Viola Davis’ Oscars policy comments on “the only profession that celebrates what a life means”
Yesterday, I congratulated the speech of the Oscars of Viola Davis to be memorable without being explicitly political – to simply talk about his work in a moving and well written way. Twitter quickly let me know that I missed something. On social networks and conservative news sites, Davis’ speech had in fact aroused indignation.
After explaining that she thought that her mission was to “exhume … The stories of people who dreamed of big and have never seen these dreams materialize, the people who fell in love and lost”, Davis said this:
I have become an artist – and I thank God that I did – because we are the only profession that celebrates what a life means.
This statement has become one of the discussion of the Internet on the right after the Oscar ceremony. “Art is wonderful; Art is enriching; art can connect us to each other, ”wrote Ben Shapiro to Daily thread. “But the total arrogance of declaring that artists are” the only profession that celebrates what a life means “is amazing. What about doctors? And mothers of stay at home, who help shape lives rather than pursuing their own professional interests?
The variants of this feeling have turned online, with Davis sometimes badly quoted as if she had said that only the “actors” celebrate what means living a life, or, worse, the only ones to “know” what a life means.
Are people right to be offended? Did she say that artists are better than anyone? By reading his words literally, in the context of his speech, and by extending the slightest benefit of the doubt, it is difficult to see the backlash against Davis as something other than a symptom of our exaggerated cultural wars.
Someone could “celebrate what a life means” in their personal way, but for whom is it a main function of their profession? Artists, certainly. Clergy, maybe. Doctors to safeguard Rather, there is to celebrate them, and that did not denigrate them to say. Home parents help Others, and Davis could even agree that it is more noble, important and essential than to “celebrate” the meaning of life.
Her argument was simply that artists play a unique role by telling stories about human experience, and that she is happy that she is part of it.
Admittedly, it could have changed to make less controversial, although probably less interesting,, statement. If she had simply said: “I became an artist – and I thank God that I did – because we celebrate what a life means”, the complaints may have been more difficult to find. The “only” highlights a specific way so that artists are special, but it is also a dog dog for anyone who occupies a strong resentment about Hollywood elitism and condescension. And there is rarely a better time to disseminate such resentment than in the moment.
On the right, the reflexive disgust for the entertainment industry has taken a new fervor under Donald Trump. During Fox and friends After the Oscars, the Snafu by which La la Land Wrongly, it was announced as the best film was shot by Steve Docy like: “Hollywood was mistaken by the elections, and last night, Hollywood was mistaken at the Oscars.” Guest Tucker Carlson accepted but added that Moonlight “Must have won” because the moralizing and politically correct establishment wanted it. Yes, the Oscars were both an uncontrollable disaster and an insidiously rigged game.
Donald Trump gave his own interpretation of the vision of the academy: “I think they were so harshly concentrated on the policy that they did not bring the act at the end,” he said BreitbartAs if the accountant of PricewaterhouseCoopers who had given Warren Beatty the bad envelope had done it because he had been too hard to Kimmel tweeting the president “u up?”
Liberals can moan in Trump by taking the merit of his criticisms to make a logistical error. But, of course, the two parties see a lot of politics in entertainment these days: see all the catches like DOOCY and compare the end of the Oscars to the electoral evening.
On Sunday, for many viewers, Davis’ speech seemed remarkable for the way he almost transcends the partisan melee and just talked passionately to act. But a word – “only” – was enough to make her a cultural sunflower test. Maybe she wanted to fight on the place of art in society, or maybe she simply portrayed her profession as she really sees. Anyway, it was a provocative decision at a time when artists are more and more held to the same standards as the Office candidates: who should choose their words not for the truth but for politics.
