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Spike Lee Joins Oscars Boycott Over Lack of Diversity

#OscarsSoWhite

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Megan Vick

Spike Lee is putting the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag into action by announcing his boycott of the Academy Awards on Monday. The acclaimed director, who received an honorary Oscar at the Governor's Awards in November, announced on Instagram that he'd be skipping the ceremony next month due to the Academy nominating no people of color in any of its four major acting categories for the second year in a row.

"We cannot support it and [I] mean no disrespect to my friends, host Chris Rock and producer Reggie Hudlin, president [Cheryl Boone] Isaacs and the Academy," Lee wrote. "But, how is it possible for the second consecutive year all 20 contenders under the acting category are white? And let's not even get into the other branches. Forty white actors in two years and no flava at all. We can't act?! WTF!!"

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Lee goes on to explain that the root of the problem is that there are even fewer minorities behind the camera in Hollywood than in front of it. Until there are people of color in power positions at studios, then the Oscars' diversity problem will continue.

"People, the truth is we ain't in those rooms, and until minorities are, the Oscar nominees will remain lilly white," Lee wrote. "It's easier for an African-American to be President Of The United States than be president of a Hollywood studio." His full message, attached to a photo of Martin Luther King Jr., is below.

Lee, who made similar remarks in his Governors Awards speech, isn't the first one to suggest boycotting the Oscars. Jada Pinkett Smith brought up the idea on Facebook on Saturday after her husband Will was passed over for his role in Concussion.

At the Oscars...people of color are always welcomed to give out awards...even entertain, but we are rarely recognized...

Posted by Jada Pinkett Smith on Saturday, January 16, 2016

Straight Outta Comptonproducer Will Packer also had strong words for the Academy when the critically acclaimed biopic of N.W.A. only received a screenplay nomination for its four white screenwriters - Jonathan Herman, Andrea Berloff, S. Leigh Savidge and Alan Wenkus.

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"The reason the rest of the world looks at us like we have no clue is because in 2016 it's a complete embarrassment to say that the heights of cinematic achievement have only been reached by white people," Packer wrote. "I repeat -- it's embarrassing. It's unfair to the performers of color who sacrificed so much, laid it all on the line AND DELIVERED with their projects this year."

I want to congratulate all of the Academy Award nominees. These people are quite deserving of being recognized as the...

Posted by Will Packer on Friday, January 15, 2016

Will the boycott wake up the Academy?

The Oscars air Sunday, Feb. 28 at 8:30 p.m. ET / 5:30 p.m. PT on ABC.