Race comes to the fore in Hollywood
After being pushed aside as a lesser problem earlier in the year, race issues have taken center stage

By Frank Visco
Collegian Editor
December 6, 2006

When the Oscar race was heating up in the first few months of 2006 and then culminated in a Best Picture win for Crash, there were constant debates about the merit and importance of the films up for the award. Many people said that Ang Lee’s Brokeback Mountain, a film that challenged long-held perceptions of homosexuality, was far more important than Paul Haggis’ race-centered Crash. In fact, it was surmised that Crash won because many Academy members were too conservative and felt squeamish about presenting the top award to a movie about homosexuals.

It’s interesting what can change over the course of several months. During that time, being gay has become perceived as far less of a stigmatization in Hollywood, especially with the new movement towards, “I’m gay, what’s the big deal?” that the outings of Neil Patrick Harris and T.R. Knight have ushered into the mainstream. However, while this has been occurring, race has become the hot button issue, as is evident by the extreme critical success of Borat, which has been praised for calling people out for their ignorance.

There are several other instances that also support that the importance of race has risen in the social consciousness. Earlier in the year Mel Gibson went on a drunken rant about the Jewish community, angering many in the Hollywood. Some were so angered that they claimed they would never work with him in the future. Comedian Rob Schneider, who is half-Jewish, went so far as to take an ad out in Variety addressed to the Hollywood community that slammed Gibson for his anti-Semitic remarks.

More recently, headlines were made by Michael Richards’ hate-fueled rant towards hecklers during a stand-up routine at the Laugh Factory. Close friend Jerry Seinfeld immediately got him onto Late Night with David Letterman to apologize, but he came across as looking a bit crazy. At one point he screamed, “I’m not a racist. That’s what’s so insane about all of this.”

Since a universally acknowledged good guy like Seinfeld stuck his head out, one might be inclined to take that comment seriously. Still, the rant may speak to long-held feelings ingrained in Richards from youth, that he reverted back to in a time of rage and stress. I mean, it seems to be one thing to use the n-word, but another entirely to say, “Fifty years ago we’d have you upside-down with a f---ing fork up your ass.” This seems especially true when one considers that Richards was merely seven-years-old 50 years ago.

Richards has been derided for his comments, but they have sparked debate among people all over the nation. Radio shows and web blogs have discussed what would’ve happened had a different race been picked on. On the Internet Movie Database (imdb.com), one blogger said that while he thinks Richards was wrong, he also sees a double standard in society. He showed this by typing various racial epitihets that attacked a variety of races, and then commenting, “Now watch which words get deleted by the administrator.” All the cuss words seemed to remain, except for one bleep, which was indicated to be the n-word.

Such an experiment speaks to a big reason why racism is such a touchy issue in today’s society. In a nation that allows Affirmative Action, many races are on edge about the issue. I won’t deem to say I can fully state the correct and virtuous answer on that larger topic, but given the n-word I will say one thing.

A friend of mine recently modified George Carlin’s “eight words you can’t say” list, by pointing out that the only two words you can’t say are the n-word and the c-word. It seems to me that this may be true because African Americans and women are the two biggest groups to have dealt with persecution in this country. They are the two groups that led the civil rights movement in this country. Thus, is it any wonder that the two words against them would be vilified far more? Furthermore, as opposed to most other epithets, the n-word has a history associated with slavery, and, in a sense, so does the c-word (after all, women were treated as subservient to men for quite a long time).

This is logical reasoning, and one that I think people should consider before claiming a double standard. Regardless, I do believe that society shouldn’t deem one type of hate as more important than the next. People shouldn’t be complaining that black people live a double standard concerning racism, or that racism is less important than homophobia.

In the end, although I think it is horrible that such racial outbursts occur, and that ignorance is obviously so widespread, I can’t help but think this has been an important year in Hollywood in terms of race relations. As opposed to a few months ago, race is once again seen as an important topic. While I would say it’s important to not get all of your information from the media, I think people could learn a few things from films like Crash and Borat, and from the mistakes of stars like Gibson and Richards. Only by curtailing ignorance, can society really move forward.

viscof1@lasalle.edu