The entertainment media had a field day last March when Will Smith slapped comedian host Chris Rock on stage at the Academy Awards.
The Mother of All Desultory Award Shows for once wasn’t so dismal.
All kidding aside, what happened shouldn’t have been allowed to happen. Smith (or anybody else) should have been barred from the stage regardless of the optics.
The event was already marred. Don’t worry about the video and still photographs. Protect the presenter.
Almost DailyBrett and the rest of the world just learned that author Salman Rushdie was repeatedly stabbed Friday immediately before a literary panel discussion. Before that former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot and killed July 8 at a public appearance.
All of these events and countless others (e.g., political assassinations), regardless of the severity of the violence, beg the same question: ‘Where’s the security?’
As a press secretary/campaign press director for eight years for the most well know Armenian public official on the planet, former California Governor George Deukmejian, everyone on our staff never forgot/never had to be reminded about the always broiling Turkish-Armenian dispute over the 1915 genocide.
Joining the Deukmejian Campaign Committee in early 1982, your author distinctly remembers reporters asking then-Attorney General Deukmejian, if he “understood” the sentiments behind the murder of Turkish Consul General Kemel Arikan by the Justice Commandos for the Armenian Genocide.
It was a trap question.
Deukmejian declared forcefully and categorically there was zero justification for cold-blooded murder. Almost DailyBrett never needed to be reminded of the sensitivity of this issue considering that Turkey — unlike Germany — to this day has never admitted its responsibility for the genocide against 1 million Armenians.
Tears were shed in the governor’s office each April 24, the Armenian Day of Remembrance.
Against this backdrop, your author naturally left it to the California State Police to provide for the governor’s safety, but was always ready to advise and help. One of the jobs of the press secretary and our advance team was to ensure and guarantee the environment for the governor was always under our control.
Accredited members of the media were encouraged to report the governor’s news conferences, briefings and public events. Ersatz reporters were shown to the door. News conferences were well covered, but not by people who had zero business being there.
Outside of 1982 direct debates (Deukmejian vs Mike Curb and Deukmejian vs Tom Bradley), other voices did not participate in our carefully controlled events. They had their pontification and bloviation opportunities, and that’s the way it should be.
As the director of Corporate Public Relations for publicly traded LSI Logic, Almost DailyBrett still insisted upon control of the environment in which our founder/CEO Wilf Corrigan was speaking and presenting.
Regardless of the job — politics, trade association, corporate, agency, university — your author has always insisted on control, and more importantly security for any public appearance.
The World Is A Dangerous Place
The 1988 author of “The Satanic Verses,” Salman Rushdie, recently made the decision to live a normal life.
He is now in intensive care, fighting for his life after multiple knife wounds. Where was security?
After decades of hiding because of Iran’s fatwa and the offering of a $3 million bounty for the death of Rushdie, the author concluded the coast was clear. There were no bag searches or magnetometers Friday. He was not accompanied by security.
Iran apparently doesn’t forget.
Can we provide 100 percent guarantees when it comes to control, and more importantly personal safety? No one thought one of the movie legends sitting in the audience at the Academy Awards would attack a presenter on stage. Why would someone do that?
Chris Rock ended up with a smarting cheek from a hard hand slap. Next time could be worse unless and until The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences gets more serious about security and yes, controls its environment.
The same applies to every other organization.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-62532200
(Almost) DailyBrett 