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Affirmative Action Oscars?

From Reuters, on MSNBC:

Black actors face snub at Oscars

LOS ANGELES ? Will white be the only color on the red carpet at the 83rd Academy Awards?

Although Oscar contenders are just lining up at the starting gate for the annual run for the gold, there?s a real possibility that for the first time since the 73rd Oscars 10 years ago, there will be no black nominees in any of the acting categories at the February ceremony. In fact, there are virtually no minorities in any of the major categories among the early lists of awards hopefuls.

?It?s more difficult than ever to get a picture made with any serious subject matter ? let alone an ethnic-themed one,? John Singleton, an Academy member and two-time Oscar nominee for 1991?s ?Boyz N the Hood,? said of the current filmmaking environment, which has in turn narrowed Oscar?s choices.

Would the failure to nominate any black actors for Oscars this year really be a ?snub? of black actors? If so, wouldn?t that mean that black actors have some sort of right to be nominated? What if a few black actors were nominated but their proportion of all nominees was smaller than than their proportion of all actors; would that too be a ?snub?? What about Hispanic or Asian actors ? were enough of them (how many is enough?) nominated so that they weren?t snubbed as well?

If the fate of black actors depends on ?ethnic-themed? pictures, perhaps those pictures should have their own Oscar, which might induce the production of more of them. And why stop there? Why not Oscars for best black actor in a non-ethnic-themed film? Best non-black actor in an ethnic-themed film? Maybe those last two could be dubbed ?Best Racially Supporting Actor: Black? and ?Best Racially Supporting Actor: White.?

Silly, of course, but no sillier than much ?diversity? clap-trap.

Full post as published by Discriminations on September 30, 2010 (boomark / email).