Soooo how do people on here feel about the white washing criticism of the Oscars?

[getbak]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Does the term "whitewashing" have a completely different meaning than I thought it did? Have I been Vizzini-ing myself all this time?

How have you been using it? It has a few different meanings depending on the context.

There's the original, literal definition of actually painting something white, usually using a low-cost lime or chalk-based paint.

That led to using the term to describe any kind of cover-up to hide or ignore flaws. In entertainment, that usually occurs when an historical character is depicted as a fully-good hero type with no negative character traits.

This can be especially amusing when looking at the portrayal of the Soviet Union depending on the era. If it's a WWII film, where the Soviets were on our side, they're shown as brave and heroic; if it's during the Cold War, the Soviets are weak and cowardly, or even downright evil.

This sort of whitewashing doesn't have racial connotations, but sometimes racial issues can be whitewashed. For example, in a lot of movies depicting the Southern US in the late 19th Century, slavery is depicted as more of a minor inconvenience for the slaves rather than the brutal existence it was. The Disney film, Song of the South is heavily criticized for how it shows life in the post Civil War South.


There's the other use of the term whitewashing in entertainment that is racial. That involves using white actors to play non-white characters. This can go back to the days of blackface, but also includes things like Mickey Rooney's Japanese landlord character in Breakfast at Tiffany's, and even recent movies like Johnny Depp playing Tonto in The Lone Ranger.

The other side of this is when they turn a character that was originally not white (either a real person in the story or a character from the previous material the story is based on) into a white character. Recently, it seems that this more often going the opposite way and previously white characters are being given different races when the stories are being updated.

[FlameOn]

The economist has an article showing historic African-American Oscar wins are in line with the American demographics and further shows that if anything Hispanics and Asian American minorities are the ones getting truly screwed over. This is from a purely numbers perspective.

If any whitewashing occurs, it is not at the awards themselves but more at acting schools and casting stage. This might point much more to this years crop films, featuring minorities, being subjectively insufficient to warrant a nomination rather than any overt racism/whitewashing.

The numbers indicate that, whereas the film industry most certainly fails to represent America’s diversity, the whitewashing occurs not behind the closed doors of the Academy, but in drama schools (shown in the SAG membership) and casting offices. For most of the past 15 years, the Academy has largely judged what has been put in front of them: minority actors land 15% of top roles, 15% of nominations and 17% of wins. Once up for top roles, black actors do well, converting 9% of top roles into 10% of best-actor nominations and 15% of the coveted golden statuettes, a bit above their share of the general population.

The view behind the scenes is perhaps more revealing. Blacks really are much more underrepresented in the director’s chair, where they account for 6% of directors of the top 600 films, according to the Annenberg study. Black women are nearly nonexistent there (two of the 600, Ms DuVernay being one). These are the numbers that critics of Hollywood should be most concerned about, along with the dearth of top roles for Hispanic and Asian actors. Best Actor nominations and wins—in which black actors have done decently, 2015 and 2016 excepted—seem to be the wrong target.

If consumers want their films to reflect the society in which they live—as they do their parliaments and executive boards—it is these areas that must see improvement. And film-goers may have more power to provoke that change than they realise. Hispanic Americans buy 25% of the nation’s cinema tickets. If they, like the actors tweeting with the #OscarsSoWhite, are sick of a whitewashed Hollywood, then Hollywood would be wise to listen.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/prosp.../film-and-race

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by getbak

How have you been using it? It has a few different meanings depending on the context.

Answer:

That led to using the term to describe any kind of cover-up to hide or ignore flaws. In entertainment, that usually occurs when an historical character is depicted as a fully-good hero type with no negative character traits.

As opposed to...

There's the other use of the term whitewashing in entertainment that is racial, That involves using white actors to play non-white characters. This can go back to the days of blackface, but also includes things like Mickey Rooney's Japanese landlord character in Breakfast at Tiffany's, and even recent movies like Johnny Depp playing Tonto in The Lone Ranger.

My intuitive sense is that this use of the term is in fact a misuse of the term; an instance of "this seems like a plausible meaning for this term so I'll just use it here". Conceptual onomatopoeia? Can I call it that?

However, this is of course true:

This sort of whitewashing doesn't have racial connotations, but sometimes racial issues can be whitewashed.

We'd better stop before jayswin gets in here and accuses me of pedantry again...

[Senator Clay Davis]

Charlotte Rampling, one of the biggest surprises in this year’s Oscar’s “Best Actress” category, has weighed in on the controversy about the lack of diversity in this year’s nominations by calling it reverse racism. “It is racist to whites,” the 69-year old British actress, nominated for Andrew Haigh’s drama 45 Years, said in an interview with French Radio network Europe 1 Friday morning. “One can never really know, but perhaps the black actors did not deserve to make the final list,” she added. When the interviewer asked whether the Academy should introduce some form of quota, she responded that we shouldn’t classify people: “These days everyone is more or less accepted … People will always say: ‘Him, he’s less handsome’; ‘Him, he’s too black’; ‘He is too white’ … someone will always be saying ‘You are too’ [this or that] … But do we have to take from this that there should be lots of minorities everywhere?”

http://nytlive.nytimes.com/womeninth...everse-racism/

“Yeah, but there’s loads of black actors,” Caine responded. “You can’t vote for an actor because he’s black. You can’t just say, ‘I’m going to vote for him. He’s not very good, but he’s black. I’ll vote for him.’ You have to give a good performance.”

Caine added he was sure there were “very good” performances last year among actors of color, specifically citing Beasts of No Nation star Idris Elba, who was one of the most surprising Oscar snubs. “The one I – I don’t know whether Idris got [nominated],” Caine said. “I saw Idris, and I thought he was wonderful. I thought he would get [nominated]. Did he not get nominated?”

Told by Robinson that Elba was not nominated, Caine replied, “Well, look at me. I won the [European Film Award] for best actor, and I got nominated for nothing else.” The 82-year-old actor had been in contention for his role in Youth.

“The great thing about it is you don’t have to go,” Caine said about failing to receive a nomination. He then joked that he wasn’t going to “sit there clapping for Leonardo DiCaprio.”

http://www.ew.com/article/2016/01/22...-michael-caine

[Hockey_Ninja]

Exclusive footage of her publicist:

[Senator Clay Davis]

Caine's point is correct. Rampling well....

[Bleeding Red]

Interestingly Will Smith noted that the two times he was nominated he lost - to other black actors (Denzel & Forrest Whitiker)!!

This is a no win for the industry.
As far as I know there are only 2 major award shows that dictate that all nominees must be of a certain race or colour - the BET awards and the Hispanic Awards.

Music industry has the same problem. Adele will win best album, but Kanye will scream that Beyonce was robbed!

[nik-]

The more this goes on, the funnier I find it that it's centered around Will Smith. And that his performance in Concussion has become the hill to die on.

It's just a patently mediocre performance. He's an average actor and can't sulk his way into an Oscar. It's basically going to taint every minority best actor nomination in some people's eyes from this point on.

So good job Fresh Prince.

[Locke]

I dont want to wade into it too much but I really do not like the idea of quotas. I think once you start doing that you start eroding whatever integrity or value the award itself has.

Its not the same as with Universities or education where quotas provide an opportunity to those that otherwise wouldnt get it, this is an award (presumably) for excellence.

It doesnt appear that they're being discriminated against, they're just up against the toughest competition.

They're still millionaires and celebrities.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by Bleeding Red

Interestingly Will Smith noted that the two times he was nominated he lost - to other black actors (Denzel & Forrest Whitiker)!!

This is a no win for the industry.
As far as I know there are only 2 major award shows that dictate that all nominees must be of a certain race or colour - the BET awards and the Hispanic Awards.

Music industry has the same problem. Adele will win best album, but Kanye will scream that Beyonce was robbed!

Kanye needs to be shot in the face.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by Locke

I dont want to wade into it too much but I really do not like the idea of quotas. I think once you start doing that you start eroding whatever integrity or value the award itself has.

Its not the same as with Universities or education where quotas provide an opportunity to those that otherwise wouldnt get it, this is an award (presumably) for excellence.

It doesnt appear that they're being discriminated against, they're just up against the toughest competition.

They're still millionaires and celebrities.

The Rooney rule in the NFL hasn't accomplished a thing other than give the same rotation of black candidates token interviews every year so teams can check that box prior to hiring the head coach they have targeted.

[Harry Lime]

“You can’t boycott something that you never went to anyway,” said the Straight Outta Compton producer. “That’s kinda weird. I look at it like a horse race. Once your horse loses the race, you tear up the ticket, go home. Back on out. … We don’t do movies for the industry, we do movies for the fans, for the people. And you now, the industry, if they give you a trophy or not, or they pat you on the back or not, it’s nice but it’s not something you should dwell on.”

The 46-year-old rapper added that his own film, which is up for Best Original Screenplay, reached its goal simply by reaching a wide swath of viewers.


"I think an older generation got an understanding of why we do that kind of music, and the younger generation got a history lesson, and we got so much praise for the movie, it’s like how could you be mad because one other academy or guild or anybody didn’t say it’s the number one?” Ice Cube added. “It’s crying about not having enough icing on your cake. It’s just ridiculous.”

Ice Cube 3 - Jada Pinkett Smith 0

[Sr. Mints]

Regardless of Pinkett's motives, her words would carry a lot more gravitas if people didn't perceive this to be about Smith's role in Concussion, this year. As it is, she's creating a distraction with regard to the real race issues in America, over an event deemed trivial by many. The timing is being taken as selfish intent, whether that's the case or not.

And incidentally, the only thing that could've made Concussion worse*, was if Dr. Omalu were cast by Snoop Dogg. Maybe Smith ought to be recognized in that sense.



*I mean TOTALLY AMAZING!

[rubecube]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

The Rooney rule in the NFL hasn't accomplished a thing other than give the same rotation of black candidates token interviews every year so teams can check that box prior to hiring the head coach they have targeted.

Hey look, EE is talking out of his ass again!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rooney...centincrease-7

At the start of the 2006 season, the overall percentage of African American coaches had jumped to 22%, up from 6% prior to the Rooney Rule.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/21/sp...diversity.html

Among the league’s hundreds of assistant coaches, 16 percent were members of minority groups in 1991; that proportion increased to 36 percent in 2007 and 29 percent in 2013.

[Kswiss]

As an Asian guy, I really thought Jackie Chan should have won the Oscar for Rush Hour 1, 2 and 3. #Jackieforanoscar

The thing that really bothers me is how the Big Bang Theory has NO Chinese guy as part of the show. Wouldn't it be more realistic if there was at least one!

[nik-]

Originally Posted by Kswiss

As an Asian guy, I really thought Jackie Chan should have won the Oscar for Rush Hour 1, 2 and 3. #Jackieforanoscar

The thing that really bothers me is how the Big Bang Theory has NO Chinese guy as part of the show. Wouldn't it be more realistic if there was at least one!

With the way they have the indian guy play it, do you really want an asian guy on that show?

It would probably be a Mickey Rooney Breakfast at Tiffany's role.

[Kswiss]

Originally Posted by nik-

With the way they have the indian guy play it, do you really want an asian guy on that show?

It would probably be a Mickey Rooney Breakfast at Tiffany's role.

Haha, I envision Harold and Kumar, with leonard and Sheldon. Twice the ratings I tell ya.

[SHOGUN]

Originally Posted by Kswiss

As an Asian guy, I really thought Jackie Chan should have won the Oscar for Rush Hour 1, 2 and 3. #Jackieforanoscar

The thing that really bothers me is how the Big Bang Theory has NO Chinese guy as part of the show. Wouldn't it be more realistic if there was at least one!

I realized I have never seen an Asian actor in hollywood get a romance scene in a film. Outside of Glenn in the walking dead, it's very rare to see any Asian actor get with the "main girl" in a movie. All the females that co starred with the most famous Asian hollywood actors (Jackie Chan, Jet Li, etc) always seem to have friend to friend relationship, never a romantic one. Really weird to think about it.

[Kswiss]

^ Yeah it seems like the criteria casting directors have for Asians are;

1) You must know martial arts
2) You must look like an Asian gangster
3) You will be cast as token scientist/smart guy

[Locke]

Yeah, at this rate you'd think minorities would be petitioning Hollywood not to cast them.