Thread: Academy Awards 2015

Read Stephen Hawking's Touching Words for Winner Eddie Redmayne
The Hollywood Reporter Ashley Lee - 1 day ago


In this Tuesday, Dec. 9, 2014 file photo, Professor Stephen Hawking, right, and cast member Eddie Redmayne arrive at UK premiere of "The Theory of Everything"

Stephen Hawking had some great words of kindness for best actor winner Eddie Redmayne.

The physicist shared a Facebook message following the victory for James Marsh's The Theory of Everything, in which Redmayne portrays him opposite Felicity Jones and Charlie Cox.

"Congratulations to Eddie Redmayne for winning an ‪#‎Oscar‬ for playing me in The Theory of Everything Movie," reads Hawking's Facebook post on Monday morning. "Well done Eddie, I'm very proud of you."

At the podium, Redmayne said while visibly overwhelmed, "I'm fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS. It belongs to one exceptional family: Stephen, Jane and the Hawking children. I will be his custodian. I will be at his beck and call. I wait on him hand and foot."


Eddie Redmayne accepts the award for best actor in a leading role for “The Theory of Everything” at the Oscars on Sunday, Feb. 22, 2015, at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles. (Photo by John Shearer/Invision/AP)
http://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/osca...yne/ar-BBhT3TP

Not sure if you watched the entire Academy Awards show on Sunday (I fell asleep somewhere after Lady Gaga sang), but you may have heard about rapper Common and John Legend’s impassioned comments about “justice” when they accepted their Oscar for Best Song.

While they mentioned gender, sexual orientation and the struggle for democracy in Hong Kong, the flavor of their comments was the terrible injustice being meted out to black Americans to this day



In their speech, Legend cited some facts, which were troubling on the face of it, but also troubling because they are twisted to promote a specific narrative.

“There are more black men under correctional control today than were under slavery in 1850.”

According to the 1850 Census, out of a total US population of 23 million, about 3 million were slaves. Of those, about 870,000 were black males above the age of 15.

Via Politicfact, according to the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, there were 526,000 black men serving time in state or federal correctional facilities in 2013, plus 877,000 on probation and 280,000 on parole. So if you add all those numbers up, you get to 1.68 million. Yes, that is more than the number of black slaves in 1850.

However, the numbers are really meaningless when you look at those numbers in terms of total population.

The 1850 census recorded about 3 million “colored people” (free and enslaved) in the U.S. The 870,000 figure represents 29 percent of the total colored population.

There are currently about 41 million black Americans. Even with 1.68 million under correctional control, that represents just four percent of the total black population. Just four percent compared to 29 percent in chains.

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http://allenbwest.com/2015/02/common...-oscar-speech/