Chris Rock slammed for 'real things to protest' Oscars joke
One of Chris Rock’s jokes opening the 88th Academy Awards is drawing fire online. The Oscars host devoted nearly his entire monologue to the issue of racial diversity in Hollywood ( all his jokes here), but one line has some viewers claiming Rock misstepped.
The joke: “Why are we protesting this Oscars? It’s the 88th Academy Awards, which means this ‘no black nominees’ thing happened at least 71 other times. You got to figure that it happened in the 50s, in the 60s. One of those years, Sidney [Poitier] didn’t put out a movie. I’m sure there were no black nominees some of those years, say ‘62’ or ‘63. Black people did not protest. Why? Because we had real things to protest at the time. We were too busy being raped and lynched to care about who won best cinematographer. When your grandmother’s swinging from a tree, it’s really hard to care about best documentary foregin short.”
In case you didn’t spot the offending phrase, it was Rock saying ” we had real things to protest” decades ago – which some took as the host suggesting there are not legitimate issues to protest now.
Blk people HAD real things to protest Rock? Ask Michael Brown, Sandra Bland, Eric Garner, if we still don’t? @blk lives
— Stephane Dunn (@DrStephaneDunn) February 29, 2016
There are still “real things to protest,” @chrisrock. Like, police violence. And the #FlintWaterCrisis. #Oscars
— deray mckesson (@deray) February 29, 2016
Did Chris Rock just undermine what people of color are experiencing today by stating that, “back then people had real things to protest?”
— going NAKED TV (@SOTVproductions) February 29, 2016
Chris Rock implied BP don’t have real things to protest now but then mentions policy brutality? Does that not fucking count?!
— The Novel Sanctuary (@roxy4589) February 29, 2016
That “real things to protest” line will be haunting Rock for awhile, or not at all if he stays off twitter. #Oscars
— Eric Deamer (@ericdeamer) February 29, 2016
ickiest thing Ive ever seen: watching Jennifer Lawrence smile & clap when Chris Rock said black people used to have “real things to protest”
— Sawyer French (@FrenchSawyer) February 29, 2016
Others defended the joke, suggesting that people who were offended were reading too much into it:
Chris Rock’s “real things to protest” line was more about our attention being misplaced rather than we DONT have real things to protest.
— trap boomin (@thecoolsection) February 29, 2016
