Picking up from yesterday –
We left off with:
- What do you do with bullies?
There are people in a camp that bullies should get physical punishments – that kids should punch someone on the playground to lay down the law or whatever. I don’t personally agree with that, but if we frame it as Will ‘fighting back against a bully’, there are some people who think that’s appropriate.
Since I don’t think it’s appropriate – and since I don’t think Rock is the bully, more of just a representation of how much people have been on the Smith family’s butt extra recently – if for a second, we entertain the idea that Will is being bullied (no matter who the bully is), what is his ‘correct’ response then?
Obviously there were lots of responses. While Rock became this symbol of so many other things, in that moment, he didn’t have to be that. Had Will let the joke roll off his back, I don’t think anything Chris Rock said would’ve gotten twirled up in everything.
But since all that did happen… it’s like… I don’t know who people want Will Smith to be. Some people thought it was very ‘attractive’ that he was aggressive and ‘stood up for his wife’. I don’t think that.
But people also make fun of him if he just takes all the insults hurled at him/his family.
So yes, there were lots of different things he could’ve done in that moment. But overall, there’ve been so many times where he’s kind of been damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t. He’s supposed to be a kind, loving, empathetic man. But also, not take any crap. But also not be mean…
Like, it’s just a lot. I think we ask a lot of Will Smith. And I think we’re SUPER mean to mean whose wives sleep with someone else, as though that somehow makes them less than, when oftentimes it doesn’t have to be a reflection of them at all.
And while I know probably no one cares about this as much as I do, I’ll finish this out tomorrow.