked the shit out of me." [To Smith:] “Wow, dude,” replied Rock “It was a G.I. Jane joke.” Smith: “Keep my wife’s name out your fucking mouth.” (I think twice.)
But even as Twitter seemed to gradually come to a realization, like I did early, that this was indeed criminal assault, it seemed people were still divided over who was at fault. It seems everyone was presumed to have known Mrs. Smith had an autoimmune disease called alopecia. The disease often results in thin hair/bald spots, and Jada had shaved her head in response to the symptoms. So Smith defenders portrayed Rock's joke as mocking her illness and pointed out Rock has joked at her expense on other occasions. But that really didn't make any sense. The GI Jane character played by Demi Moore notoriously has a shaved head (hence the joke that Jada is playing the sequel lead). I haven't seen the original movie but at least for male recruits in basic training, there is a buzz cut. Now I haven't researched female baldness, but I believe it's not exclusive to alopecia. I know cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy experience hair loss. Cleveland Clinic says up to 50% of women experience significant hair loss. Androgenetic alopecia/female pattern alopecia/female pattern hair loss (FPHL)/baldness accounts for about a third of these cases. But I don't see comparing Jada Smith to a strong female character is mocking her health condition. Sometimes actresses (besides Demi Moore) shave their heads to play a role. Sometimes people do it to express solidarity with, say, a friend undergoing chemo. Sometimes women use their hair/style to make a personal statement. One of my goddaughters, an RN, in the past dyed her beautiful blond hair blue. In my experience, women get be quite sensitive over their appearance, so I probably wouldn't have made Rock's joke; I remember I once took out a girl in Houston (as a geek, I hadn't dated a lot), she had gotten her hair done for our date, and apparently I hadn't noticed. So I was in the doghouse. This was actually a young woman I had seen at Sunday mass, i.e., once a week. . (My Mom always wanted me to meet a nice fellow Catholic girl at church and get married one day.)
I was totally blown away with the Hollywood reaction. A couple of prominent black actors went to console the perpetrator of the assault. I wrote a good number of tweets over the kerfuffle, one explicitly comparing Trump's saying he could shoot someone on Fifth Ave. and not lose a supporter to Smith hypothetically saying he could assault someone on global TV and no one would do a damn thing about it. Let's be clear: comedians target audience members all the time. The late Don Rickles notoriously insulted other people. Maybe I don't know much about stand-up comedy in clubs, but I had never before heard of someone going after a comic over a joke, and I don't think a club that failed to protect its performers would stay in business long.
A number of people, particularly from the black community, heatedly defended Smith for defending the honor of his woman. But we libertarians do not accept violations of the non-aggression principle. Chris Rock did not assault Jada Smith; at worst he told a bad joke.
Will Smith was not arrested at the scene and reportedly refused to leave. A short while later, he was awarded Best Actor for his performance in "King Richard", a film about the father of the famous Williams tennis sisters, Venus and Serena. Will Smith, beginning to sense his assault could affect his public image and have professional repercussions, delivered pseudo-apologies, i.e., to the Academy and others, but not to Rock himself.
In the days that followed, public sentiment turned against Will's unprovoked assault. Smith finally released an apology, not directly to Rock, and sensing possible sanctions from the Academy, resigned. The Academy announced a 10-year ban from Smith's attending the Oscars but not stripping his Oscar, basically a slap on the wrist.
Lessons learned? Hopefully there will be improved security at future Oscars and a zero-tolerance policy towards violence from any attendees. There need to be more serious sanctions, including bans on future awards eligibility.
