The circular firing squad of Leftism continues to lock, load and repeat, this time driven by Till director Chinonye Chukwu, who went on a tirade against the Hollywood establishment after the film was snubbed at this year’s Oscars event. Chukwu’s comments are nothing new, since many black voices within the creative sphere have sounded off about Hollywood in similar fashion for years at this point.
Chukwu’s attacks, however, come at a time when the Left is rapidly losing ground in the culture wars, and has been forced into active retreat. As the failures continue to rack up, Left-wing slacktivists become more paranoid and distrustful of those within their own echo chamber, which only serves to destabilize their already fractured and counterproductive movement.
It began when Chukwu was passed over for the Best Director nomination at the 95th Academy Awards for her work on Till, a biographical drama based on the life of Mamie Till-Bradley, and by extension, her son Emmett Till. In 1955, Emmett was brutally lynched in Mississippi for supposedly harassing a white woman named Carolyn Bryant Donham. In an act of outrageous injustice, the murderers were let off the hook by the all-white jury.
Till’s case continues to be a textbook example of the virulent racism prominent in the south during the 1950s. It helped spearhead the Civil Rights movement, and the laws eventually codified and cemented by the Republican Party in 1964 after the breaking of the Democratic Party’s record-long filibuster, which was designed to try and stop said laws from passing.
The gravity of the film’s story wasn’t enough to bring it over the finish line at this year’s Academy Awards, however. After failing to net her win, Chukwu went on the offensive, accusing the entire Hollywood establishment of the same recycled talking points so prominent on the race-obsessed Left-wing sphere of politics.
“We live in a world and work in industries that are so aggressively committed to upholding whiteness and perpetuating an unabashed misogyny towards Black women.” she began, going so far as to capitalize “black,” as is the custom with identity-politics driven Leftists. Whiteness, however, was uncapitalized, because this is how it always goes.
“And yet,” she continued, “I am forever in gratitude for the greatest lesson of my life – regardless of any challenges or obstacles, I will always have the power to cultivate my own joy, and it is this joy that will continue to be one of my greatest forms of resistance.”
It’s unclear what Chukwu meant by “resistance,” especially in the wake of massive changes to the way the Oscars conducts its business, which was originally driven by accusations of white supremacy. For instance, in 2015 and 2016, #OscarsSoWhite was one of the Left’s favorite hashtags; a reference to a supposed cabal of white supremacists running the entire operation from the top down.
To counter the increasingly volatile claims of racism, the Academy changed its entire modus operandi, bending the knee to fascistic diversity and inclusion demands, which ended up creating the exact opposite effect. Among the many outrageous changes was the demand that at least one of the lead actors or supporting actors needed to be a member of a “marginalized group,” with similar demands placed on department heads.
Then, and only then, would a film be considered eligible for an Oscar nomination, which quickly became one of the most egregious and despicable displays of Left-wing racism and discrimination in recent memory. Affirmative action had come for Hollywood, and in the process, the industry suffered horrifically by prioritizing skin color over content. Forced diversity and inclusion is a sucker’s game, and many corporations have learned the lesson the hard way, including – most recently – Mars, Inc.
Chukwu’s attacks are no surprise, however. For years, the insular Leftist Hollywood establishment folk have squabbled amongst themselves to no end, each accusing the entire system of upholding white supremacy. All this, while demonizing the Right and Conservatives as irredeemable racists responsible for all of society’s racial woes.
Unfortunately for the Left, they can’t have it both ways. Hollywood is lopsidedly and overwhelmingly Left-wing, with only a scant few Conservative voices even allowed to operate within its echo chamber. The moment they speak up, or offer an individual viewpoint that cuts against the Left’s false narratives, they are cast out as pariahs and barred from re-entry.
By attacking Hollywood with accusations of racism and sexism, Chukwu has opened fire on her own support base of Left-wing extreme-radicals with an agenda to push. What this suggests is that Chukwu, and those who think like her, do not actually believe that Leftism is a safe haven for supposedly marginalized voices. She merely doesn’t care all that much for white people.
If she did, she’d have thought twice before accusing Leftist whites of overt racism. After all, isn’t the Left united in complete solidarity when it comes to this fight? Well, it’s not quite that simple. History paints a different picture, one backed with enormous evidence that liberal whites are some of the most racist people on the planet, driven largely by a white savior complex, and the soft bigotry of low expectations placed on minorities.
The mental gymnastics required to wrap one’s head around this contradictory conundrum is exhausting. A black female director makes a biographical film about Emmett Till, presents it to an Academy already under severe scrutiny and accusations of racism, the movie ticks all the necessary intersectional checkboxes, then the director gets snubbed, which leads to more accusations of racism against the Academy.
It’s an absolute mess, but it does demonstrate that beyond the raised fist icon hijacked from the Black Consciousness Movement by domestic terrorist group Black Lives Matter, that the Left aren’t nearly as unified on this issue as they claim to be. And so, the circular firing squad continues, and by extension, the downfall of this insane, demented ideology that views every single thing through the lens of race.
The question is not whether the Academy Awards is upholding white supremacy. The real question is why this predominantly Left-wing industry seems to be going through so much excruciating turmoil and struggle over an issue they all claim – emphasis on “claim” – to believe in with such unwavering conviction. The answer, of course, is that hypocrisy is a necessary entry requirement for being on the political Left.