Every year, award season comes around and embarrasses itself. From the Golden Globes in the beginning of January to the Academy Awards (commonly known as the Oscars) which usually takes place in March, there is a new scandal. This year’s Grammys take the cake for me, though. Who won song of the year(won by Bonnie Raitt) and how did Harry Styles win album of the year? No disrespect to either artist because their work was great and they deserved the nomination, but there are better options for both of these awards. This isn’t a stand-alone case, though. These award shows, especially the Grammys, have a history of making controversial and in my opinion wrong decisions about winners. 

Voting

First, it is important to recognize how the winners are chosen. In regards to the Grammys, winners are chosen by members of the Recording Academy. To ensure fairness, Academy members (fellow artists, producers, and more) are tied to a category in which they participate and vote in. In theory, this does make sense; who better to choose winners than people who pursue music for a living? Masters even uses similar logic in the concept of Community Council; peers recommending appropriate consequences for fellow peers. Currently, the Oscars follow a voting structure almost exactly the same as that of the Grammys. So why is it so faulty? There is no exact reason. The only reason that can be possibly attributed to this is personal bias or lack of knowledge on their section.  Nevertheless, something needs to be done to revamp this system. Only 12.4 million viewed the Grammys this year compared to 2012’s 39 million people, and for the Oscars 15.3 million watched in 2022. This is a 24 million drop in viewership compared to the 39 million in 2012.

Famous Mistakes

What truly demolishes my view of these awards are the snubs and notable losses. One perfect example of this is Macklemore beating Kendrick Lamar for Best Rap album in 2014. Macklemore’s album The Heist won five Grammys that year and deserves its flowers, but Kendrick Lamar’s Good Kid, Mad City is known as a generational storytelling album about Kendrick Lamar’s life growing up in Compton, California. Even Macklemore agreed that Lamar should have won the Grammy. “ You got robbed… It’s weird and sucks that they robbed you”. These are the exact words Macklemore sent over text.

On the Oscar side, one perfect example is one win in 11 nominations for legendary director Stanley Kubrick. He was nominated for 4 movies including Clockwork Orange, Doctor Strangelove or: How I Stopped Worrying and Love the Bomb, Barry Lydon, Full Metal Jacket and lastly Space Odyssey. His only win was Space Odyssey, in which he won Best Visual Effects. To make matters worse, Kubrick didn’t receive a nomination for any of his parts of The Shining. 

Lastly, the Golden Globes didn’t nominate the 2019 film Roma for Best Picture because there was a rule that non-English films couldn’t receive nominations in that category. In comparison, Roma was nominated for 10 and won three at the Oscars. They received a nomination for Best Picture at the Oscars but fell short. Thankfully they change this rule in 2022. This rule is a disgrace to all non-English language movies in the past and it is appalling to see how long it took for such a prominent body as the Hollywood Foreign Press Association to change this rule. 

What can these awards do better in the future? Well, the goal is to return to the glory days when viewership was the highest. Some controversy is alright, but only scenarios that don’t harm the reputation. What they should do is review the winners and overlook who can vote. After horrible voting, those people shouldn’t be able to vote again. Also, the glitz and glamor of iconic hosts and tributes made these events more special. I look forward to hopefully seeing the glory days return.