The Atlantic

The 'Only' Profession to 'Celebrate What It Means to Live a Life'

In another strange sign of the mounting culture wars, Viola Davis’s emotional Oscars tribute to artists has become political fodder.
Source: Danny Moloshok / Reuters

Yesterday I praised Viola Davis’s Oscars speech for being memorable without being explicitly political—for simply talking about her job in a moving and well-written way. Twitter quickly let me know I missed something. On social media and conservative-leaning news sites, Davis’s speech had in fact sparked outrage.

After explaining that she felt her mission was to “exhume … the stories of the people who dreamed big and never saw those dreams to fruition, people who fell

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