“I guess we have to ask ‘what is the point of any of this?” Because activists are imposing their ideology on nearly every corner of the industry, making film awards — and films in general — something other than what their original purpose has always been. And honestly, what are these awards going to be but a ceremony inside of a devout religion?” — Awards Daily‘s Sasha Stone, posted on 8.23.22.

10.12.22: Wokesters within the Los Angeles Film Critics Association have decided to follow the lead of the Spirit and Gotham Awards by abandoning gender-based acting awards.

When the LAFCA foodies vote in December they’ll hand out two Best Lead Performance trophies (either gender or gender-neutral) and two awards for Best Supporting Performance (ditto).

LAFCA motive #1 is to emphasize how different L.A. wokester culture is from tens of millions of Joe and Jane Popcorn movie lovers in every corner of the nation, who don’t give a shit about any of this.

LAFCA motive #2: “Non-woke film fans may love the idea of gender-based acting categories for now, but we are leading the way to a bold and brave new realm…henceforth we are living in a gender-neutral world, whether you like it or not. Wake up and woke up and join us…it’s a joyful revolution!”

Here’s a portion of my reaction to the Spirit Award announcement, which I posted six or seven weeks ago -/ obviously the same deal.

“I will say this straight and clear and true: If the Academy decides to go gender-neutral with the Oscar acting awards, the eclipse will be total and absolute, and I mean beyond the level of anything dreamt of by Michelangelo Antonioni …culturally and aesthetically, the Oscars will have slit their own throats.

“Which award-giving org will succumb next to glorious trans fluidity-slash-equality? If the gender-neutral advocates within BAFTA, the Academy, the Golden Globes, the Critics Choice and the guilds…if they manage to eliminate gender-based acting awards, Average Joes and Janes will simply walk away and stay away…they will raise their fists and voices and say “stop this insanity, stop this bullshit…men are men and women are women and they generate different moods and expressions and ways of living and processing the ups and downs of living…stop this bullshit and come down to earth.”

Sasha Stone’s rant, posted an hour go, is a near-perfect thing:

The Spirit Awards have decided to move to “gender neutral” categories, thus stripping the last tiny bit of fun the awards race had left. the Gotham awards have already done this, and my guess is that BAFTA, with their committee-driven nominees, will soon follow suit.

So now they’ll need committees to choose not just an equitable collection of performances, but nominees that must represent every single spectrum of every marginalized group. People of color, non-binary people, people with disabilities, perhaps plus-sized people — I mean, all we seem to do now on the left is argue about which words we’re all supposed to use to not offend a single person, or get called out as a problematic witch on Twitter.

Maybe clinging to the past, or pretending film awards are meant to do anything but serve their newfound religious ideology, seems a bit pointless by now. People aren’t really all that thrilled with “gender neutral” anything, except perhaps bathrooms. All you need to remind you of this is the success of Top Gun and Elvis. Why do you think the Kardashians are a multi-billion empire? You don’t think sexy females are a hot selling point? That is why there is much excitement around the Best Actress category. It is the All About Eve of it all. But no one is going to listen to me. This train has left the station and there is no bringing it back.

“When SNL made this parody ad five years ago they were obviously goofing on wokester fanatics. Who knew it would become an actual reality?”