“In an ideal world, this [Oscar] year would bust up the well-oiled machine and allow for a wide variety of films to be let in the door. We’re not quite there yet, partly because Hollywood is still in the grips of what might be best described as a kind of woke scare, which is like the Red Scare only it’s about monitoring films for potentially ‘problematic’ concepts and themes, [some being that] the casting may be ‘too white‘ or the directors are male or someone has a history of ‘problematic’ behavior, etc.

“Twitter is the judge and jury but no one wants to be seen as complicit [in anything outside the approved wokester safety zone, and so] they vote accordingly.

“Thus, the bloggers and critics are modulating for this potential blowback with [careful] choices. We’re all predicting the Oscar using the same method. In an ordinary year we might pick a movie [that] Oscar voters would likely go for, given what we know of the Academy’s taste. This year, we compensate for the ‘woke scare’ and we say ‘this is the movie they might go for if they are wanting to send a message that they are not racists or sexists or transphobes.’

“This was, after all, the year the Academy announced they would be mandating inclusivity in their productions and narratives going forward. That means they will likely be voting from a place of defending themselves from potential attacks.” — from Sasha Stone‘s “Best Picture – Films that Reflect The Story of America in 2020,” posted today.

A friend has warned me to watch my back. “As a white man you are vulnerable, and thus you must modulate as anyone would,” he said. “Okay, it’s not quite as bad as [a threat of] being thrown in jail but it is like blacklisting, for sure.” Which is obviously a kind of jail except that you’re not kept in but locked out.

In other words, give the Khmer Rouge a reason to slit your throat and they will slit your throat without blinking an eye. Or…you know, they’ll slip a blue plastic bag over your head. I’m not exaggerating.