In one month the Academy Awards ceremony is taking place. In the US I can see it without missing my sleep and without searching for a specific channel with live broadcast. Usually, it is shown on nationwide TV.
However, this year I am not sure if I’ll watch the gala. You must have heard about the recent turmoil around the “white nomination.” For the second year in the row all the actors and actresses nominated in the four major categories are white.
Just like last year the #oscarsSowhite hashtag was quickly formed. Internet community and public figures quickly expressed their dissatisfaction, and some celebrities even urged the host of ceremony to resign.
Unfortunately, I have not seen all of the well-known films last year, including those with actors of color. Here you can read an interesting analysis of the films starring black actors, which according to the author deserved nominations.
I asked my former supervisor at Bellevue, WA, City Hall to comment on this situation. He is en expert on diversity. Here is his reply:
I will not be watching the awards this year. I have never really felt like award shows are really valuable or accurate in that they do not take into account the hundreds of films that are made and released every year. In addition, they do not take into account the many, many great performances too. How can you truly say that one film is “the best” when you have ignored or not even seen many, many other films. The voting academy is composed of 94% white people, mostly male and older.
The voting academy has over 6,000 members and does not reflect the 25% – 30% of moviegoers that are people of color, nor does its membership reflect the diversity of films that are produced. We as human beings, male and female, young and old, have our own subconscious biases. So it stands to reason that if you have a mostly white male group of people deciding who or what films should get awards the results will be slanted and bias as well. Therefore, we wind up with nominations of all white people.
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