Jeff Stahler for January 14, 2020

The Oscars are still pretty un-woke. In fact very unwoke.

Because it’s the only way Hollywood sexists would give women an award at all? Guess it takes “Best FEMALE Director” for a woman director to even get nominated. Very unwoke indeed.

To a considerable segment of the voting critics, it’s rather like the dog walking on its hind legs on stage in a dog show. It’s not that he or she does it poorly or well – its amazing to the critics that they can do it at all.

Imagine the stir if there were categories for best black actor and actress.

I really should start watching the Oscars: it would help me score better in Jeopardy.

Stahler mistakes the reason for the awards. It’s all about the Benjamins. The more awards, the more the publicity, the more the paid admissions. Er, isn’t the best director and the best picture non-gender specific?

Do people still watch the Oscars or really care about who wins what or for what, anymore?

I’ll assume Stahler found a way to blame “all the president’s men.”

Because if they didn’t, the awards would all go to men.

Because “inclusion and equality” do not mean indenticality or homogeneity.

Golly, is it Oscar-bashing Season already? Where does the time go? I can’t wait for Henry Payne’s cartoon arguing that “Ford vs. Ferrari” should have swept the nominations…

As Motivemagus suggests above, if there weren’t separate categories for male and female performances, the bulk of awards would probably go to men, because of cultural biases. But there’s also the fact that, in the vast majority of cases, men and women aren’t competing for the same roles (granted there are some roles cast for men that could have reasonably have been played by women, with or without script changes). There’s no need for “Best Male Director” and “Best Female Director” categories because any movie could be directed by either. Also, of course, the performance categories make up four of the “Big Five” awards that the audience actually cares about (or “Big Six” if you include director, or “Big Eight” if (like me) you care about the screenplays), so why limit them?

Anyway, if you don’t like the Oscars you don’t have to watch. I have no interest in the Super Bowl, but I’m not going to spend the next three weeks complaining about Super Bowl Hype in the comments here…

She apparently has no background in classic literature. Probably cut that class in lit appreciation.

So we now have a problem with lead actor and actress roles? They should compete in the same category you imply? Lets focus on ensuring women are paid fairly for their work performance and abilities in both Hollywood and corporate America first before we stark demanding gender neutral award categories. By the way, Stahler, you’re willing to apply the same mentality to gender specific sports too?

I would say eliminate the Women’s categories, but, those are the only recognition women get from the Old White Actor’s Academy.

Well, why not? Let’s be honest, every year there are a few very strong women performances, so if there was just a non gender best actor award there’s a good chance there would be some women nominated. But the Oscars are mostly a matter of advertising and campaigning and the list of nominees is limited. Results will always look unfair to many. And those who advocate non gender categories are actually wanting some kind of parity so they will never be satisfied if it turns out that one year there is not enough women, colored, vegan or whatever. If you start to set up quotas it loses all meaning. Deserving people always get the snub, and it doesn’t have to be a gender or race problem. Lupita Nyongo is not nominated for best actress despite her great performance in US. Does it have to be a racist thing? In 1981 Ordinary People won best film against Raging Bull. Was it an anti italian-american thing?