Mainstream media outlets ran numerous op-eds on Tuesday criticizing the 70th Emmy awards for promoting diversity, but then failing to give awards to enough ethnic minorities.
Monday’s award ceremony made diversity and racial politics its central theme. The hosts proudly announced that they had the most ethnically diverse group of Emmy nominees ever, and even sang a song called “We Solved It!” to celebrate the landmark.
However, the diverse group of nominees proved short of the mark for members of the elite media, who complained that not enough people of color went home with trophies. Below is a roundup of elite media outlets ripping the Television Academy for failing to live up to their promise of diversity.
CNN
In an article entitled, “More diversity jokes than wins for people of color at the Emmys,” CNN highlighted how the “talk did not translate into wins for performers of color.” After detailing all the films starring people of color who failed to win awards, the network quoted actor John Leguizamo’s “easy” solution to having more Latino winners.
“We Latin people are 50% of people in LA and less than three percent of our faces are on camera,” he said.
“The talent is out there. The people are out there. We need to have executives who are Latino who are making those choices, who understand our culture and who are making the right decisions.”
The New York Times
The New York Times, who recently promoted a racist to their editorial board, noted the “palpable tension and embarrassment” in the theater over the lack of minority winners.
“The 70th Primetime Emmy Awards opened Monday night with a little soft-shoe self-deprecation, a semi-musical number called “We Solved It,” in which a chorus of television stars claimed that their industry’s diversity problem had been overcome — until RuPaul arrived with the news that no, they’d jumped the gun,” the Times read.
“Not content to say it in song, the show then emphasized the point by handing out its first 10 awards, and 22 out of 26 overall, to white performers, directors, writers, and producers. The host Michael Che made a joke about it after six awards, James Corden after nine.”
“The tension and embarrassment in the Microsoft Theater were palpable when an African-American, Regina King, finally won, for best actress in a limited series in Netflix’s “Seven Seconds,” the paper added.
The Washington Post
In its Emmy Awards review, The Washington Post noted how “the talk about diversity doesn’t quite translate,” citing the success of Amazon’s comedy series The Marvelous Mrs. Maise.
“Monday night’s Primetime Emmy Awards show on NBC opened with a clever song-and-dance number exuberantly called ‘We Solved It,’ touting the diversity of this year’s nominees, with the twist being that nothing’s solved,” the review explained. “Want proof? Make way for a bunch of awards for a comedy about a white Jewish woman trying to reinvent herself in 1950s New York!”
Vox
In Vox’s assessment of the evening, the authors determined diversity as one of the “losers” of the night’s proceedings.
“The disparity between the night’s lively opening number — which joked about Hollywood having ‘solved diversity’ because the nominee pool was the most diverse it’s ever been —and Che and Jost’s lifeless opening monologue proved to be something of a harbinger for the night to come, as efforts to celebrate diversity ended up flopping in practice,” the site wrote.
The Week
British magazine The Week also ran a winners and losers roundup, describing the evening’s results as “particularly disheartening.”
“Diversity was the theme of the night at the 2018 Emmys, although all the bragging on stage didn’t seem to translate into actual award results,” the article read. “After a literal song and dance mocking Hollywood’s attempts at diversifying television, the next seven awards failed to go to people of color.”
“The results were particularly disheartening seeing as it really was the most diverse Emmys in history, with more than 30 actors and actresses of color nominated across all categories. #EmmysSoWhite?”
Follow Ben Kew on Facebook, Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at bkew@breitbart.com.
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