White Gold Logies Racism

#LogiesSoWhite: Outrage Over Gold Logie Noms Reinforces White Preference On Aussie TV

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Attacks against Waleed Aly and Lee Lin Chin as Gold Logie nominees fail to hold any merit and are simply racist, writes Tara Watson.

Over the last 20 odd years, a non-white person has never been nominated for a Gold Logie. That will change this year – and twofold.

As it was announced on Sunday, two contenders in this years ‘Most Popular Personality’ category are SBS’s Lee Lin Chin and The Projects Waleed Aly, joining colleague Carrie Bickmore, hosts Grant Denyer and Scott Cam, along with actress Essie Davis.

While the majority of people are rejoicing at the rather late exclusion of a more diverse nomination pool, there are those that have disproportionately and unprecedentedly attacked the inclusion of Aly and Lee Lin.

Yesterday, The Daily Telegraph published an article ‘The Logies: ‘Embarassing’ Gold nominees get poor reception from television industry’ that suggested that certain ‘industry insiders’ were against the inclusion of the non-white nominees, stating: “The Logies are an embarrassment. It is a complete joke”. However, these ‘insiders’ were not named.

Regarding Lee Lin they said:

“Lee Lin Chin has developed a huge cult following on social media and that seems to have got her the nomination… you have to wonder how many of those people who voted for her actually watch SBS World News.”

This somehow negates that social-media campaigns for Logie winners is a new thing. Maybe they should ask themselves how Karl Stefanovic took the gold in 2011?

Regarding Aly, the ‘insider’ said:

“What has Waleed ever done? Because he does an editorial slapping someone down every now and then, does that qualify him for a Gold Logie? And is The Project successful? No.”

The argument saying The Project isn’t successful therefore Aly shouldn’t be nominated is particularly problematic. No one had a problem with host Carrie Bickmore being nominated four times before for the show, which she won the Gold Logie for last year- which was wholly supported and celebrated.

Adding fuel to the fire, in their emerging campaign against Aly, today The Daily Telegraph published a list entitled ‘Six reasons why Waleed Aly should not win gold’ by Victoria Hannaford. This included some fairly trivial reasoning, at one point she appears to blame the demise of The Verdict on Ally, she goes on to say that Leigh Sales is better – as if they couldn’t have both been included.

Hannaford says that Aly’s views are biased, read: opposite to the views of The Daily Telegraph, and that he is not popular, which is comically contradictory to the format of the competition which is vote-based. She also somehow concludes that Aly has been nominated simply for being non-white and Muslim, rather than his intellect.

Basically, it’s a nonsensical article that doesn’t make any valid arguments against Aly as a nominee. The article is so legit bonkers, people have started speculating it’s all a parody, but sadly it seems for real.

Since the article was posted, #IStandWithWaleed has started trending, with even Lee Lin giving her voice to the controversy.

Certain attack points that will fail to hold water is the reputation of Lee Lin and Aly.

Lee Lin Chin has been working in Australia as a news-reader and journalist since the 1980’s, working for SBS since 1992 and she is the first SBS presenter to ever be nominated for the award.

Yes, she has become increasingly popular in the last few years due to her social media presence, but this doesn’t take away from her dedicated years working within the media.

A reminder also that this is a publicly voted ‘Most Popular Personality’ award so ultimately, there’s no grounds for dispute.

While Aly has been a television presence for years, often called upon for his insights from being head of public affairs at the Islamic Council of Victoria. On the ABC, he hosted Big Ideas and appeared on the panels of countless other shows, before joining The Project. As a journalist, he has contributed to countless media outlets and won a Walkey Award in 2005.

Furthermore, Aly’s The Project segments ‘Something we should talk about‘ have become viral sensations at home and abroad, with topics explored ranging from ISIL to climate change and domestic violence. His ‘ISIL is weak’ monologue has since clocked over 30 million views and was a refreshing and uniting force in the aftermath of the Paris terrorist attacks, a speech that awarded him a Quill Award, along with co-writer Tom Whitty.

They are two truly deserving parties. Especially so, when reflecting back on prior years nominees and winner.

Home and Away soapie actors and actresses are regular nominees and winners. Hamish Blake won a Gold Logie in 2012, and in 2013 and 2015 both the radio presenters Blake and Andy Lee were nominated. While Blake and Lee may be hilarious and wonderful humans, the majority of their body of the work springs from radio, rather than on television – where they would do a single yearly travel mini-series.

Nominee Scott Cam has already won the gold in 2014, for merely hosting a renovation show The Block – or arguably just for simply being a typical white Aussie bloke.

What is even more puzzling is that little to no attention has been called to the first-time inclusion of Grant Denyer as a Gold Logie nominee. Denyer is the host of Family Feud, and has only work on game shows and weather forecasting to his name.

Yet somehow, a Walky Award-winning journalist and one of Australia’s oldest news veteran are the odd ones out?

Further attention was drawn to the two non-white nominees as Today’s Karl Stefanovic said he was surprised co-host wasn’t nominated, joking “Lisa’s too white,” with Lisa Wilkinson quipping back “I got a spray tan and everything and still didn’t make it”. Wilkinson has since apologised for the misjudged and disrespectful joke.

https://twitter.com/nakkiahlui/status/717497960716566528

At last year’s awards ceremony, actress and Larrakia woman Miranda Tapsell used her acceptance speech to encourage more diversity on Australian TV, telling showrunners to:

“Put more beautiful people of colour on TV,” she said. “Connect viewers in ways which transcend race and unite us,” she said.

Yet, when given diverse faces to choose from, people are crying out that these people are out of step with the Australian television industry at large – which is majority white.

That’s the crux of the problem. We should really be scratching our heads as to why the two, especially Lee Lin, have not been nominated sooner.

The Logie Awards aren’t exactly the most respectable accolades. It is basically a glorified popularity contest.

But it is a democracy – open to all – and it gives the people what they want.

They want Waleed Aly and Lee Lin Chin.