Racist Oscars?

I of course am a huge movie fan and so therefore I love to watch the Oscars. I love to go out and see all of the movies that are nominated and then watch the winners be reveled on Oscar night. It was talked a lot about this year 2015 that the Oscar nominations lacked diversity. The Academy is primarily white men over the age of sixty-five and it has been talked a lot about if the Academy is racist. Levinson from Variety has said, “There are those who say a black woman, who directed “Selma,” was overlooked because ofracial bias, and the actor who played Martin Luther King Jr. was alsooverlooked because he was black.” The film was nominated for Best Picture but that was it and none of the actors or actresses was nominated for the Best Actress and Best Actor category. How can it be that there were no nominations for the individuals where the movie is nominated for Best Picture?

Levinson makes another point that there is a voting system that the Academy has and there are eight films that get nominated for Best Picture. A lot of controversy is not that the Academy is racist it is that the Academy favors certain directors and certain actors and actresses then others. It is a popularity contest and if you rub the Academy the wrong way you might never get an Oscar. We can learn a lot from Leonardo Dicaprio. I agree with Levinson that if some of the Academy members are racist well we will never really know that a very small percentage of actors and actresses are black, Hispanic, or Asian. However ’12 Years a Slave “ won for Best Picture and supporting actress Lupita Nyong’o and the screenwriter also won who is black. The voters are always accused of being old and white and do not want diversity in the Oscar winners.

A point made by Levinson was that, “It is interesting that “too old” is not a discriminatory comment, but I’ll leave that for others to debate.” It is ok to call someone a racist, but calling him or her old is not discriminatory. It is saying someone is racist because they are old and white is just as bad as saying they are racist. Being old and white does not mean you are racist. I think that there are race issues in America that need to be looked at and the lack of diversity in Hollywood is clear.  It is known by all that “Selma” got snubbed with only two nominations for Best Picture and Best Song.

Gary Susman from Moviefone.com makes a point to say, “It has been noted that this year is the first since 1998 that no actors of colorhave been nominated.” People want to blame the Academy because they vote, but there have been films in the past and actors and actresses that have won and have been of color. The real problem is with the movie industry and they are not producing films with people of color and not casting a lot of diversity in films. Also some years other films are just stronger then other ones. Some films just stir up more attention then others. The Academy is 94% white, we all know that. But the problem is not the Academy, it is that Hollywood lacks diversity. The Academy does not have a lot of diverse films to pick from because Hollywood does not make as many diverse films.