Short answer: Incredibly unethical.
Spike Lee, ground-breaking black director, social commentator, Knicks fan and hot-head, announced that he’s boycotting the Oscars because its 2016 nominations list did not meet diversity mandates, and posted this rant/manifesto on Instagram:
“Again. I Would Like To Thank President Cheryl Boone Isaacs And The Board Of Governors Of The Academy Of Motion Pictures Arts And Sciences For Awarding Me an Honorary Oscar This Past November. I Am Most Appreciative. However My Wife, Mrs. Tonya Lewis Lee And I Will Not Be Attending The Oscar Ceremony This Coming February. We Cannot Support It And Mean No Disrespect To My Friends, Host Chris Rock and Producer Reggie Hudlin, President Isaacs And The Academy. But, How Is It Possible For The 2nd Consecutive Year All 20 Contenders Under The Actor Category Are White? And Let’s Not Even Get Into The Other Branches. 40 White Actors In 2 Years And No Flava At All. We Can’t Act?! WTF!! It’s No Coincidence I’m Writing This As We Celebrate The 30th Anniversary Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s Birthday. Dr. King Said “There Comes A Time When One Must Take A Position That Is Neither Safe, Nor Politic, Nor Popular But He Must Take It Because Conscience Tells Him It’s Right”. For Too Many Years When The Oscars Nominations Are Revealed, My Office Phone Rings Off The Hook With The Media Asking Me My Opinion About The Lack Of African-Americans And This Year Was No Different. For Once, (Maybe) I Would Like The Media To Ask All The White Nominees And Studio Heads How They Feel About Another All White Ballot. If Someone Has Addressed This And I Missed It Then I Stand Mistaken. As I See It, The Academy Awards Is Not Where The “Real” Battle Is. It’s In The Executive Office Of The Hollywood Studios And TV And Cable Networks. This Is Where The Gate Keepers Decide What Gets Made And What Gets Jettisoned To “Turnaround” Or Scrap Heap. This Is What’s Important. The Gate Keepers. Those With “The Green Light” Vote….”
Now let me list as many of the ways Lee’s boycott is unethical (I may stray into why it is stupid as well), as I can before my fingers get tired and nausea overwhelms me:
1. The boycott is racist. He is boycotting fellow artists, their work, their honor for their work, and the ceremony giving them that honor, because of their race alone. If an unknown number of the actors being honored were black, Lee would not be boycotting. It is by definition a racist boycott.
2. The boycott, and any larger boycott that follows, will automatically devalue any future Oscar nominations or awards to any black artists in the future, as these will appear to be motivated by duress, fear, and other factors beyond performance, talent and ability.
3. He is behaving disrespectfully and unfairly to his colleagues who were nominated, for something they have absolutely no control over. This is incompetent and unprofessional.
4. If, as his rant admits, the Oscars themselves are not at fault for the absence of nomintaions to black artists, then boycotting the Oscars is inherently unfair and irresponsible.
5. The boycott is incoherent, and like almost all boycotts, does damage without purpose. What is Lee saying? That there should be a quota? That the vote was rigged? That there needs to be affirmative action in voting for the Oscars?
6. It’s gutless. Go ahead, Spike: name which of the nominees don’t deserve to be on the list, and should be replaced with unquestionably superior black performers. Then explain why your arguments are boycott-worthy, as exactly as valid cases are made for un-nominated white actors.
7. “We Can’t Act?” is an intentionally dishonest statement. Nobody in show business—hell, nobody in community theater—equates awards or nominations with ability, merit, or anything but good work combined with the luck of the draw. Lee knows this—he’s a jerk, but he’s a smart jerk. Kevin Bacon has never been nominated. Ewan McGregor has never been nominated. John Goodman has never been nominated. Bruce Willis. Richard Gere. This shocked me: Donald Sutherland, one of the most prolific, versatile, consistently excellent actors alive, has never been nominated for an Oscar. Nobody, especially them, has ever taken this as a statement that those actors, and literally hundreds of others, thousand if we include past generations, “can’t act.”
8. Lee is grand-standing offensively, and degrading civil rights heroes in doing so. “It’s No Coincidence I’m Writing This As We Celebrate The 30th Anniversary Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr’s Birthday….” Right, Spike…your refusing to go to a party with a bunch of millionaires evokes for all of us the sacrifice of protesters who braved police dogs, fire hoses and billy-clubs.
9. The boycott has a conflict of interest attached, because Lee was a potential nominee, though not a deserving one. Is this a principled protest, or a tantrum? In all likelihood, both. Well, except that it isn’t very principled.
That does it; I’m sick of writing about Spike already. Feel free to write in with more.
Ethics Alarms 
He will boycott? Wow….I may finally watch!
Spike Lee and his intentional racist disrespect of his fellow actors, directors, etc. just dumped him into a list of officially outed racists; he’s a POS! Since I refuse to support racist ideals, I’ll make every effort not to watch another thing he participates in (I actually spend the time reading the credits ahead of time, if they are available, looking for some old friends).
Spike Lee, you made your racist choices, now you can suffer the consequences of those choices. I hope Lee is shunned from all things related to the film industry. As far as I’m concerned he can be the new pool boy for a fellow racist POS Al Sharpton.
FU Spike Lee and any faux apology you have the guts to deliver.
Aside From Everything Else, Why The Hell Does He Type Like This? I Can Only Imagine His Scripts Reading With All Title Caps, Including Things That Should Be All-Caps Like “Interior: Day.”
There has got to be some kind or personality disorder attached to typing like that.
I Agree. It Is Irritating (I.E., It Annoys Me).
I didn’t want to say anything because it’s a little bit petty and a distraction from the real problem of his rant, but I totally agree, Title Case Can Be Truly Annoying Especially In Long Winded Manifestos And Rants! There are functions in word processors and desktop publishing software that will do this to any selected text, I’ve used this function many times when I’m generating advertising text where it’s completely acceptable to use it for things like bullet points.
It’s really hard to blow off title case in long things but I can blow off ALL CAP’s because there are physical limitations that “force” people to choose that method because they cannot press more than one key at a time and/or they have serious vision problems that make it hard for them to read and they don’t want to make a mistake when they type. I had a friend that was dying of brain cancer that did this in all of our correspondence, it was totally excusable and I’ve learned to tolerate it because I don’t know why they are choosing to do it.
Sometimes you just have to walk a day in other’s shoes to understand their reasons behind these kinds of choices, I choose not to be petty about such things.
He’s. So. Angry. He. Can Only. Squeeze. Out. One Word. At. A. Time. Through. His. Sphincter.
When logorrhea meets diarrhea…
Jack, I agree with all of your arguments – Lee’s protest is incredibly unethical. Still, assuming an entirely non-racist country (which is a claim I won’t defend), a country that is eighty-seven percent non-black (a claim I will defend if you don’t count the few persons considering themselves partially black), an entirely non-racist film industry (though they really seem to sway in the other direction), and an entirely non-racist population of Academy Award voters (though they, too, seem to sway in the opposite direction), a reasonable, non-racist number of black nominees out of twenty would be 2.3. I have no desire to research and calculate the number of black actors nominated per year in the past, nor to engage in the effort required to calculate the standard deviation and error in the estimate. I admit the current situation may be a result of chance. Nonetheless, while not worthy of boycott, it is at least worthy of suspicion (Even If Lee’s Protest Is So Damn Irritating).
All things being equal, human beings more positively—maybe not a lot, but still— respond to performers who are like them than they respond to performers who aren’t. That’s a bias, but it isn’t racism . I see black performers doing stand-up in front of all-black audiences laughing their heads of, and I don’t get the jokes at all…and no whites are anywhere to be seen. My racim? Their racism? It’s cultural affinities, that’s all. It’s taste. So in an industry that makes entertainment to appeal to mostly white audiences, a mostly white industry tend toward mostly white performers. Big shock? The fact that this hasn’t happened more often is that voters have voted against their honest preferences—which they should not do.
“So in an industry that makes entertainment to appeal to mostly white audiences, a mostly white industry tend toward mostly white performers. ”
I disagree with your first statement as I cant believe anyone said “hey lets make a movie that appeals to only 50% of the population.
I think this voting result is a result of the last two parts of your statement. Its a mostly white industry made up of white performers. Do I believe its racist or bigoted? No. I believe its a result of people casting other people who look like them and who they identify with.
And its not a left or right issue. Its across the board. I recently had an argument with a friend who was far far to the left who thought that Tyler Perry’s stage shows were crap , that Perry was an idiot and so were his fans. I told him that I personally didn’t get the appeal but obviously there was an audience for these shows and Perry had smartly tapped into it. My friend was having non of it, as far as he was concerned it was low brow garbage and Perry’s audiences didn’t know any better, that they should be seeing the more Shakespeare and the such. I told him he was a snob and left it at that.
I agree completely Bill, but I don’t know where you got the idea that the movie audience is 50% white. According to the industry’s stats, White and Hispanic frequent movie-goers in 2014 was almost 10 times that of frequent black movie-goers. Doesn’t that explain a lot (though it is a chicken-egg stat, come to think of it.).
Click to access MPAA-Theatrical-Market-Statistics-2014.pdf
I was thinking more of the over all population not the percentage of theater goers.
But if black theater goers are not seeing themselves reflected on screen that may explain the low turn outs.
I’m sure it’s part of it; some of it is class; some of it is fractured family and generational.
I am offended that you imply here that Spike Lee is a racist. Spike, if you can hear me, I am certain that you are not racist.
[Actual Spike Lee Quote:] “White women when they want to be with black men, they just know all they have to do is go to some club…I give interracial couples a look. Daggers. They get uncomfortable when they see me on the street. Hand in hand and arm in arm. I just hope they’re in it for the sex mythology.”
Okaaaaay.
Spike wants quotas.
All that can be accomplished with this kind of soft terrorism is any black person (what conservatives call “just another American”) who gets nominated or awarded will never know if they’re a token to avoid being skewered by the militant race grievance industry or if it is actual merit.
“This year’s award for being black and showing up goes to….”
Michael Moore is also boycotting because no unkempt, fake blue-collar,hateful,loud-mouth Communists have been nominated.
Don’t get me started about that partisan hack Michael Moore and his cult’ish following among some Liberals; I boycotted that POS long ago.
Hah. He’s still pissed he didn’t get anything for playing Jabba the Hut.
https://ethicsalarms.com/2015/01/20/the-destructive-useful-unethical-presumption-of-bigotry-part-2-the-oscar-snub/#comment-301230
That’s a nicely stated opinion on color blindness and the Oscars!
Here’s an article with several quotes from insiders that makes it clear hwo foolish, unfair and pointless Lee’s boycott (and those of Jada Pinkett Smith and, yecchh, Michael Moore: http://www.ew.com/article/2016/01/18/oscars-straight-outta-compton-snub
And the correct response to that is “Well, of course. This is all obvious, and of course nobody equates Oscar honors as a legitimate, objective commentary on quality.
This post has led me to the conclusion that quotas are what Spike and Black Lives Matter and the Obama Administration and Al Sharpton and the campus demonstrators want. All these fancy terms such as systemic racism and disparate impact are simply code words for wanting quotas in every aspect of American life.
If black people aren’t proportionally represented in [fill in the blank], it’s racist and must be rectified by affirmative action-like programs. If there aren’t nineteen percent [or whatever the census says is the correct percentage] black people throughout Goldman Sachs, including managing partners, its a result of racism. If there aren’t nineteen percent black people on the faculty of every college and university in America, it’s racism. If there aren’t nineteen percent black people in Congress and in every government job in America, it’s racism. If nineteen percent of all students in every college and university aren’t black and if Phi Beta Kappa isn’t nineteen percent black, it’s racism. These facts and results have absolutely nothing to do with anything else. If every town in the country is not nineteen percent black and those people are not spread throughout all towns as if they have been folded in like an expert baker folding an ingredient into a cake batter, it’s racism.
At first blush, this conclusion may seem absurd but it’s the only logical explanation of the intractability of this systemic racism and disparate impact straw man stalking the earth like a giant Stay-Pufft marshmallow man. Of course no one asks whether there are enough young black people who want to do what it takes to get a job at Goldman Sachs (never mind put up with all you have to put up with to work at a place like that). Or whether there are enough young black people who want to go through the gauntlet of getting a Ph.D. and a job in academia or academic administration. Working at Goldman Sachs or working in the academy are simply not for everyone. And aren’t young black people smart enough, just like everyone else, to know that?
And then we have the opposite side of this demand. If there are quotas for the Oscars and in academia, what about jazz players or football players or basketball players and track athletes? Only one black guy on a basketball court for either team at any given time? A jazz trio can only have what, one black guy? Is it two or three black guys on the field for either team at any given time allowed in football? I’m not sure how the math would work out. Two point three guys? Maybe nineteen percent of all participants with the denominator being the number of plays times eleven? Which would be determined at the end of the game and some plays would be replayed if the percentage turns out to be wrong? Too many black guys in prison? No problem, let them out until they only comprise nineteen percent. Too many black people arrested? No problem. Once those arrested have reached nineteen percent of a city’s prior total arrests for the prior year, no more black guys get arrested until next year. Non-black people arrests less than eighty-one percent? Round up some more of the usual non-black suspects.
This will wipe out systemic racism and disparate impact. It’s what these groups want. I wish they’d just be forthright about it. It would open the country up to the absolute poverty of their ideas.
Then at the blacks-only awards programs there should be only 19% blacks people awarded.
Black Entertainment Television should air 81% all white programming.
BET is owned by a majority white company (Viacom), which in turn has an all white executive board. Any racism displayed would be of the internalized kind.
https://abagond.wordpress.com/2013/12/13/wet-white-entertainment-television/
Correction: of the commercial kind.
Oh Deery.
On Other Bill’s comment about 19% black this and that; seems to me that if Black Lives Matter isn’t 81% non-black it must, equally, be a racist organisation. No?
Yes.
Lol. Black Lives Matter isn’t really a formal organization like NAACP, it’s a movement. As far as a racial breakdown on people who agree with the movement:
views on police killings of African American men are highly stratified by race and ethnicity. Approximately two-thirds (65%) of white Americans say recent killings of African American men by police are isolated incidents, while about four in ten (41%) Hispanic Americans and only 15% of black
Americans say the same. More than eight in ten (81%) black Americans say recent police killings of African American men are part of a broader pattern of how police treat African Americans.
So about 60% of Hispanics and 35% of white Americans believe the stated claims of the BLM movement. Note also that:
Most Americans do not believe that police officers treat blacks and other minorities the same as whites. Only about four in ten (41%) Americans say that the police generally treat racial and ethnic
groups equally, while nearly six in ten (57%) disagree. In 2014, Americans were somewhat more divided: 45% said that police treat white and non-white Americans equally, while 52% disagreed.
White Americans are divided in their views about police treatment of racial minorities. Half (50%) say police officers generally treat blacks and other minorities the same as whites, while 48% disagree. In contrast, more than eight in ten (84%) black Americans and nearly three-quarters (73%) of Hispanic Americans say police officers do not generally treat non-whites the same as whites.
The attitudes of white Americans are stratified by social class. Fifty-three percent of white working-class Americans believe police officers generally treat non-whites and whites equally, while 45% disagree. In contrast, less than half (44%) of white college-educated
Americans say blacks and other minorities are generally treated the same as whites by police officers, while 56% say the opposite.
So what? The media and the administration have worked overtime to create the illusion of innate and hostile racial bias. The affluent whites who believe it are taking political sides, not using any personal experience. Nor are the polls results you cite consistent with the exorbitant claims of Black Lives Matter. Here’s a poll: Do you believe Mike Brown had his hands up in surrender? Anyone who answers in the affirmative is irrelevant, because their opinion is per se based on lies. What’s the opinion of all Americans who do not believe the false narratives? That’s the result that matters. I don’t care about the opinions of people who base their views on lies.
So do you think the police treat white citizens and black citizens equally?
Yes.
Ok. If you believe that the police treat black citizens the same as whites, then I can see why you would think Black Lives Matter is nonsense.
It’s not nonsense; it’s racist in rhetoric and conduct. There are biases that cause both white, and perhaps even black police to sometimes perceive more of a threat from black suspects that they would not feel in a similar circumstance with a white suspect. But that’s not the same as racism, it’s not hostile, it’s not sinister, except in individual cases of outright racists, and it isn’t helped by chanting that black lives matter, is if anyone who isn’t black thinks they don’t.
Our interpretation of what’s nonsense is a little different; I think BLM is nonsense because of its racism you think it’s not nonsense because for the same reason.
Either way I think we both can agree that BLM is projecting foolish or unacceptable behavior. 😉
The BLM movement is nonsense. The BLM movement IS a racist movement demanding that police treat black people differently than all other people simply because they are black; such race based preferential treatment is RACIST and demanding such treatment is also RACIST!
What do you think people like Al Sharpton would think of organized groups of white people publicly demanding preferential treatment for white people in major cities across the United States just because they are white? Al Sharpton would be on every TV in the nation, on every news broadcast in the nation, on every radio station in the nation, screaming RACIST at the top of his lungs and inflaming black people to rise up against the injustice. What is Al Sharpton doing as it relates to BLM; people like Al Sharpton only care about racism against black people, him and his ilk don’t give a damn about racism towards anyone but black people, which is also RACIST!
People supporting the BLM movement, whether directly or indirectly, are being hypocritical racists and their too damned illogically ignorant to realize it. BLM and their supporters are completely consumed by their own hyperbole and that hyperbole blinds them to their own racism. I understand that these people perceive a problem and want to address their perceived problem but opposing perceived racism with active racism is hypocritical racism!
Racism is racism regardless of its source; I am opposed to racism in all its ugly forms.
deery,
That was an loaded question and you know it; anyone that answers that question is implying that the police, all police, are racist. Equally in this case is a perception and can have different meanings for each person you ask depending on their knowledge of police confrontation with others and their perception of those confrontations; so, please share with us your detailed definition of “equally” as it pertains to this specific topic.
Let me ask you a couple of loaded questions:
1. In general: Do you think that white citizens that are approached by police officers treat those officers differently than non-white citizens that are approached by police officers?
2. In general: Do you think that white criminals that are approached by police officers treat those officers differently than non-white criminals that are approached by police officers?
3. In general: Do you think that police officers should treat any violent citizen differently from any another violent citizen when that officer is confronted with a violent citizen?
4. In general: Do you think that police should have a heightened sense of awareness in areas of cities that have extremely high crime rates?
5. In general: Do you think that police should have the right to confront potential death from a perceived violent citizen with deadly force?
Police are trained to react to a situation that is presented to them in as mush of a “predefined” appropriate reaction as physically possible but they are not robots without feelings or fears, they are just as human as the citizens they serve. The manner in which police react is determined by the officers perception of the situation that is presented to them. Citizens choose how they present themselves to police officers, whether they present themselves as civil or uncivil, respectful or disrespectful, compliant or resisting, violent or non-violent it is their choice. All these things make a HUGE difference in how an officer reacts to any given situation.
To repeat (and no doubt paraphrase) a Heather Mac Donald observation: “Black lives matter more to the police than they do to any other governmental institution.” The police go places most everyone else avoids to confront violent criminals and all sorts of other nastiness. You couldn’t get me to be a cop for anything on Earth. I’m amazed people even want to be cops. As amazed as I am people want to serve in the military. But I thank both of those groups every day for doing so. They are braver than I am.
That is a statement so generalized that it is unanswerable. Some police don’t. There are studies that show that police hesitate to shoot blacks a split second longer than whites. Is that “equally”? I am certain that there is no intentional unequal treatment as a systemic problem. I am certain that there are wide discrepancies among individual police officers and specific departments.
Quit rephrasing it that way!
Don’t you know we’re supposed to condemn
allall non-federal police forces based on the actions of a few?!We have been over this before. What do you consider “systematic”? At what point does it tip over from being an individual problem and “isolated incidents” to being systematic? If the police and police departments in the three of the largest cities (NYC, LA, Chicago) are on record as intentionally discriminating against minorities is that enough to make it systematic? What if you add a slew of smaller cities into it as well?
It’s not nonsense; it’s racist in rhetoric and conduct. There are biases that cause both white, and perhaps even black police to sometimes perceive more of a threat from black suspects that they would not feel in a similar circumstance with a white suspect. But that’s not the same as racism, it’s not hostile, it’s not sinister, except in individual cases of outright racists, and it isn’t helped by chanting that black lives matter, is if anyone who isn’t black thinks they don’t.
It is interesting that you consider someone who is exercising their racial bias against another person as not being a racist, but people who ask for those same people to *stop* exercising their racial against them are considered the “real racists.”
Racism doesn’t have to be hostile. Racism doesn’t have to be sinister. In fact, I think it is often commonplace and matter of fact. Systematic racism doesn’t require individuals to have an evil heart. Jim Crow did not require individual people to be evil Redlining did not require evil intent from individual lenders. Hell, even slavery did not require every individual who participated in that system to be evil incarnate. Pointing out instances of embedded systematic racism is not racist.
Racism and bias are not the same thing. That’s part of the problem: constantly allowing the definitions to blur. Saying that because I am white, I have animus against blacks: that’s racism. That’s Black Lives Matter. White audiences preferring to watch movies with white actors: that’s a bias. Preferences are not racist. Holding blacks and whites to different standards is race prejudice. It’s unfair, even if there are good arguments for the practice, For example, racial profiling is race prejudice, even if it is statistically rational. It is not racist, however.
Actually, what is your global definition of racism? That might help to clear things up.
Because how is this Saying that because I am white, I have animus against blacks: that’s racism. , not an example of this: For example, racial profiling is race prejudice, even if it is statistically rational. It is not racist, however.
Your question is incoherent. I really don’t know what you think you are asking. Racism is a belief that another race is inferior, and that all members of it are to be presumed less deserving of equal treatment, respect and trust because of their race alone. Racial prejudice is treating members of one race differently from others based on race. Affirmative action is prejudice against whites. It is racism toward blacks, if it is done in the belief that they cannot compete on an level playing field.
Ok. Do you believe there is such a thing as systematic or institutional racism?
Theoretically? Sure. A system can be intentionally rigged to harm a race. Jim Crow was a racist system. There are some I can point to, such as college admission quotas that penalize Asian-Americans, intentionally. Most of the time, however, what is called institutional racism is a cynical ploy or delusion to ignore the contributing effects of factors within a struggling community’s control and responsibility. Systems aren’t racist. People are racist. Systems in which one race does better than another statistically is not preemptively racist. State lotteries harm blacks disproportionately, but that wasn’t the intent, and blacks gave it within their pwoer to make it a white problem only. Don’t waste money on it. Show business is tough for minorities and women, in part as a hangover from conditions created by old racist and sexist systems—that doesn’t make the system racist now. Most successful and accomplished playwrights are white males. That means there are many more roles for white males. Majority white cultures develop stories overhwelmingly about white culture, starring whites. Entertainment follows. There is nothing intentional about the problems it creates for black talent. It’s life. Life is not racist.
“Systemic racism” is a way of characterizing the unfairness of life as sinister. It relates to a philosophy of forced equality of outcomes as just, and a resistance to that philosophy and cruel.
Thank you for satisfying my personal curiosity in the matter Jack. I appreciate it.
Not so fast. What do you consider systematic racism?
This is another of those vagueness of language arguments. When I hear a typical leftist describe what they call “systemic” or “organizational” racism, they end up describing what would better be termed endemic racism…or an organization occupied by racists. Those individuals may abuse their power or act outside their authority to act on their own racism, but there is NO racism programmed into the system itself. If there were (and there isn’t) then you’d have an actual argument for “systemic”, or what I would consider better termed, “constitutional” racism.
Great followup question!!!
This is a definition of systematic racism that I agree with: Institutional racism (also known as structural racism, state racism or systemic racism) is racial discrimination by governments, corporations, religions, or educational institutions or other large organizations with the power to influence the lives of many individuals.
So slavery and Jim Crow are obvious examples. But also redlining, stop and frisk as practiced by the NYC, and even in medicine, like the Tuskegee experiment or the “Mississippi appendectomies” that were widespread throughout the south are other examples of institutionalized racism.
My take on this is that it is a response to a forceful, behind-the-scenes backlash for two things, (1) Spike Lee’s not getting on board the BLM train in the first place, and (2) his repeatedly and daringly stating — (one of the ethical points Jack has been making for such a long time) — that the black community itself had a responsibility for black lives and to black welfare. I wouldn’t be surprised if Lee’s were a fearful response either, on a personal as well as professional level. He’s been angry at the world for some months now:
Spike Lee’s accusations can’t really be put in any rational perspective. There are over forty national organizations that bestow awards for merit in cinema each year in the U.S. comprised of Critics, Festivals, Industry and Audience. Lee decided to go after one of them, the most popular Oscars, but cumulatively the others do make a difference. Here, for instance are the choices of the Black Film Critics Circle, a prestigious and – bias aside – knowing and fair-minded group. Their Top Ten are: Creed, Mad Max:Fury Road, Straight Outa Compton, Spotlight, The Martian, Room, Beasts of No Nation, The Hateful Eight, The Big Short, Ex Machina.
Three out of ten (one of them African-made, acted and themed). I call that a righteous proportion.
BFCC, at their December awards ceremony, named Stallone as Best Supporting for “Creed,” “Straight Outa Compton for Original Screenplay, and “What Happened, Nina Simone?” as Best Documentary. Surprise! All three turned out to be Oscar nominations as well, up against strong competition. And so did the black critics’ white choices, such as Best Director going to Miller for “Fury Road”, and Best Actress going to “Room”‘s Brie Larson. (So? Maybe Lee’s got it backwards and the Academy copied the BFCC list?).
Looking at the NAACP Image nominations for cinema, there are more black entries — the bias is naturally stronger here — but the films mentioned are weaker, some considerably for all-around status, like Concussion (yes, Will Smith did a good job in a well-meant but very flawed film); Straight Outa Compton (black assessments: “movie about a group of risk-takers should have taken more risks itself,” “a slickly produced piece of commercial art,” and “beholden to the appeasement of so many artists and legacies and estates that none of it coheres’.”); or Dope (Robert Abele in the LA Times: “just another unfunny grab bag of stereotypes. Don’t believe the hype.”); and Secret in Their Eyes, Brotherly Love; Southpaw, Light Girls, The Perfect Guy, Lila and Eve . . . Infinity Polar Bear . . .. Now we’re in the realm of everyone- gets-a-prize.
The Academy anti-nomination buzz this year hasn’t been as critical of the chosen movies so much as hot for Academy-snubbed films, including “Creed,” and “Beast of No Nation”… but the loudest whines also included, ridiculously, mediocre entries like “The Good Dinosaur.” “Creed” had a thumb up from most critics, but it wasn’t up that high except for “stunning fight sequences.” Beyond that, including black reviewers, it “rides on Jordan’s charisma;” is seen repeatedly as “formulaic and predictable” … these are the good reviews, remember …”jerks tears,” “street corn,” “same old ritual” “same old same old.” In the end, it just wasn’t Best material and thus Jordan narrowly missed the Best Actor category. If anything “Beast” had higher credentials and a terrific amateur child star, and it didn’t make it either.
However the Oscar results come out, there is no overriding support for Spike Lee’s accusations … except perhaps … do you suppose? … the overall snub for “Chi-Raq,” Lee’s Own Contribution To Cinema in 2015 That Was Panned. By Black Critics In Particular. As In Variations Of Not-Just-Bad BUT “insultingly bad.” Very personal, that one. The offense against the black American population turns out to be . . . . his own.
Arg. Not “endemic”. Not the word I’m looking for. “Epidemic” maybe.