2013 Academy Awards host Seth McFarlane. Photo courtesy of Disney ABD Television Group; Creative Commons License.
Commentary by Rev. Melvin Woodworth*
I don’t think I’m unduly concerned with propriety and modesty, but maybe I am.
As I approached the Academy Awards ceremony, I had memories of host Billy Crystal morphing from character to character with skill. I was not prepared for Seth McFarlane. When captain Kirk of the Enterprise dropped in to warn that McFarlane was about to destroy the program, I should have trusted his precognition.
The program moved to a “We Saw Your Boobs” routine that celebrated the movies and moments in which portions of actresses’ breasts had been exposed to view. It was worthy of the sixth grade locker room talk of pre-adolescent boys.
I tried hard to imagine a perspective from which this routine would seem funny or enlightening. I failed. All I could see was injury and disgust on the faces of women in the audience. All I could hear was the most brilliant and gifted actresses in history being downgraded to glimpses of flesh for male titillation. All I experienced was a man saying, I misappropriated some piece of you that is private, and sacred, and I will use it against you. You are forever vulnerable to me.
It was rude, crude and dehumanizing. The audience, and we, deserved better.
No one said, “No.” No one said, “This should not be happening,” and so this morning I learned that others picked up the thread of “humorous sexism” and carried it further, referring to a nine year old African-American actress in terms of female genitalia. The poison spread like wildfire.
What sexism is humorous that reduces a phenomenal nine year old artist to a piece of flesh? What kind of society is entertained by and pays huge sums to a man teaching every female, (and male) from child to acting icon that, work as hard as they will and succeed as much as they like, what the world will see and remember of a female artist is a glimpse of their skin.
What depth of callousness allows such indignities?
In the 70s I believed that my daughter’s generation might grow up without the misogynist language and stereotypes that relegate them to the role of sex toys. I am sad to realize how far we have fallen short of that goal.
I hold Quvenzhané Wallis in my prayers. Her success and that of the movie she is in will bring pressures on her that a child of nine is ill prepared to face.
I pray that she and every other person who saw the awards will resist internalizing the degrading messages inherent in the program and its aftermath.
I pray that some day we will celebrate entertainers and their transcendent accomplishments without preying upon vulnerable members of their industries, diminishing them as individuals, discounting their achievements, and subordinating their mastery of their craft to the erotic value of their bodies.
I pray that some day we will fully understand that sexism, racism, homophobia, capacityism (do we have a word for that?), etc. are never humorous, but are degrading, and assaultive and have no place in a compassionate society.
* Melvin Woodworth is pastor of First United Methodist Church in Tacoma, Washington.
So sad, and so true.
thanks for writing this, Mel. so true and so well-written.
Mel, please try to get your comments circulated in an even larger venue. As public and widespread as possible.
Thanks for expressing for many of us who sat wondering about what was so blatantly degrading and misapropriate against women and everyone watching.
Just what I was thinking – and, while I am no fan of the Kardashians, his “joke” at their expense (and the expense of their ethnic background) was also beyond the pale.
Your response to the degradation of women is appropriate.
When we lose all standards, the sense of what is “appropriate” or even kind and human, seems to disappear.
Melvin, Your commentary made me glad that I did not watch the Academy awards. I agree with the your commentary should be circulated in a wider venue! You have always been a skilled speaker at the pulpit and I am glad to have seen this well-scripted commentary and to say God Bless for speaking out!
Jim and Carlota Goodman