Nolte: Cuckold Will Smith Takes His Humiliation Out on Chris Rock

Here’s what I think happened between Will Smith and Chris Rock during last night’s Oscars…

First off, comedian Chris Rock is not getting enough credit for his poise and class. How many people would have reacted the way he did to such an awful and ugly thing? In front of the whole wide world, Rock’s sucker-punched/slapped by a man-baby who easily has 40 pounds on him. Rock’s reaction? He doesn’t give up even an inch of ground. Then he makes a joke: “Will Smith just slapped the shit out of me!” Then he addresses Smith’s abusive heckling to shut Smith down. Then he makes another joke about this being “the greatest night in television history.” Then he went on with the show.

Extraordinary, just extraordinary.

Total pro.

Bravo.

The Oscars should ask Chris Rock to host the show next year just so that he can get the biggest laugh in history walking out in a neck brace.

However, none of that diminishes the fact that this was by far the ugliest moment in the Academy’s already bruised history. And as the public processes what happened over the coming days, it will be remembered as something even uglier, mainly because Smith was allowed to get away with it.

Rock was there to present the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. He made an anodyne joke about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett-Smith, and her short hair…  “Jada, can’t wait for GI Jane 2,” was all he said.

How is that an insult?

At the time, all the hoopla around GI Jane (1997) was about how great Demi Moore looked in the starring role.

Apparently, Jada suffers from alopecia areata, which causes hair loss, but comparing your wife to 1997-era Demi Moore (or Demi Moore today for that matter) is far from an insult.

At first, Smith laughed. But Jada laughed for only about a half-second and then rolled her eyes. Next thing we know, Smith stomps on the stage, hits Rock with a sucker slap, stomps off the stage, and starts yelling from his seat, “Keep my wife’s name out of your fucking mouth.”

What a baby.

What a bully.

Here’s what I think is really going on… Just one man’s opinion…

Jada’s been running her mouth for years about how she cuckolds Will Smith with extra-marital affairs by way of their “open marriage.” So Will Smith walked into Sunday’s Oscars a man who’s been serially humiliated by his own wife and who tries to put on a face about how he’s okay with it. Smith’s humiliation goes back even further to Jada’s “close friendship” with the late rapper Tupac Shakur.

Put yourself in Smith’s position…

You’re one of the biggest movie stars in the world. Your screen image is that of a tough guy who can handle himself, who’s never caught off guard or made to look like a beta male, and in real life, your wife is openly discussing the fact you’re a cuckold.

None of this is a secret:

Smith himself has appeared on the show, most notably for a frank discussion with Jada about a period of non-monogamy in their marriage. “The pursuit of truth is the only way to be happy in this lifetime,” Smith told me. “And we sort of came to the agreement that authenticity was the release from the shackles of fame and public scrutiny.” When you tell the truth, the pair reasoned, you never have to fear being found out.

What’s more, Smith is obviously uncomfortable with it:

“Jada never believed in conventional marriage,[Smith said].… Jada had family members that had an unconventional relationship. So she grew up in a way that was very different than how I grew up. There were significant endless discussions about, what is relational perfection? What is the perfect way to interact as a couple? And for the large part of our relationship, monogamy was what we chose, not thinking of monogamy as the only relational perfection,” Smith told me. “We have given each other trust and freedom, with the belief that everybody has to find their own way. And marriage for us can’t be a prison. And I don’t suggest our road for anybody. I don’t suggest this road for anybody. But the experiences that the freedoms that we’ve given one another and the unconditional support, to me, is the highest definition of love.”

And this is not some one-time thing. In his own memoir, Smith discussed his “raging jealousy” about his wife’s relationship with Tupac Shakur in the 90s–the early days of Smith and Pinkett’s courtship and marriage:

“Though they were never intimate, their love for each other is legendary – they defined ‘ride or die,’” he writes. “In the beginning of our relationship, my mind was tortured by their connection. He was PAC! And I was me.”

[…]

“Pac was like Harry [Will Smith’s younger brother] – he triggered the perception of myself as a coward,” Smith continues. “I hated that I wasn’t what he was in the world, and I suffered a raging jealousy: I wanted Jada to look at me like that.”

So now everyone knows about this, including everyone in Hollywood, and the effect on Smith has got to be utter humiliation.

So, now, let’s fast-forward to Sunday night, and Smith knows everyone knows, knows it’s being talked about more than ever, and then Oscar host Regina Hall ridicules your cuckold status with this joke.

Then Chris Rock makes a joke about your wife that your wife doesn’t like and, well… Seeking to reclaim and reassert his manhood in the eyes of his wife and the world, this happened…

That’s my opinion of the psychology behind this…

Despite what some left-wing sociopaths are saying, Rock didn’t deserve that. It was an uncontrolled, rage-filled overreaction on Smith’s part that had nothing to do with Rock and everything to do with a cuckold’s need to reassert his manhood in front of a world that’s either laughing at him or pitying him.

Just my opinion. That’s all this is…

People in open marriages pretend to be sophisticated but I see this as an example of how crippling and psychologically battering infidelity is. I would add that it would not surprise me if Will Smith now looks like an even weaker man in Jada’s eyes. Why would she be impressed by her husband’s lack of control and his targeting of Rock, who is a much smaller man? This wasn’t chivalry. This was insecurity and weakness, this was their dirty laundry put on display in front of the whole world.

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC. Follow his Facebook Page here.