If you do not live under a rock, then you must be aware of what happened at the 2022 Oscars. During the event when Chris Rock was handling the duties of the host at the prestigious awards, he made a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith.
While it wouldn’t feel like a bad thing to do initially, since Rock is paid for making jokes as he is a stand-up comedian. However, what Chris did wrong was make a joke about Pinkett Smith’s alopecia disease.
Pinkett Smith’s husband and renowned actor Will Smith seemed to laugh at the joke at first but later lost his cool. So much so that the veteran actor proceeded to go onto the stage in front of hundreds of people and slapped Chris Rock.
It is understandable that he might have been frustrated about Rock making a joke about his wife, slapping him? Might be taking things a tad bit worse. Although Smith apologized for his actions, the world continues to react to Smith’s actions.
Golden State Warriors superstar Stephen Curry recently gave his reaction to the incident. Following that, now, NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar wrote a blog post about it. He highlighted the fact that Smith’s actions only perpetuated stereotypes about the Black community.
Via Kareem.substack:
“With a single petulant blow, (Smith) advocated violence, diminished women, insulted the entertainment industry, and perpetuated stereotypes about the Black community. One of the main talking points from those supporting the systemic racism in America is characterizing Blacks as more prone to violence and less able to control their emotions. Smith just gave comfort to the enemy by providing them with the perfect optics they were dreaming of. Many will be reinvigorated to continue their campaign to marginalize African Americans and others through voter suppression campaign.”
Kareem further wrote, “The speech was about justifying his violence… Those who protect don’t brag about it in front of 15 million people. They just do it and shut up. You don’t do it as a movie promotion claiming how you’re like the character you just won an award portraying.”
In the same blog post, Kareem also applauded Chris Rock for handling the situation with maturity and not blowing things out of proportion.
At the end of the day, both the actors were wrong in one way or another, but slapping someone on a stage with such a huge spotlight should never be the answer. Hopefully, the two have already sorted things out, as Smith claimed in his apology to fans.
