I agree with both of you, @Gilead and @Merrymouse.
I also have alopecia, this of course doesn't mean I'm all for violence to defend myself from abuse, but I'm baffled as to why Chris Rock hasn't apologised, or more so, why people in the media haven't focused on this also.
In my mind, violence isn't ok unless you are defending yourself from someone else's violence. So no, I don't think Will slapping Chris was the best reaction, but my feelings are that I can try to understand why Will did it.
I think a previous poster earlier on in this thread mentioned about teaching children to turn the other cheek, then eventually you might feel compelled to teach them to fight back when they keep getting beaten up and no one is doing anything about it.
Perhaps that's partly what led to Will's behaviour in that moment, a build up of bullying from Chris. Chris has a history of being unpleasant towards Jada and from what I have read, doesn't seem to have a great opinion of women, particularly black women in general.
People are saying GI Jane is a compliment, yes with Demi Moore and Jada both being beautiful women, absolutely I can see that. I don't think Chris was being complimentary though, I think he was needling Jada to get a rise-he's done it before.
In that moment Will felt an impulse to defend his wife. He went about it the wrong way but I can understand why he did it.
Chris Rock isn't someone that I know much about, but from what I've read, he does seem to have it in for Jada Pinkett.
This article in The Guardian below picks up on Chris's misogynistic impulses towards black women:
www.theguardian.com/stage/2022/mar/28/chris-rock-comedy-career-will-smith
'In I Think I Love My Wife, a reboot of a classic French film, Rock casted women as the root of all evil. And then of course he went on and made Good Hair, which does far more to put down Black women than uplift them.'
There's another interesting article, (apologies if it's already been mentioned) in The Guardian:
www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/mar/29/white-outrage-about-will-smiths-slap-is-rooted-in-anti-blackness-its-inequality-in-plain-sight
The final paragraphs in the article make a lot of sense to me:
'But let’s not forget why all this started in the first place. In case there was any confusion, alopecia is absolutely a disability, and one that Black women are more prone to. Whether or not Rock knew about Pinkett Smith’s condition, the politics of Black women’s hair is well known to be a historically fraught and often traumatising topic (he should know – he made a documentary about it in 2009).
Still, this kind of punching down on Black women remains typical of many Black male comedians who, like the rest of the world, don’t see Black women’s struggles and experiences as real or legitimate. And this lack of care for Black women also partly explains why people were so taken aback by the image of Smith standing up for his wife in that way. The world is so used to seeing Black women as unworthy of being protected and fought for that it can’t see any merit to Smith’s actions or the emotions that spurred them.
Smith has since apologised to Rock and the Academy, and this event will soon become just another wild story in our pop culture memory. But as we await the results of the Academy’s investigation, what I hope will remain is the opportunity to truly question how society views Black men, what we see as disability, and who we see as worthy of protecting.'
I agree with Merrymouse's point about the roasting of people for entertainment and how it needs to stop-it isn't funny and it does feel like bullying sometimes. In this case, I think it was bullying from Chris and Will reacted after a build up of insults towards his wife over the years. He shouldn't have slapped Chris, but Will has apologised and now Chris needs to apologise also.