A slap at the Oscars given by Will Smith to Chris Rock has created a moral dilemma: Was violence justified? 

It all started when Rock, the host of the event, made a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith, Will Smith’s wife. The spark that lit the fire was the line “Jada, love you, GI Jane 2, can’t wait to see it.”

For context: Pinkett has alopecia which has caused her to lose all of her hair. GI Jane is a war movie starring Demi Moore as the titular character, a bald Navy Seal. After Rock cracked the joke, the camera panned to Mr. Smith, laughing at the joke. However, Ms. Smith did not seem amused. She put on a sarcastic smile before turning to the side, rolling her eyes. 

Rock tried to move on from the joke, however, Mr. Smith charged toward the stage. Rock then said “uh-oh” before Smith walked up to him and slapped him in the face. Hard. Smith went back to his seat, and started screaming at Rock to, “keep his wife’s name out of your mouth.”

A few moments later he went back on stage after winning an Oscar. There, he made a teary-eyed apology for the incident.

“I thought that it was unprofessional of him to slap him in a serious setting like the Oscars,”, said sophomore Leandra Obando. 

Considering that the Oscars is such a professional event, and Rock is the host this year, he should have some sort of security while on the stage. It is mind blowing that he could get physically assaulted on national television without being protected or with any repercussions to Smith. It’s run by a major entertainment company, and Rock is one of the most well known and respected comedians of all time. 

However, some say that Rock takes some blame in this. “Chris Rock probably shouldn’t have made that joke,” said senior Gabriela Danger, “but Will Smith didn’t need to go up in the middle of an awards show to hit him.”

On the other hand, Rock may not have even known that Mrs. Smith suffers from alopecia in the first place. To me, it was obvious that he didn’t have bad intentions. However, the pair do have history in regards to offensive jokes at awards shows. In 2016, Mrs. Smith didn’t attend the Oscars in protest against the lack of African-American nominations, and Chris Rock joked that she “wasn’t invited” anyway. 

A couple of days after the incident, he wrote in an Instagram post “I would like to publicly apologize to you, Chris. I was out of line and I was wrong. I am embarrassed and my actions were not indicative of the man I want to be.”

Earlier this week, Mr. Smith officially resigned from the Academy.