2024 is already a year to log in the record books. On January 7th, the Golden Globe Awards aired — a highly anticipated award show that reflects the past year in film and television.
With 2023 being an outstanding year in Hollywood with the releases of Barbie, Oppenheimer, Killers of the Flower Moon, and The Last of Us, there were bound to be some shocks during the ceremony. While there were many surprises this year, none of them were expected; the shocks that came were heavily due to the host of this year’s event – Jo Koy. Koy, a stand-up comedian, was bound to crack a few jokes, right? That he did. Jokes were made, but a majority would not consider them funny. These “jokes” were heavily rooted in sexism and targeted women in the audience. At the beginning of the awards ceremony, Koy made the comment, “Barbie is based on a plastic doll with big boobies,” after praising Barbie’s biggest competitor in theaters – Oppenheimer. The extremely misogynistic comment was a shock to all in attendance as well as viewers, due to Barbie’s major box office success.
Barbie’s message was explaining the basic principle of feminism in one of the most accessible ways imaginable. This record breaking film had audiences of all demographics intrigued from the very beginning. Barbie’s plot was not greatly explained in the trailers or press, this caused some confusion when it started playing in theaters over the summer. Because of Barbie’s major box office opening there was a lot of information about the movie circulating the globe through social media. The main theme that began to circulate was that of feminism. The way Barbie tackled ideas of feminism allowed many groups of people to find comfort in the once looked down upon brand. The brand Barbie was once looked down upon during the women’s rights movement because many women thought that the design of Barbie was unrealistic causing women to set unrealistic expectations for themselves. Because of this major shift in view of the brand, many successful men began to think that they were able to crack jokes about the now majorly successful global hit. The jokes made like those of Koy’s comments at the Golden Globes ended up just being outright sexist.
As sad as it sounds, there is no denying that sexism has always made its way onto the stages at these major events. Many award shows have taken steps to alleviate the issue of sexism, such as the Grammys going gender-neutral ten years ago and the MTV Movie and TV Awards following in their footsteps in 2017.
While much of the sexism happens during the awards portion of the show, much happens on the red carpet as well. Actress Ayo Edebiri was faced with sexualized questions about her male co-worker, Jeremy Allen White’s, viral Calvin Klein campaign. During the interview conducted by Access Hollywood, Edebiri expresses that people have to understand that White is her co-worker.
None of this would have happened in a perfect world, but let’s face it – the world is far from perfect. This year’s Golden Globe Awards ceremony is a perfect representation of what not to do. Hopefully, in the future, these mistakes will not happen. It is our job as informed individuals to call out the misogyny we see, even on the biggest stages.