Posted on 03/25/2002 8:10:40 PM PST by Pokey78
Edited on 04/23/2004 12:04:20 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The Motion Picture Academy is as much "academy" as the People's Democratic Republic of Korea is "democratic." But on Sunday night, at the Oscars, the academicians were positively Crimson in the way they immersed themselves (and the rest of us) in a single, iron-willed thesis.
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
When will idiots like Whoopi consider themselves Americans first?
Why are we all expected to be so damn colorblind yet laud every little piece of blackness as somehow "special". It doesn't fit....."and if it doesn't fit...one must not SUBMIT!!!"
Another point: the race issue at the Oscars only shows multi-culturalism and separates people. It doesn't bring people together. As for the Sidney P. being a role model only for blacks, everyone should read Tammy Bruce's book, The Thought Police.
And all this focus on race. Good Lord, seems to me we have moved away from King's dream of people being judged based on the content of their character versus the color of their skin. And the people moving away the fastest are the people of color! Go figure.
Never. I heard Whoopi say, on Politically Incorrect, that she thought communism was cool and didn't know what all the fuss was about. (To his credit, Bill Maher slammed her.) These highly paid black actors just want to cause dissension. Not good role models for their bro's. And not making them any friends, either, among other Americans of all colors who work hard and never, ever make the kind of money she and her whining cohorts in HoWood pull down.
I didn't see the Oscars, but I listened in vicariously through Matt Drudge's program. When I heard Berry's remarks, and some of the initial reactions, I simply thought the situation unfortunate. I dunno quite why, but I don't think Halle Berry thinks of herself as an African-American. Yet, she works in the Hollywood System, where the PC Cardinals and Bishops are thicker there than the Catholic ones in Rome, Berry probably has to view herself professionally as an African-American: because that's the way she is cast.
I first saw (or noticed) Halle Berry in Executive Decision and again in X-Men. Neither role would ever have been regarded as Oscar-winning material. Yet in neither role was she clearly "playing" an African American. In one she was a smart stewardess and in the other, a mutant human with super-powers. Monster's Ball is different. That film is about about race and the deliberate blindness to it that the protagonists exhibit.
What I'm trying to get across is that Berry's is probably of two minds: Professionally, she has to carry the mantle of "African-American" because that is how Hollywood treats her and honors her in the big roles. So come Oscar time, she bent to that professional role. Privately, I don't think she's as concientious of it. At least not in the way that Whoopi or Jesse or Al are. I don't think she does and I hope she doesn't.
Put another way, although it's not quite the same example, we had a girl in our high school whose parents were a Causcaion and a Polynesian (Hawaiian). She was a beautiful girl. Yet, for some reason, many people thought she was black. Rude/PC people would ask her questions to get an "African-American perspective." It grated her to have to explain her background and then turn around and set it aside to answer the question objectively. But, whether she liked it or not or the questioners meant it or not, she received and lived the "African American" perspective because that's how she was treated.
Halle Berry goes through much the same thing, I'm guessing. On the one hand, she probably looks in the mirror and, except for complexion, she does not see the typical African American face before her. (Don't get me started. Watch TV, the movies, and the nightly news to see and hear what Hollywood and the Mainstream Media passes off as typical.) Probably she is not regarded by people as African-American if she goes about unrecognized. Yet in 21st Century America, thanks to PC ideology and its dogged promotion by the Left, especially in Hollywood, her professional peers and employers have to label her something, so, looking into her background, pigeon-hole her as an African-American.
That's why I consider her situation "unfortunate." She probably was not expecting her Oscar win. Yet when she won, she understood the sad context of the win. She might have tried to shake it and somehow assert the win based purely on her talent. As it should have been. Instead, we witnessed a sad spectacle and we read the fallout on Free Republic.
Probably, I am coming off like an apologist. Then again, maybe I'm wrong and she has "drunk the Kool-aid." I'm just willing to give her the benefit of the doubt and suggest that perhaps she didn't mean to come across the way she did.
You don't teach "multiculturalism," you just live it.
Don't flame me till' you think about it.
But didn't Whoopi Goldberg herself point that out during the awards?
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By not calling herself bi-racial, it is a denial her own Mother's race...So sad.
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On the extortion angle, I wonder how much of Hollywood's U.S. audience is now black (and thus how much of a threat a boycott would be.)
Anyone remember Eartha Kitt? A fabulous singer, beautful lady, who will say that she is a fantastic mixture of almost every race she can conjur up.
In the end, IMHO, it doesn't matter what color a person is, it's their talent, or looks, whatever...and I wish they hadn't made it an issue at the Oscar's. But it will always happen.
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Al Sharpton you can understand doing it. That is his nature it seems, like the Daley's of Chicago, or Hague -- he's a natural grifter of a politician, perhaps more natural than Jesse.
But the actors and actresses, Halle, Denzel, Whoopi -- they have fallen into a trap here. This is a foot-shooting in progress.
Not to me. Maybe you've never seen many Blacks.
What difference does it make what color her skin is? and
Why make race an issue at the Oscars?
My wife just recently passed an ESL test (written by Hispanics) that some of her black colleagues did not. The immediate hue and cry ? Racism !
Does EVERYTHING have to be racially based ?
Your comments, particularly, would be appreciated as you've often provided a thoughtful perspective.
I'd agree if you throw in the caveat "in the opinion of the academy."
The only movie I ever walked out of won best picture in its year.
But If YOU say she looks "black", and that is consistant, I have to bow to your expertise :~)
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Which one? I am guessing American Beauty.
On the other hand, Whoopi Goldberg is an absurdity. She has been decent in some movies, ridiculous in others. But she is hardly the best MC they could find, and her vulgarity detracts from the event as family entertainment. As one who can remember all the years that Bob Hope lent real class to the affair, I found her unfortunate, to say the least.
But my real pique was with all of the mentioned hyperbole about Sidney Poitier. He was not in my opinion, the quality of actor that is Washington. The reason, to be very blunt, is that in every movie I ever saw him in, he projected a definite attitude. That attitude was still there, when he accepted the award. It is a racial chip on the shoulder attitude, and it does him no credit.
As for him being a pioneer? That just isn't so, unless you ignore some incredibly strong performances by Negro actors and actresses, long before Poitier. Didn't, for example, Hattie McDowell get an Oscar for her supporting role in Gone With The Wind? (Yes that was only a supporting role; but a very powerful supporting role in the 3 hour and forty minute classic, that is clearly one of the great movies of all time, is more than the equivalent of many a starring role in a much shorter, less powerful picture.) Of course, that Poitier attitude is too full of racial hostility to even realize that Mammie in Gone With The Wind was not a type cast domestic, but a sustaining force in the multi-generation history of an important family. Perhaps if he lost the attitude, he could have been an equally gifted performer. But with the attitude, Hattie projected ten times his power on the screen.
She understood how to create a real character. In Gone With The Wind, she projected more of a real sense of history, drama and human interaction, just by herself, than Poitier, O'Connor and the whole cast, together in In The Heat Of The Night. But then, Poitier was more into expressing his own pique. Sunday night was no exception.
William Flax Return Of The Gods Web Site
Of course not but you'd never know that by looking at most of American history. Let's face it- for most of our time in the Americas, Blacks have lived under slavery and legal segregation, denied many of the opportunties others could have without question.
For approximately the last 35-40 years or so, we've had a chance to reverse some of this unpleasant history but there's still some work to do on all sides of the fence.
Umh what do you consider looking black? That was such an ignorant, philistine comment. So freaking ignorant, and don't even try to redeem yourself. So I guess if a dark skin girl with long hair and is pretty she doesn't look black? Black is just a term darling that comes in different shades, and shapes. Believe it or not. Actually she looks more black than white. What does the award have to do with her being black? As far as I'm concerned that girl worked her ass off to get where she is. I don't see you on tv getting an award, so get a life. Simply ignorant!
The last post was directed to Mafree, not spectree.
This is what we end up with after 15 years of pitching "Industrial-strength" sunscreen.
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