Thoughts On The Shameful 79th Annual BAFTA Awards

 

Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo at the BAFTA Awards. 

Sunday started off on a disrespectful final week of Black History Month in London. Ever since the painful humiliation Michael B. Jordan, Delroy Lindo, Hannah Beachler, and another aforementioned Black woman in the audience bravely endured from hard “n” word screaming Paul Davidson—a sufferer of Tourette syndrome— at the 79th Annual BAFTA Awards, the opened wound has continued bleeding and bleeding and bleeding. The call coming from inside the house—or institution rather—requests that the offended parties understand Davidson’s condition and not grant any genuine salve to those affected by the racist tics. Every time such prejudice glares its ugly face, Black people are left compartmentalizing an unfair balance of holding the grace bag in one hand while trying to stitch together the gaping holes with the other. They’re instructed to be compliant, to have nuance, gentle and kind. 

It’s a mighty fine gaslighting tactic. 

Where is the empathy for them? The respect? 

Now certain awards shows never seemed true safe spaces for people of color, considering what they tend to honor and the systems that they continue upholding— a system that’s still donning firsts at their big ages. Invited nominees and presenters must be walking along eggshells, especially Black women actresses and filmmakers who are often more likely to hand out trophies than win them. 

Production designer Hannah Beachler’s tweets on her firsthand accounts of the word being said not once but three times.

Many have applauded the compassionate response of the stilled BAFTA audience including host Sir Alan Cummings, but the changed faces on Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo’s will haunt us for a lifetime, looks of shock and dismay, even horror and pain happening on a live stage in front of their friends and peers. Hearing that Jordan’s parents cried added another layered sting. BAFTA also chose to keep the slur in the airing even as Warner Brothers asked them to remove it. That spoke volumes regarding censorship since this part of Akinola Davies Jr.’s acceptance speech was purposefully omitted, 

“Archive your loved ones. Archive your stories yesterday, today, and forever. For Nigeria,  for London, the Congo, Sudan. Free Palestine.” 

Davidson and BAFTA provided insensitive statements that were anything but apologetic. Their empty words fail to comfort the very people it harmed shows the world that blackness matters so little, that Black people must show humility in the face of blatant cruelty. BAFTA remains standing ten toes down on whiter ground— more so than the Oscars at times— and the events on Sunday and the glaring aftermath prove it. They care more about Davidson than the historically negative connotations of the hard n word.