Pinkett Smith says Oscars backlash not really about Oscars

“I stand with my peers who are calling for change in expanding the stories that are told and recognition of the people who tell them”.

The accusation came just days after Jada Pinkett Smith announced she was boycotting the Academy Awards because not enough minorities, like her husband (who was overlooked by the Oscars for his role in “Concussion”), were nominated.

They include Chris Rock, Oscar victor Lupita Nyong’o, Selma director Ava DuVernay, comedian Kevin Hart and Steve McQueen, the black British director of 2014 Oscar-winning movie 12 Years a Slave. Hispanics and African Americans go to the movies more often than whites do. “He’s just going to do what he’s wants to do and I support him either way”.

Lee, a noted basketball fan, said he planned to attend the New York Knicks game when the Oscars are presented on February 28.

‘Considering that Alabama had its highest recruitment for the KKK for Martin Luther King’s birthday, I hope that we as African-Americans can find a way to get along and step together, ‘ said Jada.

The wife of actor Will Smith won’t watch the awards either, after people of colour missed out on Academy Award nominations. “The industry has been building up over a very long time, starting with white men running the studios who hire other people who look like them.

“People even complain even when we have a lot of nominations”. Cheryl Boone Isaacs, president of the Academy and the first Black women to hold the position, has even expressed her displeasure with the “lack of inclusion” in this year’s crop of Oscar hopefuls. The Academy Awards handed out a year ago also confined itself to a list of actresses and actors, in lead and supporting ranks, reflecting a monolithically white talent roster. “This is a hard but important conversation, and it’s time for big changes”.

Boone Isaacs has responded to the controversy, writing in a statement on Monday: “I am both heartbroken and frustrated about the lack of inclusion”.

Though that change would likely inspire howls of outrage from the group’s older members, it was the approach then academy President Gregory Peck took in 1970 in response to criticism that the organization was out of touch with changes in the industry.

Last week “Straight Outta Compton” and “Ride Along 2” producer Will Packer wrote this on Facebook: “The academy’s voting record is only part of the issue”. And most of us know that Hubert has been a 20-year member of the Will Smith haters club. But the change is not coming as fast as we would like.

No, a better call, a much more thoughtful call to action would be to put Hollywood’s liberalism to work by calling on Black Hollywood’s white Hollywood friends to sit this one out and refrain from walking the red carpet or attending the event. “I don’t think so. Black history is American history”, adding that the best way and only way to eliminate racism is to “stop talking about it”.

These films/performances and the scripts that drive them often go into development YEARS before they are released and thus in Oscar contention.

There are no people of color nominated for any of the major categories, and #OscarsSoWhite and #OscarsStillSoWhite have kept the conversation going in social media.