Academy Politics, Part I: Why Movies are More Important than Politics
By Chad A. B. Wilson
Published February 19, 2007, 9:47 am in Rhetoric.
I'm talking about the academy, of course, as in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. That's right, Oscar night is coming up, so I have to discuss film politics for a moment.
As I have mentioned before, I love movies. I am more apt to discuss movies at a bar than politics, though I think I'm comfortable with both of them. Movies are just so much less controversial, right?
Until you tell someone that Pretty Woman was a piece of garbage. Or that Titanic was a overdone, trite, yet perfect disaster of a film. And then people start to get upset. When I tell them that Clueless was one of the smartest comedies of the 1990s, people look me as if I just said that Howard Dean should have been president, or Anna Nicole Smith is our American Princess Di. And notice then how people begin to get even more emotional than they do over politics.
There are those who pay attention to politics and those who do not. It's a simple dichotomy. And then we can further divide those that pay attention to politics, for these are the people we're most interested in. This group is made up of several different types of people. They all pay attention to the subject, but they don't all express themselves in the same way. These are not quite discrete categories, although I will treat them this way. Most people of any group are capable of falling into the other groups at various times.
First, there are those who love to follow politics but don't like to discuss them. These are the blog-readers, too. They love to learn all they can, but they're either shy, too confident, or not confident enough. Let's not worry about this group.
Second, there are those who like to discuss politics rationally. These are the people I'm most used to. And most people who love politics fall into this camp, I would argue. These people understand that politics really are a matter of life and death and that their entire identity may be wrapped up in their politics, but they don't get upset when people disagree with them. These are the people who will change their mind when confronted with reasonable arguments against their positions. They're used to discussing politics, and they generally won't call the other side names. I like to think I fall into this camp, although I know I sometimes slip into the next one. Like when I call all Democrats stupid...
Third, there are those who love to follow politics, but who treat it completely emotionally. This group cannot understand and refuses to try to understand the other side of the issue. There is no other side for this group. They raise their voices and insult those that disagree with them. This is your belligerent uncle who always tries to rile everyone up by saying that Bush should go to prison for treason or something like that. Then he begins to berate everyone with how stupid Bush is and how stupid everyone was for voting for him in the first place. It makes for an interesting Thanksgiving dinner, sure, but we all realize that the person is, well, irrational.
No one like the third group. I know we all fall into that group sometimes, but the truth is that we don't like to hang out with our belligerent Uncle John. He's, well, a jerk a lot of the time, and we don't ever want to say anything agains this opinion because he calls us names. These people think they're getting their points across, but they're really not. Really, they're just an annoying, uncomfortable form of entertainment. When our Grandfathers and Uncle John get into an argument, it's hilarious to be sure, but neither one ever convinces the other that they'r right. They might as well be throwing "Your momma is so fat..." insults at one another.
Because I don't like these kinds of people, I tend to gravitate toward discussing politics with the second group, the rationalists. Sure, we're not rational all the time, but we all seem to understand how debate works. There are rules for political discussion, after all, and they're generally written in the form of don'ts. I'm not talking about fomral or classical debate style here; what I'm talking about is merely a groundwork for informed and productive political discussion:
Don't raise your voice.
Don't insult the other person.
Don't call anyone names.
Don't state assertions without reasons and evidence.
Don't belittle the other person.
And the list could go on and on, but we'll let these stand. Most people who debate politics in bars or coffee houses or drawing rooms understand these guidelines or rules. They know that without these don'ts, civil discussion becomes impossible, and people will get upset.
But what does this have to do with movies?
What I have described is solely about politics. People expect that politics is a heated topic, so they understand that there must be ground-rules. They understand that all of these things must be taken into consideration when politics comes up. Your Uncle John doesn't, of course, but we all know he's a bit of a loon, anyway.
But when movies come up, all sense of civility goes out the window. Ask someone why The Matrix is their favorite movie, and they're liable to say, "I don't know." Or "It's cool."
And that's good enough for most people.
But ask them why they support Hilary Clinton for president, and they would need to have a lot more reasons and evidence than that. Imagine someone saying, "She's cool." I wouldn't let that stand. Nope, I would press on and on.
But we don't do that with movies for some reason. We don't hold our movie opinions up to the same standards as we do our political opinions. For some reason, we are expected to simply hold opinions about movies, but we are expected to have reasons and evidence for politics. Why not have reasons and evidence for both?
It's partly because everyone watches movies and everyone has an opinion about movies. We can't divide the Western world into those who watch movies and those who do not, for everyone watches them.
What am I getting at?
It's this: get among a group of friends and try insulting someone's favorite movie. Or try praising a movie most people think is garbage. Then watch their reaction. People will get appalled. "What? That movie's awesome!" some person will say. "Yeah, I loved that movie. It was so cool!" Or "Dude, that movie sucked."
Now get into the same group and say, "Barack Obama should be president." You won't get the same reaction, at least not at first. First, there will be silence. Then maybe someone will say something like, "you're crazy" without wanting to go any further into the issue. And then someone will say, "Why?" And you're into a good political discussion.
But the "why?" question will rarely come up about movies. It's just not on the radar screen. With movies, we have visceral reactions with no basis in anything. With politics, we're not expected to do that.
So at my Oscar party this weekend, I plan on asking my guests to desribe why they think Babel should win best picture, or why Little Miss Sunshine deserves it. It's like watching election night, after all. We're all just waiting for Dan Rather, I mean Katie Couric, to call the election, to tell us once and for all who wins the big prize. It's like staying up until way past my bedtime on a Sunday night trying to find out who wins Best Picture. But like those Tuesdays in November, I generally fall asleep long before it gets to that point.
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