Writing in this morning’s Washington Post, Eugene Robinson looks at the Academy Award nominee’s and foolishly assumes that they have anything to do with reality.
Why is it that Washington often seems so out of touch with the rest of the country? Maybe it’s because people here are so busy taking themselves seriously that they don’t have the time, or the inclination, to go to the movies. Just look at this year’s contenders at the Academy Awards.
Ah yes, let’s move from Washington, D.C. to the capitol of Reality Nation —– Hollywood, California.
So what’s been coming out of Hollywood this year ?
[T]he leading contender for the Oscar for best picture is “Brokeback Mountain,” a love story about two gay cowboys — not Village People “cowboys” prancing up and down the streets of some godless big city where “values” means nothing more than a half-price sale at a fancy boutique, but real cowboys who live in the flyover, red-state American West. (Okay, it’s been noted by some that actually they herd sheep, but they’re definitely what most of us think of as cowboys.)
Pardon me, Eugene, but wouldn’t that make them sheepboys instead of cowboys ? Minor point, I guess, so let’s see what else the Bard of the Potomac has to say:
Another nominee for best picture is the biopic “Capote,” whose subject is a great writer who happened to be flamboyantly homosexual. And Felicity Huffman is a contender for best actress for playing a preoperative transsexual in “Transamerica.”
Okay, so let me see if I understand Eugene’s argument correctly. Three movies depicting homosexual themes have been nominated for several Academy Awards. The Academy Awards are nominated, and voted on, by Hollywood insiders. Therefore, its Washington that is out of touch with the rest of America.
Yea, makes perfect sense to me.
Of course, even Robinson realizes that Hollywood’s doesn’t reflect the real America, but that doesn’t stop him from reaching conclusions that are simply unsupported by the evidence:
Hollywood, which doesn’t make movies to lose money, seems to have decided that most Americans will neither faint dead away nor riot in the streets if homosexuality is openly depicted and discussed.
Hmmm, so that must mean that the number one movie in America is Brokeback Mountain right ? I don’t think so…..according to the latest Box Office Mojo report, Brokeback Mountain is the #14 movie in America, down from $ 11 last week, and its $ 75 million gross isn’t that impressive when compared to the $ 288 million brought in by the latest Harry Potter movie, King Kong’s $ 216 million, or even Walk The Line’s $ 117 million. Seems like its Hollywood who’s out of tune with America, rather than the other way around.
Of course, as usual, Robinson uses this fallacious argument to advance even more of his nonsense.
This year, if the Oscar nominations are any guide, it’s the Democrats who ought to be in a position to absorb valuable political lessons. America is a complicated place filled with minorities of all kinds, including gay people. Celebrating America means celebrating our differences. Standing for America means standing for American principles. War, even when it’s justified, has to have peace as its ultimate end.
Sorry Eugene, but given that you have rested your entire premise on the theory that the Academy Awards have anything to do with reality, your thesis is a complete bunch of crap.
