The Emmy's Nod at Diversity is Framing, Not Action

In recent years, Hollywood award shows have sparked conversation about diversity –– and outrage about the lack thereof. This year’s Emmy’s broke records for diversity with the most diverse nomination pool ever. However, the Emmy winners were considerably less diverse. #EmmysSoWhite trended on Twitter once again. Sandra Oh was one actress whose Emmy loss caused outrage. Oh made history as the first Asian to be nominated for lead actress at the Emmy’s. When Oh lost, many argued that the Emmy’s used Oh to pretend to be diverse, giving the awards to the same white artists as usual. While these Emmy’s did break records for diversity, there is still a ways to go towards equal representation and recognition.

This story made me wonder if diversity to appease the public is right. The Emmy’s recognized they had a diversity issue, but seemed to do the bare minimum to fix that. The way the Emmy’s framed this award show hails diversity, boasting about the most diverse Emmys to date, but the whole story shows that these nominees may not be enough.