Fuss about nothing or geniune cause for concern

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I'm of course talking about the proposed boycott of the Oscars by a number of high profile black actors due to the lack of black nominees for the major awards.

Having not seen Will Smith's performance in Concussion I'm in no position to state whether or not his omission is warranted or otherwise. What I will say is that, in my opinion, Will Smith has never done anything remotely Oscar worthy but I fully understand why his wife feels the need to make a big deal out of it. Likewise, Spike Lee, the less attention focused on whatever travesty of a film he's currently producing, the better in my opinion.

However, is Hollywood racist, do black actors get overlooked for major roles/awards, do black actors want a film version of the Rooney Rule or should the Oscar be won on it's own merit?

I will say this though, I rarely agreed with the list of winners and as Billy Crystal said, it's little more than rich people giving each other gold statues

Saw the new Star Wars earlier.  Disgraceful how the most incompetent stormtrooper ever turns out to be black.

Just typical of how blacks are portrayed in this franchise: for example, we had the only other black male, Lando, turning in his friends after a bit of pressure from the racistly-named Dark Side in ESB and Diane Abbot playing Jabba the Hutt in ROTJ.

I, for one, will not only not be attending the Oscars but I won't be going to any Star Wars premieres either.

Too much fuss being made about four people who work in Hollywood not going to the Oscars. I've only heard of Spike Lee, Will Smith, Jada Smith and David Oyelowo complain so far, they hardly represent all black people.

Galted wrote:Saw the new Star Wars earlier.  Disgraceful how the most incompetent stormtrooper ever turns out to be black.

Just typical of how blacks are portrayed in this franchise: for example, we had the only other black male, Lando, turning in his friends after a bit of pressure from the racistly-named Dark Side in ESB and Diane Abbot playing Jabba the Hutt in ROTJ.

I, for one, will not only not be attending the Oscars but I won't be going to any Star Wars premieres either.

In Transformers the the first robot to die was black which I found really hurtful. Even in a movie with no black people the black guy still died first!

I didn't even know Will Smith was black. I thought he was a white guy called William Smithers. Surely a black man in a racist environment like Hollywood wouldn't be allowed to make hundreds of millions of dollars for being in some dreadfully sh!t films would he?

Is it any coincidence that Sidney Poitier is honored by BAFTA the same year when there is such controversy over the OSCARS?