Sour note at the Oscars

Aside from their real and avowed purpose of giving honor and recognition to the best in the motion picture industry, the Oscars have also proven to be a very tempting venue or forum from which to unleash causes.

Once there was a streaker who darted across the stage during one Oscar night long ago. To those too young to know what a streaker is, it is a person who tries to make a statement by darting across some public place without any clothes on.

I can no longer remember the statement that Oscar night streaker sought to make, in the same manner that I cannot also recall why George C. Scott refused to accept his best actor award for Patton.

And if I can remember right and have not mixed up the details of those which I can still recall, I think Marlon Brando also once caused a native American woman to receive his award for him.

All of these, of course, may seem to be just ordinary gimmicks. On the other hand, those who made them do not need any gimmicks to promote anything. The real reason why they did what they did was because they needed to push something.

Now, I do not know if the Oscars would be an appropriate venue to air a cause or make a statement. After all, people watch the Oscars not just to know who are the best of the best for a given year but, more importantly, to be entertained.

For believe it or not, there is nothing like the movies. The movies is one passion that has caught the entire human civilization without exception. There is probably no person on earth, living or dead, who has not enjoyed a movie or two.

Even the Dalai Lama was known to have a particular liking for the movies. North Korea’s Kim Jong Il is another movie nut, with a particular liking for, believe it or not, American movies.

And that is why people are drawn to the Oscars. If this were the NBA, it would be the All-Star Game. The Oscars are the Olympic Games of the movies. And if two American athletes can raise clenched fists to make a political statement, why not in the Oscars.

But those who make statements to further a cause during the Oscars run a calculated risk. People in the middle of being entertained seldom take kindly any interruption, especially that which they particularly disagree with.

America is supposed to be free. So why cannot people with statements to make do it elsewhere instead of at the Oscars? Just because it is the focus of global attention for four hours doesn’t mean the world should be taken advantage of.

But that is precisely what happened. I think it was the writer for one of the top motion picture nominees who started a tearful spiel about a cause that the vast majority of the global audience did not agree with.

Yet, as if that was not enough, one of the night’s big winners, pushed the envelope further by taking up where the writer left off. Jesus Christ, how could people proclaiming to be so sensitive about rights be so insensitive to the rights of the far greater numbers.

Nobody is stopping these people from promoting their causes. In fact, precisely why their movie is in the Oscars is because they have enjoyed the freedom to do so. And watching their movie is also an exercise in freedom. People are free to watch or not.

But to do that at the Oscars, where the global audience had no choice but to endure listening to a spiel they do not agree with, is to trample on the rights of that global audience to be free to watch the Oscars uninterrupted by unsolicited statements.