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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 26, 2023 12:06:14 GMT
I think there is also a sense of guilt in liberal white Americans about Black people and it’s true that the actual situation in a lot of Black communities is terrible and in big part an inheritance of recent past wrongdoings but it won’t be resolved with auto flagellation and senseless empty gestures.
And of course, discrimination and abandonment also exist in other communities.
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Post by ellie on Jan 26, 2023 12:42:06 GMT
I agree Sgev. Now I preface what I’m going to say with the fact that I live several thousand miles away from the USA so my knowledge of the diversity situation there may be flawed. But it seems to me a lot of the pro diversity actions are simply window dressing and, as you say Sgev, empty gestures.
I mean, really what is giving multi millionaire black actors awards (that they sometimes don’t really deserve - Will Smith I’m looking at you! ) really doing to improve the lot of the poor black people who really suffer as a result of institutional and social racism? The hard actions that need to be taken seem to be outnumbered by empty PR gestures.
On a different but related topic, I was surprised, in the recent Presidential election, at how many Latino voters were Republican and of the very right wing section of the Party. Is there a big divide between the rich and poor of that community? Do they lack the public solidarity that the black community seems to demonstrate.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 26, 2023 13:51:30 GMT
Latinos comes from diverse backgrounds and countries indeed. Typically, Cubans who emigrated after the cruel comunist revolution in their native country are very suspicious of anything left-wing, even the actually very timid Democrats version (I recently heard an interesting opinion by a British journalist saying that what Americans and British doesn't realize is that the American version of the Torys aren't Republicans but Democrats) and Mexicans supposendly are more left-wing oriented because Democrats are supposedly more immigrants friendly. There was this wonderful prediction that Texas was soon or later become a Democrat state because the strong presence of Mexicans but Democrats spoiled it during the last election because, like with Black voters, the sympathy toward Democrats aren't because liberal policies but because the racism they perceive on the other side (those communities, Black and Latinos are culturally very conservative) and Democrats are increasingly influenced by unpopular social media ideas. For example, clean energies. That's actually something with I can agreed although seeing how damaging some of them are to the environment (to extract lithium you need gigantic amounts of water, for example) can make me cynical about activists but in the case of Mexican workers in Texas it is difficult because a lot of them live from their jobs in the oil industry. Most voters would go for the economy, their own economy instead of cultural wars but even there, you have that Latinx silliness with some very privileged Chicano activists who clearly doesn't speak Spanish and very privileged white academics saying it's the right way to refer to Latinos even when it's a term almost impossible to say in Spanish! Those little details get you a lot of likes on Twitter but slowly are destroying the trust of the political base of the Democrats in these communities. Hopefully, they could be more subtle and selling in a better way their ideas during the next elections.
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Post by ellie on Jan 26, 2023 14:24:36 GMT
Thanks for your response Sgev. It explains a lot. From over here it seems to me that the Democrats need to find a younger more dynamic and relatable leader to galvanise support. Biden just comes across as frail and very old. And Kamala Harris seems to have disappeared. We never see anything about her in the media over here.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 27, 2023 22:02:08 GMT
Apparently, the Academy is "investigating" AR's Oscar campaign! They never investigated Weinstein methods nor the multimillion campaigns of every year!
All because Twitter! How such an insignificant site could have such power over institutions?
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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 27, 2023 22:22:59 GMT
Seriously what a debacle! Last year it was Will Smith and now this!
Cate Blanchett is very outspoken about her convictions and I understand she promoted AR's nomination. She is the sure winner so the right thing to do would be to boycott these awards! The issue is that most people who depend of their reputation are terrified of being called "racist" by Twitter even when it's not the case! I just hope that those actors who promoted AR stand by their word and defend her! They can't let her reputation being damaged by this!
Also, the Academy is totally finished! They always had very little credibility but now they seem to only obey to deluded randoms on social media!
EDITED I want to understand what they are doing and I guess they could be referring to some rule about being extra friendly with potential voters. If I remember well, they at certain point changed some rules because the Weinstein’s infamous techniques (but they never humiliated him or any celebrity with an “investigation” after the nominations).
Probably the independent studio indeed paid to some actors to promote her. It’s still perplexing because big studios spend millions on much expensive tools to promote their candidates. Everyone knows it! It’s never about quality or the best but about campaigns. And it’s pretty unfortunate because the awful social media is not just making it about racism but directly attacking an actress that most probably than not didn’t decided anything about this.
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Post by ellie on Jan 28, 2023 12:33:48 GMT
I don’t understand. Doesn’t every actor/studio etc campaign for nominations. And surely lots of them are going to know or be friendly with some of the voters. What is the specific issue with AR’s nomination that has caused all this backlash.
Honestly I really think The Oscars (and most other awards) have lost all credibility these days. They might as well just let Twitter vote for and decide who wins.
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Post by roverpup on Jan 28, 2023 12:47:31 GMT
Isn't that what all those "For Your Consideration" ads are about?
Paid advertisements to promote actors, films, etc. People and organizations vouching for the film.
Why should this actress be a subject of "investigation"?
This is nuts! It really makes the Academy look stupid.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 28, 2023 13:03:03 GMT
I don’t know! I just remembered that some years ago they supposedly changed some rules because the Weinstein campaigns and there were mentions about directly “courting” voters so I wonder if they are talking about a rule along those lines but it’s extremely problematic because studios undoubtedly do worse things and spend much more money: the most polemic campaigns are the negative ones against rivals and all those magazine covers, ads, trips to do Q&As and secondary awards for stars are extremely expensive.
AR campaign seemed to be about familiar names championing her and doing a pair of Q&A with, again, major stars at exactly the right time of the voting. Were they paid? Or are really just friends/fans of her or the indie film? Anyway it doesn’t seem worse than what studios do. I have seen people saying, including a critic, that black actresses doesn’t have opportunity of a campaign like hers but that’s ridiculous because both black actresses mentioned, especially VD, had a traditional huge campaign by big studios. Someone asked why pundits were calling AR “a grassroot” campaign when her friends were “white privileged celebrities”, well, because even when Hollywood actors are more powerful than your random Twitter poster they aren’t so powerful like Hollywood studios! And who knows about Twitter randoms! It seems they can really scare The Academy even when they are insignificant in numbers!
I think it’s a big error by the Academy. They wrongly think Twitter means popularity but it doesn’t. They have years trying to please Twitter and they always get it wrong. It’s shameful! Now they are going against their own voters! Maybe they should do what BAFTA does and create a rightful thinking comitee who choose politically correct nominees but right now they are humiliating a talented indie actress and the voters.
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Post by sgev1977 on Jan 28, 2023 13:38:15 GMT
TBH the Oscar has always been a lousy award that it’s rarely won by the most deserving person but in its dying years it has becoming even more pathetic with their obsession with being beloved by social media! So I’m increasingly happy with BC winning the not so popular but much more prestigious awards by critics last year, especially the historical NYFCC award (contrary to the Oscars they recognized the talents of Chaplin, Welles, Kubrick and Hitchcock at their respectively times) and by the way, there were a few of negative tweets when they didn’t awarded black actors last year even when the year before Delroy Lindo (totally ignored by the Academy) and Chadwick Boseman both won Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor respectively but those tweets were ignored and forgotten!
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