Michael Moore becomes latest celeb to address Hollywood's diversity gap.
"This is absolutely wrong."
Hollywood has a white male filmmaker problem.
Just ask white male filmmaker Michael Moore.
Photo by Rob Kim/Getty Images.
He played the numbers game to prove an important point about the people who make our movies.
And, as we all know, numbers are hard to argue with (because facts).
Across last year's top 100-performing films, just 1.9% were directed by women.
As The Hollywood Reporter noted, Moore threw out a sobering stat on Oct. 4, 2015, during a Q&A session at the New York Film Festival: A measly 1.9% of Hollywood's top-grossing movies were directed by women in 2014.
He got that (downright embarrassing) figure from a recent study by USC's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, which annually examines diversity in Hollywood.
Chart via USC's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism.
"This is absolutely wrong," Moore said, noting he's benefited from a broken system that favors those who look like him. "This is the most liberal of all industries, when you use the word 'industry' in this country, and for it to be so shamelessly white and male?"
“I'm not saying that just because I'm a liberal making a politically-correct statement; I'm saying it as a filmgoer and audience member. I'm missing out on her story. Their stories. That person. When you block out whole groups of film by that cinema, what are the great films that you and I are missing because their great voices can't be heard? I want to go to that movie. I want to hear that voice. I'm being denied that voice by a system that's sent out to give the reins to white men."
The good news is, Moore isn't alone in demanding that Hollywood evolve to better reflect the society it portrays.
The industry's diversity gaps are making waves right now, with several Hollywood heavyweights chiming in.
But not everyone's two cents have been well-received.
Viola Davis by Mark Davis/Getty Images. Emma Watson by Gerard Julien/AFP/Getty Images. Matt Damon by Niklas Halle'n/AFP/Getty Images.
After becoming the first black woman to win an Emmy for best actress in a drama series last month, Viola Davis used the historic moment to point out the lack of opportunity women of color face in Hollywood. Emma Watson spoke out against sexism in the industry just last week, pointing to her own career to prove change is needed. (Of the 19 films she's acted in, only two have been directed by women.)
And Matt Damon threw in his two cents, too — although interrupting a successful black female director to explain what she gets wrong about diversity probably wasn't the best approach to the issue — and he's certainly caught a fair amount of the flak because of it.
With all of this chatter about Hollywood's white male problem, is anything getting better?
In short, yes — there are hopeful signs we're making progress on the diversity front.
That USC report I noted earlier? It points to "encouraging" signs that women are taking on (and finding success in) more influential roles in Hollywood — take, for instance, the slew of female-led flicks that have killed it at the box office this year.
The cast of "Mad Max: Fury Road," a film with a feminist storyline that featured women in prominent roles and dominated the box office earlier this year. Photo by Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images.
And in May 2015, the ACLU called for an investigation into gender discrimination within the film industry, which may be looked into by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission this month. Depending on how that investigation is handled, some serious shake-ups in the way Hollywood does business could be unfolding soon.
In the meantime, you can help push the industry forward.
Support projects by and starring women. Stay educated on the daunting realities that persist for women (as well as people of color and those who are LGBT) in the industry. And speak up when a loved one pulls a Matt Damon and says something about inclusion that just ... doesn't add up. Your voice — and the movie you choose to see in theaters this weekend — does make a difference.
A Generation Jones teenager poses in her room.Image via Wikmedia Commons
An office kitchen.via 
An angry man eating spaghetti.via 
An Irish woman went to the doctor for a routine eye exam. She left with bright neon green eyes.
It's not easy seeing green.
Did she get superpowers?
Going to the eye doctor can be a hassle and a pain. It's not just the routine issues and inconveniences that come along when making a doctor appointment, but sometimes the various devices being used to check your eyes' health feel invasive and uncomfortable. But at least at the end of the appointment, most of us don't look like we're turning into The Incredible Hulk. That wasn't the case for one Irish woman.
Photographer Margerita B. Wargola was just going in for a routine eye exam at the hospital but ended up leaving with her eyes a shocking, bright neon green.
At the doctor's office, the nurse practitioner was prepping Wargola for a test with a machine that Wargola had experienced before. Before the test started, Wargola presumed the nurse had dropped some saline into her eyes, as they were feeling dry. After she blinked, everything went yellow.
Wargola and the nurse initially panicked. Neither knew what was going on as Wargola suddenly had yellow vision and radioactive-looking green eyes. After the initial shock, both realized the issue: the nurse forgot to ask Wargola to remove her contact lenses before putting contrast drops in her eyes for the exam. Wargola and the nurse quickly removed the lenses from her eyes and washed them thoroughly with saline. Fortunately, Wargola's eyes were unharmed. Unfortunately, her contacts were permanently stained and she didn't bring a spare pair.
- YouTube youtube.com
Since she has poor vision, Wargola was forced to drive herself home after the eye exam wearing the neon-green contact lenses that make her look like a member of the Green Lantern Corps. She couldn't help but laugh at her predicament and recorded a video explaining it all on social media. Since then, her video has sparked a couple Reddit threads and collected a bunch of comments on Instagram:
“But the REAL question is: do you now have X-Ray vision?”
“You can just say you're a superhero.”
“I would make a few stops on the way home just to freak some people out!”
“I would have lived it up! Grab a coffee, do grocery shopping, walk around a shopping center.”
“This one would pair well with that girl who ate something with turmeric with her invisalign on and walked around Paris smiling at people with seemingly BRIGHT YELLOW TEETH.”
“I would save those for fancy special occasions! WOW!”
“Every time I'd stop I'd turn slowly and stare at the person in the car next to me.”
“Keep them. Tell people what to do. They’ll do your bidding.”
In a follow-up Instagram video, Wargola showed her followers that she was safe at home with normal eyes, showing that the damaged contact lenses were so stained that they turned the saline solution in her contacts case into a bright Gatorade yellow. She wasn't mad at the nurse and, in fact, plans on keeping the lenses to wear on St. Patrick's Day or some other special occasion.
While no harm was done and a good laugh was had, it's still best for doctors, nurses, and patients alike to double-check and ask or tell if contact lenses are being worn before each eye test. If not, there might be more than ultra-green eyes to worry about.