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Oscars have become too political. This further erodes interest in it. In 2021 it’s too easy being political. Not being political would be interesting.
by TedShiller 6y ago
Oscars have become too political. This further erodes interest in it.
In 2021 it’s too easy being political. Not being political would be interesting.
- kristianc 6y agoPolitical in what sense? In the mid-90's the Best Picture was won, successively, by Schindler's List, Forrest Gump, and Braveheart. Each of those had a pretty solid political viewpoint, and I'd imagine the ratings were pretty high for those Oscar ceremonies. More likely, as the article says, we're living in a multi-channel world now where people have the choice to tune in, or not, to these monolithic cultural touchstones.
- croon 6y agoAll culture has always been political, the only thing that's changed is people taking offense at it.
- krapp 6y agoPeople taking offense at politics hasn't changed either. George Carlin was doing bits on cancel culture (what used to be called "political correctness") forty years ago.
- croon 6y agoFair enough, everything old is new.
- wccrawford 6y agoCancel culture is political correctness, but applied to a person's entire history, always. Being angry at something someone just did is not cancel culture. But when you look at something someone did 20 years ago and they've already apologized and learned from it, but then still insist they not have a job because of it, that's cancel culture. Cancel Culture is the opposite of "the right to be forgotten". But you're correct that people have always taken offense at politics. I can't imagine that ever wasn't the case.
- everdrive 6y agoI generally agree with you, but I would say that something like "donglegate" also fits in the cancel culture spectrum. Would you agree? Should there be a different term for it? (maybe just twitter shaming, followed by the modern rule that if you get too much attention on twitter you will be fired?)
- wccrawford 6y agoI think there's definitely something there worth talking about, but trying to broaden a term to mean more will actually just make the term less useful, and it'll be harder to talk about both things instead. I'm not sure what I'd call "donglegate" other than "internet justice", but it wouldn't be "cancel culture".
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- Ygg2 6y agoIf everything is political, then politics is just background noise.
- ploika 6y agoNot at all. Different things are political to different degrees and levels of importance.
- Ygg2 6y ago> different degrees and levels of But then the low level becomes baseline for apolitical.
- croon 6y agoI disagree, I wasn't stating it to be reductive, I was claiming that you can't find an IMDB top 250/Criterion collection/whatever fancy list of movies you prefer that doesn't have political statements. It makes them daring, the opposite of background noise.
- Ygg2 6y agoThat depends on how pedant you want to be about things being political. Movies like The Thing, Terminator, Alien, Aliens, etc. Don't really have a political message other than some vague politics as window dressing. Also since you said culture, and not FILMS. Give me the politics of Tetris, Pong, Super Mario, Donkey Kong.
- rland 6y agoThe Terminator included a graphic 10 minutes of Arnold Schwarz terminating an entire police station full of LAPD. I mean, I'm not sure what Cameron was thinking when he made it but I consider that a political statement no matter how anyone slices it.
- croon 6y ago> Movies like The Thing, Terminator, Alien, Aliens, etc. Don't really have a political message other than some vague politics as window dressing. https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a34518538/john-carpenter-2020-interview-coronavirus-trump-they-live-the-thing/ https://www.esquire.com/entertainment/movies/a34518538/john-... https://gen.medium.com/the-scariest-thing-about-alien-is-how-real-it-s-become-fa2182d2207e https://gen.medium.com/the-scariest-thing-about-alien-is-how... https://www.forbes.com/sites/jerrybowyer/2012/06/13/the-politics-of-ridley-scotts-blockbuster-film-prometheus/?sh=60c077293e6a https://www.forbes.com/sites/jerrybowyer/2012/06/13/the-poli... https://www.bfi.org.uk/interviews/terminator-james-cameron https://www.bfi.org.uk/interviews/terminator-james-cameron > Give me the politics of Tetris, Pong, Super Mario, Donkey Kong You got me. Let me rephrase it as any culture with a message.
- roenxi 6y agoWell, that and the political forces at work are boring. The cultural creators are excessively partisan, and excessive partisanship is the death of interesting nuance. Interesting politics in a story is politics that challenges the orthodoxy and explores topics delicately. Partisans don't do that. They are the orthodoxy, and they can't handle nuance.
- dougmwne 6y agoYup, pretty much. I am a progressive. I am deeply committed to it. And yet, I have been watching the death of art at the hands of the partisans. The depictions must be purely on message, whichever side you're on. The art's only function is to mouthpiece the values of the faction it belongs to. There's nothing interesting to say in mainstream art anymore because there's no room to say it.
- everdrive 6y agoThat's true in a sense, but there have been times when the popular culture was more relaxed, and was a closer fit to the median of the country. Part of the problem of course is that there is not really a common, popular culture any longer. And so it's much easier for most people to feel estranged from Hollywood. Everyone's estranged, and no one has much in common. But, it's also the case that the modern moralism that's permeating everything is particularly catastrophic and melodramatic. For sure, there have been times in history when things were worse, but that's hardly cause to celebrate. Media can certainly become "less political" in a normal sense that anyone would recognize without making your comment untrue at all.
- CountDrewku 6y agoIf people are suddenly taking offense to it that means the culture has shifted so far in one direction it's no longer relatable to the average person. The idea that people suddenly started being offended easier seems less likely than the industry falling off the political spectrum to the point people are sick of it.
- commandlinefan 6y ago> the only thing that's changed is people taking offense at it. So what you're saying is the the oscars have always been offending people, they're just offending different people now? If you're right, then the article still has an interesting point and it's something they should pay attention to: they used to have a big audience, and now they don't, so they must be offending the people that they used to be relying on. But that doesn't seem likely - the people most likely to actually be offended by the political tone of the oscars are the right-wing, traditional conservative types who ridiculed awards shows anyway. They've gone hard into the most extreme politics of the people who were tuning in to begin with and even they have gotten tired of the constant barrage of lecturing.
- MisterBastahrd 6y agoIf you don't think that something is political, it's probably because you're the one benefitting from the politics of the day. There are a hell of a lot of societal standards that were created for the purposes of keeping the status quo in place, and "we don't talk about politics" is one of them.
- dijit 6y agoYou might not be aware, but the core of this mentality is “you’re either with us or against us”; and is one of the most toxic mantras that those who seek to enact change engage in. I conduct many actions a day which do not make me complicit in the status quo. The mere act of throwing an item away is not political unto itself, the item in question may be. But we really must find better ways not to ascribe malice when some unknown group of people does something ordinary without consideration of politics.
- MisterBastahrd 6y agoIt could just be that actively choosing to be ignorant is in itself a form of malice if that ignorance harms others. I say this as someone who you feel lacks awareness, after all. Maybe I'm just too dumb to pretend that the obvious is actually nuanced.
- orwin 6y agoFirst: no its not "core", it is sometime a byproduct. In my opinion you have that reversed. The "everything is political" mean "every action or non-action any human take is political". Gravity is not political. How you describe gravitation to an audience is. The issue of this saying is that it make false equivalence. Everything might be political, but the degree differs, and not everything have to do with a "side". The way math is usually taught (poorly imho) have nothing to do with right or left, but with the culture and how we treat children, how we grade them and what we expect from them.[0] The "everything is equally political" that some people seems to be saying can and will become "you’re either with us or against us" [0] writing this i understand this is a poor example since in my country this criticism is politically charger when extrapolated.
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- lewisflude 6y agoCan you elaborate what you mean by political? I've seen this term used as a criticism in media when the focus is put on a non-white, non-male or somehow "othered" person. To me, I read this as people seeing the accomplishments of white men as legitimate and anything else purely as optics. I do think there is probably an element of pandering to an audience that goes on, but I'd love to see some evidence or just hear some more of your thoughts on this one.
- sol_invictus 6y agoIf you have a sizable populace willing to garrote you if your award nominations do not include a large enough representation of minority populaces, regardless of how movies, actors, directors, screenwriters, and anyone else actually performs in any given category (which, I believe, is the main point of an award), the incentive for including an equalized representation across all award categories far outweighs the benefit of awarding based on merit. That is the evidence you asked for, you're welcome. It's not a white / non-white question at all, as you can see.
- busterarm 6y agoMany awards since last year, Oscars included, actually require this kind of representation now to be nominated.
- sol_invictus 6y agoThen the equation is even more simple.
- lewisflude 6y agoI wouldn't call that evidence, but I can see how the pressure of political activism could challenge the idea that awards are merit based. But I don't think I've ever seen any actual evidence that the merits of non-white, non-male people are any less than their counterparts. Most responses I see are talking more broadly about "PC culture". I think this could also be a case of a) More non-white, non-male, "othered" people working in media b) More of an audience for that content than ever, enabling people that fit different profiles to make movies
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- tootie 6y agoHere's Richard Gere in 1993 directly addressing Deng Xiaoping from the podium: https://youtu.be/mh8cAlNGQxI https://youtu.be/mh8cAlNGQxI Here's Marlon Brando sending a (fake) Native American to accept his award for Godfather in 1973: https://youtu.be/2QUacU0I4yU?t=38s https://youtu.be/2QUacU0I4yU?t=38s
- renewiltord 6y agoLooking at Wikipedia, it appears that Ms Sacheen Littlefeather's father was Apache and Yaqui. That doesn't seem fake.