The almost interminable awards season for the film industry has culminated with the extravaganza that is The Oscars. 

As those barely clad Golden Men get placed in homes and offices; and the designer finery is returned to wherever it was borrowed from, or carefully stored for fashion posterity; and the online snitty or charming chatter quiets, one might ask what is served by the subjective selection of what is the “best.”

It is beyond this writer’s ken (or Barbie) to grasp how—given the massive efforts of the filmmaking process, which requires the hard work of so many people, all with specialized skills and talents—how it’s possible to choose the “best” in any category.

And the process of “besting” reduces the kind of direct unfiltered engagement that films might engender. It is, admittedly, very entertaining in an extraordinarily superficial way. And that’s OK, except in that it contributes to our general mindset to make decisions based on choosing winners and losers.

The awards filter our choices, and how one wins, and another loses is no doubt part of the mystery of The Hollywood Industrial Complex. But how can one be objective when we are continually so assaulted by the subjective? 

It’s true in our politics too. And that is even more to the point, because the language of politics during the campaign is really about winners and losers.

Our 45th president embraced the word loser like it was a lightning bolt from Zeus, throwing it out at whoever he wanted to attack. And he hasn’t stopped, even as disgrace rises around him like the stink from a broken cesspool.

But loser-winner mentality generally permeates most politics. It’s personality politics, and often it feels a little bit like a really amped-up version of high school government elections. Who’s most popular?

In national election campaigns, power is pursued through fast passes and soundbites.  It’s fan culture, not civic culture, and it is often not civil.

As individuals, we have a choice both in popular culture and popular politics to not be guided by what’s purportedly “best,” but by making our own choices based on what we’re seeing and hearing and how that affects us.

It isn’t that hard when one turns off the blare issuing from The Hollywood Industrial Complex or The Political Industrial Complex.

And when we do, then we’re really free to make our own decisions about what might possibly be the best choice for what we view and for whom we vote.

Cynthia Nash lives in Milanville, PA.