Racism: Jada Pinkett Smith and Spike Lee to Skip the 2016 Oscars

As a result of the all-white acting nominations for
the 2016 Oscars, Hollywood is taking a stand.

On Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, both Jada Pinkett Smith and director Spike Lee announced that they would not attend this year’s ceremony. The news comes just days after Smith suggested that people of color should “refrain from participating all together.”

 

“I will not be at the Academy Awards and I won’t be watching,” Smith said in a new video posted to Facebook. Her husband, Will Smith, was thought to be a contender at this year’s Oscars for his role in Concussion, but was snubbed by the Academy.

“The Academy has the right to acknowledge whomever they chose and invite whomever they choose,” the 44-year-old actress added. “Begging for acknowledgement or even asking for it diminishes dignity.”

 

In a separate Instagram post, Lee also slammed the Academy for its lack of diversity. “How is it possible for the 2nd consecutive year all 20 contenders under the actor category are white?” the director wrote. “And let’s not even get into the other branches. Forty white actors in two two years and no flava at all. We can’t act?!”

“We cannot support it,” he wrote.

 

This is not the first time Lee has admonished the Academy. In November 2015, when he accepted his honorary Oscar at the Governors Awards, the director said Hollywood was “so behind sports” in terms of diversity.

 

“It’s easier to be the president of the United States as a black person than be the head of a studio,” Lee said. “Honestly, it’s easier to be president of the United States than the head of a studio or head of network.”

 

The debate about the Oscars was a hot topic at the Critics’ Choice Awards, where stars reacted to Smith’s proposed boycott.

“I don’t know if avoiding it altogether is going to help, but I just think we have to continue to move forward,” Niecy Nash told ET. “We have this awareness and this spotlight – we’ve got to look at other work. There’s other work out there that I think was missed. We’ve just got to do better.”