Latest
from Michael Moore Tuesday, April 8, 2003 My
Oscar "Backlash": "Stupid White Men" Back
At #1, "Bowling" Breaks New
Records IT appears that the
Bush administration will have succeeded in
colonizing Iraq sometime in the next few
days. This is a blunder of such magnitude
-- and we will pay for it for years to
come. It was not worth the life of one
single American kid in uniform, let alone
the thousands of Iraqis who have died, and
my condolences and prayers go out to all
of them. So, where are all those weapons of mass
destruction that were the pretense for
this war? Ha! There is so much to say
about all this, but I will save it for
later. What I am most concerned about right
now is that all of you -- the majority of
Americans who did not support this war in
the first place -- not go silent or be
intimidated by what will be touted as some
great military victory. Now, more than
ever, the voices of peace and truth must
be heard. I have received a lot of mail
from people who are feeling a profound
sense of despair and believe that their
voices have been drowned out by the drums
and bombs of false patriotism. Some are
afraid of retaliation at work or at school
or in their neighborhoods because they
have been vocal proponents of peace. They
have been told over and over that it is
not "appropriate" to protest once the
country is at war, and that your only duty
now is to "support the troops. " Can I share with you what it's been
like for me since I used my time on the
Oscar stage two weeks ago to speak out
against Bush and this war? I hope
that, in reading what I'm about to tell
you, you'll feel a bit more emboldened to
make your voice heard in whatever way or
forum that is open to you. When "Bowling for Columbine" was
announced as the Oscar winner for Best
Documentary at the Academy Awards, the
audience rose to its feet. It was a great
moment, one that I will always cherish.
They were standing and cheering for a film
that says we Americans are a uniquely
violent people, using our massive stash of
guns to kill each other and to use them
against many countries around the world.
They were applauding a film that shows
George W. Bush using fictitious
fears to frighten the public into giving
him whatever he wants. And they were
honoring a film that states the following:
The first Gulf War was an attempt to
reinstall the dictator of Kuwait;
Saddam Hussein was armed with
weapons from the United States; and the
American government is responsible for the
deaths of a half-million children in Iraq
over the past decade through its sanctions
and bombing. That was the movie they were
cheering, that was the movie they voted
for, and so I decided that is what I
should acknowledge in my speech. And, thus, I said the following from
the Oscar stage: "On behalf of our producers
Kathleen Glynn and Michael Donovan
(from Canada), I would like to thank
the Academy for this award. I have
invited the other Documentary nominees
on stage with me. They are here in
solidarity because we like non-fiction.
We like non-fiction because we live in
fictitious times. We live in a time
where fictitious election results give
us a fictitious president. We are now
fighting a war for fictitious reasons.
Whether it's the fiction of duct tape
or the fictitious 'Orange Alerts,' we
are against this war, Mr. Bush. Shame
on you, Mr. Bush, shame on you. And,
whenever you've got the Pope and the
Dixie Chicks against you, you're time
is up." Halfway through my remarks, some in the
audience started to cheer. That
immediately set off a group of people in
the balcony who started to boo. Then those
supporting my remarks started to shout
down the booers. The Los Angeles
Times reported that the director of
the show started screaming at the
orchestra "Music! Music!" in order to cut
me off, so the band dutifully struck up a
tune and my time was up. (For more on why
I said what I said, you can read the op-ed
I wrote for the Los Angeles Times
plus other reaction from around the
country at my website) The next day -- and in the two weeks
since -- the right-wing pundits and radio
shock jocks have been calling for my head.
So, has all this ruckus hurt me? Have they
succeeded in "silencing" me? Well, take a look at my Oscar
"backlash": - On the day after I criticized Bush
and the war at the Academy Awards,
attendance at "Bowling for Columbine"
in theaters around the country went up
110% (source: Daily
Variety/BoxOfficeMojo. com). The
following weekend, the box office gross
was up a whopping 73% (Variety). It is
now the longest-running consecutive
commercial release in America, 26 weeks
in a row and still thriving. The number
of theaters showing the film since the
Oscars has
INCREASED, and
it has now bested the previous box
office record for a documentary by
nearly 300%.
- Yesterday (April 6), "Stupid White
Men" shot back to #1 on the New York
Times bestseller list. This is my
book's 50th week on the list, 8 of them
at number one, and this marks its
fourth return to the top position,
something that virtually never
happens.
- In the week after the Oscars, my
website was getting 10-20 million hits
A DAY (one day
we even got more hits than the White
House!). The mail has been
overwhelmingly positive and supportive
(and the hate mail has been
hilarious!).
- In the two days following the
Oscars, more people pre-ordered the
video for "Bowling for Columbine" on
Amazon. com than the video for the
Oscar winner for Best Picture,
"Chicago. "
- In the past week, I have obtained
funding for my next documentary, and I
have been offered a slot back on
television to do an updated version of
"TV Nation"/ "The Awful Truth. "
I tell you all of this because I want
to counteract a message that is told to us
all the time -- that, if you take a chance
to speak out politically, you will live to
regret it. It will hurt you in some way,
usually financially. You could lose your
job. Others may not hire you. You will
lose friends. And on and on and on. Take the Dixie Chicks. I'm sure you've
all heard by now that, because their lead
singer mentioned how she was ashamed that
Bush was from her home state of Texas,
their record sales have "plummeted" and
country stations are boycotting their
music. The truth is that their sales are
NOT down. This
week, after all the attacks, their album
is still at #1 on the Billboard country
charts and, according to Entertainment
Weekly, on the pop charts during all the
brouhaha, they ROSE
from #6 to #4. In the New York Times, Frank
Rich reports that he tried to find a
ticket to ANY of
the Dixie Chicks' upcoming concerts but he
couldn't because they were all sold out.
... Their song, "Travelin' Soldier" (a
beautiful anti-war ballad) was the most
requested song on the internet last week.
They have not been hurt at all -- but that
is not what the media would have you
believe. Why is that? Because there is
nothing more important now than to keep
the voices of dissent -- and those who
would dare to ask a question --
SILENT. And what
better way than to try and take a few
well-known entertainers down with a pack
of lies so that the average Joe or Jane
gets the message loud and clear: "Wow, if
they would do that to the Dixie Chicks or
Michael Moore, what would they do to
little ol' me?" In other words, shut the
f--- up. And that, my friends, is the real point
of this film that I just got an Oscar for
-- how those in charge use
FEAR to manipulate
the public into doing whatever they are
told. Well, the good news -- if there can be
any good news this week -- is that not
only have neither I nor others been
silenced, we have been joined by millions
of Americans who think the same way we do.
Don't let the false patriots intimidate
you by setting the agenda or the terms of
the debate. Don't be defeated by polls
that show 70% of the public in favor of
the war. Remember that these Americans
being polled are the same Americans whose
kids (or neighbor's kids) have been sent
over to Iraq. They are scared for the
troops and they are being cowed into
supporting a war they did not want -- and
they want even less to see their friends,
family, and neighbors come home dead.
Everyone supports the troops returning
home alive and all of us need to reach out
and let their families know that. Unfortunately, Bush and Co. are not
through yet. This invasion and conquest
will encourage them to do it again
elsewhere. The real purpose of this war
was to say to the rest of the world,
"Don't Mess with Texas - If You Got What
We Want, We're Coming to Get It!" This is
not the time for the majority of us who
believe in a peaceful America to be quiet.
Make your voices heard. Despite what they
have pulled off, it is still our
country. Michael
Moore www.
michaelmoore. com
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