Will Smith punches Chris Rock on stage at the Oscars.

[CheeseMuffin]

I think I speak for us all when I ask WTF just happened?

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2022/mar/27/will-smith-punch-chris-rock-wife-joke-gi-jane-video-oscars

@Annasgirl

I’m totally shocked and disgusted that so many women are coming in to this post and saying CR deserved to be hit. No one ever deserves to be hit. My God, if this is so many women’s attitude to male violence, we will never end it.

@Annasgirl - I don't think CR deserved to be hit at all. But I do think he should have been careful about what he said and he can get away with it because it's funny when it certainly wasn't. Not to Jada and not to Will.

@LaraDeSalle

Are you a bit embarrassed now you've realised you kept saying you'd posted a video of will smith and Chris rock hugging and it turns out it's actually a video of will smith and someone entirely different?

Because you were so vehemently going on about the video maybe this is a lesson to check stuff before you share it so confidently then look ever so silly when it's wrong.

Points for being the first person ever to confuse Bradley cooper and Chris rock though.

I don't think CR deserved to be hit at all. But I do think he should have been careful about what he said and he can get away with it because it's funny when it certainly wasn't. Not to Jada and not to Will.

I agree it wasn't funny at all. I didn't laugh.

Will did though, before he saw Jada's reaction and then got up and assaulted Chris Rock. He laughed before he saw that she was upset.

If I was Jada I would have been very upset to see my husband laughing at a joke at my expense and then behaving so disgustingly by assaulting someone.

@LampLighter414

One thought I have on this is that if it was a white couple, with the lady having lost her hair, this joke would have never been made. Black women are seen as fair game to be the butt of jokes unlike white women who must be defended at all costs.

If that had been Jennifer Garner or Kristen Bell or someone sat there. It would never have been said - regardless of whether the comedian is white or black. And if it had there would have been huge backlash for such a mean spirited joke.

Regardless it doesn't justify Will's response. But perhaps some more context as to why it can be more frustrating for Black celebs in Hollywood.

The joke was made by a black man about a black woman. I don't think this analogy stands up. I don't want to spout off as if I know anything that much about black people and how they relate to their hair but I went to boarding school and year after year shared close living space with young black girls and often witnessed how they spoke about and tried to manage their hair - the straightening, treatments, trying to get condition into it after having those treatments. White Western women just don't have those issues. It's not A Thing For them so it wouldn't occur to a comic of any colour to make such a "joke". Black men will have absorbed the issues around hair from their wives/sisters/mothers/daughters hence CR making the documentary "Good Hair" in response to his daughter's comments about her own hair. I don't think adding that racial element stands up.

Personally I think there's some history there between all three of them, CR does seem to keep poking at Jada. This is not the first time. There is no excuse whatsoever for WS's pathetic behaviour though. I don't think he deserves to lose his Oscar though, he'd already earned that before this debacle. I'm was never a fan, I think he over emotes in everything he's in and I cannot stand his Brave, Trying Not To Cry Pout that is a feature at some point, of every single thing he's in no matter what the plot.

Will smith walked up on the stage, what could he do then, it was too late to go and sit back down. Could he have called him away for a chat?
He was all fired up then, he couldn’t turn back, he had to keep going, just I wish he hadn’t hit him. There are other ways of dealing with things but once he had walked up on the stage, his choices were limited.

@Gonnagetgoing I am not sure what you are saying. Will Smith has been extremely famous for decades.

And whether younger men like what he did or don't, the fact that he reacted with violence, and was allowed to get away with it, quite spectacularly so, in fact, is the message they get. They don't have to consciously think "oh, wow, let's behave like that" in order for that message to be damaging.

I have a feeling that in the next episode of red table talk we have Will Smith telling how nobody will disrespect his family that his publicist has written. Then jada will go on a thing about how she appreciates her husband defending her event hough she doesn't need him to and how that joke was terrible and then there will be a section about alopecia.

The joke was bad. You dont make fun of somebody's illness. Through the award season there has been jokes about Jadas many lovers which again are bad jokes. If she had just shaved her head for fun it would have been chuckle worthy joke but this was just not cool. But also Wills reaction was terrible. At first he fake laughs and then see jada rolling her eyes and then a slap. The reaction will damage his career. Doing after Oscars press (without the incident) defending his wife he would have come across as a here and Chris rock would have had to release an apology and he would have come across badly. Anyway, PR nightmare for Will.

Will did though, before he saw Jada's reaction

I think these celebs have a permanent fake smile and an inner laugh quecard inside them to chuckle at everything just so they don't appear humourless. Probably not even listening what they say.

Will Smith will probably be checking into a faculty before the end of the day. He must be under extreme stress to react like that.

@3luckystars

Will smith walked up on the stage, what could he do then, it was too late to go and sit back down. Could he have called him away for a chat? He was all fired up then, he couldn’t turn back, he had to keep going, just I wish he hadn’t hit him. There are other ways of dealing with things but once he had walked up on the stage, his choices were limited.

So you think that once people start to take a bad course of action or an abusive one, they can't back out? They can always back out, even at the last second.

Worrying you think it would have been more embarrassing for him to use words and not hands, walk off or walk back to his seat than it is for him to have assaulted someone in a room full of people on live tv.

I actually think hair for most women - whether they are black, Indian, Chinese or white - is very important, and whether long or short hair, thin, curly, frizzy; a woman's hair is still very important.
That said, even older men going bald can be very sensisitve, even though this is very common in men.
So, yes, i agree the supposed 'joke' should not have been said.
However, violence is not the solution, and at the Oscars even less so.
Basically, it possibly spoilt the event for many other Oscar attendees, whether winners or contenders.
Chris Rock showed remarkable fortitude in recovering and continuing his presentation.

@3luckystars

Well I’m trying to take the Hollywood part out of it and think of them as just normal people.

If my friend was suffering from a health condition and some man slagged her off and made a joke out of her, publicly, If her husband went up and punched the man who upset his wife, and told him to shut up then what would I think about that.

To me Will Smith looks like a man under an enormous amount of stress. I feel sorry for them all.

You feel sorry for mulit millionaire priviledged people living in an ego bubble whilst the rest of the world falls apart around them?

Yea, I woke up with sympathy for the Hollywood elite too today, then opened my gas bill, my pay slip and turned on the news....

@Rewis

Will did though, before he saw Jada's reaction

I think these celebs have a permanent fake smile and an inner laugh quecard inside them to chuckle at everything just so they don't appear humourless. Probably not even listening what they say.

Absolutely agree with this. He was just laughing on auto pilot, surely most people have tuned off at awards nights. All I hear is blah blah blah then blah blah

@LondonWolf sorry if my point wasn't clear. All I was saying is that if it had been say Kristen Bell sat there with her husband with a shaved head due to a medical condition then no comedian, white or black, would have ever made that joke in the first place. And if they had then there would have been uproar.

It doesn't justify Will's response.

I do feel if he had indeed just sat there and said nothing (the right thing to do). I think there would have been zero consequence on Chris Rock. Unlike if this had been made about a white female Hollywood celeb.

There are some things in life that you can't get away with, and Chris Rock stepped right over that line.

Alopecia is devastating for a lot of people that suffer with it, I can well imagine that Jada has shed many tears over it, she has certainly talked emotionally about it.

I don't know what Chris Rock was thinking. I don't condone what Will Smith did, but I certainly understand it, he, more than anyone would know how hurtful Chris' words would have been.

Lessons learned all round I reckon.

Had Rock made a joke about someone's disability, no one would have laughed. This was unfunny and totally inappropriate and unacceptable. For Will Smith to respond with violence and the angry shouting was totally unacceptable. He went from laughter to violence and intimidation in a heartbeat. Very disturbing.

He's totally overshadowed his own achievement and potentially damaged his career. The person I feel sorry for is Jada. Poked fun at by a jerk and defended by a jerk.

Just busily screen-shotting some of the absolute gold on here in case the thread is deleted . . .

What a bizarre response.

Would the Oscar’s be in the headlines?

Don’t be silly. The Oscars are always all over the news.

@LampLighter414

One thought I have on this is that if it was a white couple, with the lady having lost her hair, this joke would have never been made. Black women are seen as fair game to be the butt of jokes unlike white women who must be defended at all costs.

If that had been Jennifer Garner or Kristen Bell or someone sat there. It would never have been said - regardless of whether the comedian is white or black. And if it had there would have been huge backlash for such a mean spirited joke.

Regardless it doesn't justify Will's response. But perhaps some more context as to why it can be more frustrating for Black celebs in Hollywood.

I kind of disagree tbh, will and Jada smith seem to be fair game for making jokes, because of how they come across, if this was Beyoncé and Jay-Z, the reaction wouldn't be the same and the joke probably wouldn't of been made. Britney Spears has been the butt of thousands of jokes throughout her career, including when she had a breakdown and shaved her head

[quote LampLighter414]@LondonWolf sorry if my point wasn't clear. All I was saying is that if it had been say Kristen Bell sat there with her husband with a shaved head due to a medical condition then no comedian, white or black, would have ever made that joke in the first place. And if they had then there would have been uproar.

It doesn't justify Will's response.

I do feel if he had indeed just sat there and said nothing (the right thing to do). I think there would have been zero consequence on Chris Rock. Unlike if this had been made about a white female Hollywood celeb.[/quote]
I guess the thing is that it wasn’t the choice between sitting ‘doing nothing’ or attacking someone. He could have addressed it in his acceptance speech/afterwards in press together with Jada and would have come out of the whole thing looking very very good.

The way he’s handled it has (in my opinion) actually diminished the issue of the nasty joke culture because people are more focused on the violent reaction.

They are not just "normal people" though. They are, whether they deserve it or not, people that lots of other people look at, talk about, think about. I don't give a hoot about "celebrity" and as I wrote earlier, I had never heard of either Rock or Jada before today. But all of these people who are closely observed by millions of others have an influence on the zeitgeist and behaviour.

I can't understand the posters defending Will Smith here. It isn't a "team Chris or team Will" situation here, they both acted disgustingly. If you said something offensive do you genuinely think it would then be OK to get slapped? Because you deserved it? Hitting someone is never OK.

I've always been a huge Will Smith fan but he's made himself look like a total prick. I can't believe the number of women on here justifying male violence.

Weird to see so many women defending male violence in response to a bad joke/mean spirited comment. While on forums elsewhere the vast majority of male commentators find it indefensible. Strange times.

@gazprom

My violent dad's behaviour was excused by my mum as coming from too much 'passion'

Exactly this. It was disgusting behaviour by CR and WS. The voice of the women around whom this all centred. Jada can defend herself, but she wasn't given the he chance.

Yea, I woke up with sympathy for the Hollywood elite too today, then opened my gas bill, my pay slip and turned on the news....

Can you give us the financial cut off where people aren’t allowed to have any problems just because they have money?

I mean, I can afford all my bills, no worries there, but I’m not as rich as the Pinkett-smiths. Is it ok for people to make fun of my alopecia? Am I allowed to feel really bad for having a bald patch that’s bigger than 50% of my scalp? Or do I have to be happy about it because I can afford my gas bill? Just so we know at which financial level we can feel better about other life altering things.

Horrible joke. I think most DHs/ DPs would do the same or want to do the same if their wife/ partner was made the butt of an unpleasant joke about her physical appearance in front of a live audience of Hollywood folk and a worldwide audience of gazillions. She looked beautiful but who knows what insecurities she faces. Will Smith will know and the joke crossed a line.