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by
Michael Flanagan
Kevin
Smith has yet again sparked controversy with
his films.
First, with Clerks, he made
people realize that service, grocery,
convenience, video clerks—heck, all
clerks—really don’t overly enjoy serving
the public. (As a graduate of Grand Union, I appreciate that.)
Then, with Mallrats, the
controversy was, “The maker of Clerks
just got lucky, because this one is really
bad.” (I
liked Mallrats.
And the subsequent video and special
edition DVD served to prove it a success.)
Then, with Chasing Amy, it
became, “The guy who made that flop Mallrats
made a good, dramatic and funny intelligent
film.” (Of course, all of his films are good, dramatic, funny, and
intelligent.
They’re just looked at as dick and
fart jokes…but they’re funny and intelligent
dick and fart jokes.)
He took a big step up to the plate with
Dogma, and faced a major religious
organization we will not name here.
Dogma lost a distributor due to
the protests, but scored well at the box
office and on DVD.
(I liked Dogma, but for it, Smith will
burn in Hell.
That was a joke.)
Now, before it’s even released in
theaters, the upcoming Jay and Silent Bob
Strike Back is joining the club.
GLAAD, the Gay and
Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, has
addressed complaints with Smith on alleged
“gay jokes” in the new movie.
The organization objects to jokes at
“the expense of the stereotyped category of
people,” references to gay men as “objects
of acceptable ridicule and dehumanization,”
references to gay men using “an expanded
vocabulary of defamatory words and phrases,”
and using the word “gay” to mean
“something that is wrong or stupid,”
validating “a common slur used by school-age
youth to mean anything unacceptable.”
In the letter, GLAAD
describes its understanding of satire in
Smith’s films, but they claim that
“satirical sophistication is not a
fundamental expectation of an audience
bombarded by fag jokes and gags revolving
around genitals and simulated sex acts.” GLAAD suggests that the film, specifically the character of
Jay, trivializes the impact of negative
homosexual humor, when in fact, such humor
should be addressed with “retribution” and
“remorse.”
Smith went on to meet
with a representative of GLAAD and discussed
the issue at hand.
According to Smith, the meeting
resulted in the representative admitting “he
knew [Smith] was not a homophobe. But he
couldn't cotton to the disparity between who
[Smith is] and some of the humor in the
flick.”
Smith voluntarily ended up donating ten
thousand dollars to the Matthew Shepherd
Foundation, not as retribution for doing
something wrong, but to “allay [the
representative’s] fears.”
The Foundation serves to educate on the
dangers of homophobia, and is a cause in which
Smith believes and agrees with.
GLAAD is asking Miramax, the production
company of the film, for a $200,000 donation
to the same Foundation.
Now, Smith says, he’s
“being painted as homophobic by GLAAD.”
A reporter from Entertainment Weekly,
Smith says, insinuated that the payment Smith
made to GLAAD is an “admission of
culpability.”
Smith defends himself in
a post at his production company’s Web site,
ViewAskew.com.
Smith points out that “the openly gay
journalists who saw it during the junket
didn't express one iota of a reservation”
about the film’s content.
Furthermore, Bob Hawks, Smith’s close
friend and “the man responsible for the
distribution of Clerks,” is openly gay, and
enjoyed the film.
Smith defends the film itself by saying
“I'm not sorry—because I didn't make jokes
at the expense of the gay community…I'm
making fun of a mind-set that exists in our
culture…And making fun of said mind-set
doesn't legitimize it, in my opinion; it
de-fangs it.”
Poor Mr. Smith.
It seems he’s certain his movies are
destined to upset one wing or another.
In our current atmosphere of societal
correctness and litigation-enforced
lifestyles, it seems impossible to make a
statement, whether it’s through action,
information, or art.
And that’s just it: You can’t make
everybody happy.
And you never will.
Art has been offending people in all of
its forms for centuries, and it will continue
to do so. Why? Here’s my
opinion: art, and especially satire, holds up
a mirror to us as a culture, as a society.
Some people see the wrong part of us,
some people don’t see us at all, and some
people really don’t want to see who
we are. And
some, who are at a great advantage in this day
and age, can see what they want to see, and
use it against the person holding the mirror.
To read the letter and
Smith’s response at the view askew Web site,
click here.
To address your opinions
to GLAAD in a civil manner on behalf of
Smith, email them at glaad@glaad.org.
Or…
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