Natalie Portman Calls Out Sexism And Here Come The Mansplainers To Prove Her Point

Portman shames The Golden Globes for ignoring female directors

Natalie Portman became a true hero of the she-people last night at The Golden Globes when she called out the lack of female directors in the Best Director category with a jab so smooth, and so sharp that dudes were saying, “Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha oh shit I’m bleeding.”

Portman, who has spoken out in support of the #MeToo movement with her own stories of sexual harassment, came out on stage to present the award for Best Director with filmmaker Ron Howard. She didn’t mince words when it came to pointing out the obvious — that every nominee was a man.

Did she just–? Oh yes, she did. After Howard said, “We’re honored to be here to present the award for best director,” Portman stepped to the mic and said, “And here are the all-male nominees.”

Portman’s comment was in reference to the fact that all five nominees for Best Director were men despite some phenomenal work by female directors: there was Patty Jenkins, whose film Wonder Woman became the highest-grossing superhero origin movie of all time; Dee Rees, who directed the critically-acclaimed film Mudbound; Kathryn Bigelow, who directed the incredible movie Detroit; and Greta Gerwig, who was not nominated for directing even though her film, Lady Bird, was nominated for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Screenplay.

Many celebrated what Portman did:

But then, of course, there were some men who just had to get on Twitter and “dude it all up.” Unfortunately for them, their tweet complaints about Portman’s words only showed how justified she was in saying them:

You lost everyone at “that time of the month.”

You’re right, Steven Spielberg was not nominated for his penis (although I’m sure it’s spectacular and does a phenomenal job of combining technical mastery with commercial success). But when you look at the fact that, as Barbra Streisand pointed out, only one woman (Streisand) has ever won the Golden Globe for Best Director, and that was in 1984, you might start to think, “Wow. That’s an awful lot of talented penises.”

Oh, and p.s., Natalie: You earned those opportunities through talent and hard work.

And to add to the ridiculousness, some even mansplained why Portman was wrong in the comments of the below tweet, which explained why their criticism was wrong.

https://twitter.com/jetpack/status/950211851492589569

https://twitter.com/jetpack/status/950339053571977217

The old “no one from that group got those accolades because no one from that group deserved them” argument is tired and has been used to rationalize prejudice over and over again. When it’s one award one time, then you might be talking about the quality of the available candidates. But when it’s 99% of the awards, you need to start doing some critical thinking and consider the role of history in these decisions.

Natalie Portman, with the addition of just two words, didn’t just point out the bias, she spoke its name. And, what’s more, she did it to its face. What she did was brave, overdue, and appreciated. Therefore, we are going to give her the last word:

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