When Abusers Get Oscars

I generally don't talk about the news here. There are ongoing wars in the world, including Russia's invasion of Ukraine and civil wars in Yemen and Myanmar. There's an ongoing global pandemic that many Americans just seem to be absolutely exhausted by or in denial about. Severe weather that is the result of climate change is creating refugees all over the world. State legislatures are trying to pass laws restricting civil rights, including voter identification laws and whatever TF the "don't say gay" law is, laws preventing women from having access to safe and legal abortions, and poor Anita Hill is probably having a panic attack watching Ketanji Brown Jackson answer dumb questions from dumb men.  

I honestly just don't feel like I can talk about any of it without revealing my ignorance. I don't really understand what's happening in Myanmar and it seems crazy that I would write anything about it. It's not that I don't care, but it's that I don't think I have anything smart to say.  My own grief and concern over the news isn't particularly interesting or insightful.

But I do have a certain level of expertise about domestic violence. I was the victim of domestic violence when I was a child. I volunteered for a sexual assault/domestic violence hotline in college. Then I worked as a court advocated for domestic violence victims before I went to grad school. In grad school, I volunteered with an organization that did court monitoring in cases of sexual assault, child abuse, domestic violence, and sex trafficking. I am, it turns out, quite aware of this topic. (I've also written about it quite a bit in this space.)

So when I first read that Will Smith hit Chris Rock after Rock told a tasteless joke about Jada Pinkett Smith, my immediate thought was if his temper is so hair trigger that he will hit someone in full view of cameras at a ceremony watched worldwide, his wife and children must be terrified all the time. This was quickly followed up with why didn't he allow his wife to fight his own battles?

I spent a great deal of yesterday reading defenses of Will Smith's behavior. People seem to to think that "love will make you do crazy things" is an acceptable defense for physical assault. People seem to think that because Chris Rock made a joke about Pinkett Smith's alopecia, it opened the door for Smith to be allowed to hit him. So many things to unpack with these defense. I'm not here to defense Chris Rock or his joke, but if you are an A-list celebrity, you take the shots that are tossed your way. I imagine it's hard for Rock to "punch up" these days and if you are the Smith family, you're in the public eye and sometimes that means dumb, cruel jokes will be lobbed at you. I think we would all argue that there are better ways to deal with bad jokes that committing a crime.

It must be incredibly hard to be a celebrity and have your every move scrutinized by the press and comedians at awards shows. But wouldn't it have been much classier if Pinkett Smith had gone on to do interviews/Twitter threads about her condition and educated instead of not having a choice at all in her husband adding to the somewhat unfair reputation of Black men and their proclivity towards violence? Wouldn't it have been better if Pinkett Smith had been allowed to choose how the discussion about that joke would eventually go?  Taking away Pinkett Smith's agency about how she wanted that joke to go down in history is not how a supportive husband should handle conflict. 

So I'm disgusted that there's an actual debate about "which side" is the "right side" to this story. Yep. Chris Rock has made more than one joke about Jada Pinkett Smith. But that's no reason for hitting someone.

I'm also incredibly dispirited by the reaction of the Academy and the people in the audience. First, you know that when Will Smith stood up, before he ever landed the slap heard around the world, there was an immediate discussion about whether or not to stop him. And the producers chose to allow him to continue towards the stage, probably hoping for the exact thing that actually happened - everyone has heard about this story and is talking about this instead of who the winners were. Then, they did not make Will Smith immediately leave. No, they gave him an Oscar a few minutes later. An Oscar that led to the audience giving him a standing ovation. A standing ovation to a man who just committed assault in front of them. 

By allowing Will Smith to remain to have his celebration, the Academy implicitly condoned public violence. The members of the audience who chose to clap for him, stand for him, and listen to his speech implicitly condoned his behavior. And if we condone behavior like this in public, what hope is there for people who are being abused in private, in their own homes? Hundreds of people watched Will Smith physically assault somebody and he faced absolutely no consequences. What consequences can the woman who suffers the bruises and cuts alone in her house with no witnesses count on for her abuser?  

And that's what is most upsetting. 

Honestly, this has all been percolating in my mind since the whole Kanye West/Kim Kardashian/Pete Davidson debacle. West and Kardashian are involved in a contentious divorce and now Kardashian is dating Davidson. West has taken to threatening Davidson and there are some rumors that West has also been harassing Kardashian. 

(I'd like to take the time to say I honestly cannot name a single West song, have only a vague idea of who Kardashian is [reality show? sex tape? maybe?], and only know Davidson as a comic with a drug problem, so the fact that I know all this stuff is maybe proof that the monoculture does exist. And that I don't have "favorites" among these fools.)

If famous and rich people like Kim Kardashian and Jada Pinkett Smith are experiencing abuse (because let's face it, if Will Smith went off like that last night, he's doing it at home, too) and their abusers face no consequences, there's absolutely no hope for the rest of us if there's danger at home. And our entire society should be ashamed and mad and up in arms over this.

Instead, we'll just add Will Smith's name to the list of men who have won a Best Actor Oscar and  forget about this incident. 

Because what else is there to do.