Debbie Schlussel: Quote of the Day: Chips-On-Their-Shoulders Still Affixed to Gazillionaire Black Celeb Obama Fans; #1 Movie Star in U.S. Claims America "Reject[s]" Blacks
Will HOprah Winfrey ever stop using her show as an Obama-gloatfest? Don't count on it. Yesterday, two days after the election, HRHSBotU [Her Royal Highness Supreme Being of the Universe] Oprah was suppoed to be promoting Will Smith's upcoming movie, "Seven Pounds," but instead, she spent the first 25 minutes of her daily TV talk show co-gloating with Smith about Barack Obama's election.
The display of the matching giant chips--more like boulders--on the shoulders of this pair of gazillionaires was hilarious only in its absurdity. After being asked how he felt about the Obama win by HRHSBotU Oprah, Will Smith answered, thus:
You wanna be a part of America, but we've been rejected for so long that it's hard to take ownership.
HUH?! Did I just hear the number one box office draw in America--the highest paid movie star in Hollywood (who makes $20 million plus per film)--who is embraced over and over in every hit movie he makes by mostly White moviegoers, just say "we've been rejected for so long"? Did I just hear him utter the word "we" in conjunction to "rejection" to include the wealthiest woman in the entire entertainment industry--one of the wealthiest women in the entire world and the most influential woman in the world, the woman who was made so by mostly White viewers and O Magazine subscribers? This is "rejection"? Hello . . . ? Earth to Will Smith . . . .
Please tell me what this guy knows from rejection . . . or this calorically-endowed middle-aged woman? Is he referring to "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air"--his star vehicle and the show that White American TV viewers turned into the most successful comedy on TV for several seasons running? Is he referring to his stint as a rapper, both as Will Smith and as half of "DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince", when he became an instant gazillionaire because White teens bought his music in droves?
Sorry, but Will Smith is no sharecropper. He never knew slavery. And he's never known rejection. Instead, he has been embraced over and over and over again by mostly White audiences and fans. Ditto for Oprah, Tiger Woods, and myriad others over the years. Barack Obama's election didn't prove a thing. If they didn't realize that they've been embraced, regardless of skin color, by all of America that made them wealthy and powerful beyond their wildest dreams, they'll never realize it.
And it's just absurd to hear the number one movie star tell the number one female entertainer--both of 'em Black--about how "we've been rejected for so long."
Time to dump those garish chips on your shoulders, which make you look like silly fashion victims. They may be all the rage in urban America. But they're accessories that clash very loudly with your success.
Oh, and by the way, it seems that the other accessory Will Smith likes to wear is that foot-in-mouth lollipop. Remember, this is the guy who not long ago said that Hitler was basically a good person who didn't wake up in the morning and say, I think I'll kill some Jews. Uh, yeah, Will, that's exactly what he woke up saying, every single morning. Get a fricking clue.
He's also the guy who--on one of many previous visits to the Oprah Show--said that he was surprised to play a Black cowboy in "Wild Wild West" because Black cowboys were unusual. Really? That's news to the history books, since Blacks were a sizable number of the cowboys in the 1800s and played a big role in the Old West. I've written about this repeatedly over the years. But, hey, it interferes with the chip-on-his-shoulder, "rejected-by-America" narrative he prefers. Why let the fact interfere with an agenda? Some people's favorite role is playing the victim. And they'll never give it up.
Sooooo tired of this guy's political pronouncements. Great actor . . . but shut the heck up and act.
Posted by Debbie on November 7, 2008 10:01 AM to Debbie Schlussel