The interview Gary Oldman did in this month's Playboy reveals an eminently reasonable man who has been able to maintain a solid perspective on life despite having one of the most successful careers in the motion picture business.
But we live in an age where every professional special interest group in the western world is on a constant lookout for some cause of outrage to gripe about and use to try to justify their existence.
Oldman came to Mel Gibson's defense, not for the preposterous statements good ol' Mad Max made about Jews a few years back, but for the massive overreaction and hypocrisy about the backlash. But that was enough to cause some of the self-serving "Official Jews" to drool over the chance to force a celebrity into obeisance to them.
Let's keep in mind that Gary Oldman has nothing against Jews. But more to the point, the repercussions of the Mel Gibson incident were outlandish beyond all proportion. For one thing, Gibson was raised by by a father whose brand of extremist, weird Catholicism has been denounced by every Pope for the last four decades, so it's probably safe to assume that some of that must have permeated his psyche. But nonetheless, prior to the 2006 incident, Gibson was hardly known for being some sort of closet neo-Nazi. The most important thing to keep in mind about Gibson's anti-Jewish rant was that he was plastered out of his mind on tequila when it happened.
I'm a firm believer in the in vino veritas principle that alcohol reveals the real you, so Gibson may have, as a result of his upbringing, some underlying belief that what he said was true. But Gibson has never actively promoted antisemitsm, and again, because I can't emphasize this enough, he was totally blotto on cactus juice. While I may not have raved about international Zionist conspiracies to traffic cops under the influence, speaking as someone who has been the victim of large quantities of Mexico's most popular export on more than one occasion, I can verify that it can easily lead to getting into some fucked up situations.
And just so you know, I'm going to tell a little tale out of school so that you realize that I'm not the only supporter of Israel and Jews who feels this way about Mel Gibson.
Back around 2007 or so, I was involved in talks about making a documentary about the Dead Sea Scrolls, and there were some discussions with some fairly senior Israeli government officials participating in it. It occurred to me that having someone like Mel Gibson's company involved could be a useful thing. Gibson's Icon Productions is one of the most proficient production companies in Hollywood and it would give Gibson a chance to show the sort of proper atonement he seemed to want to demonstrate. When I mentioned getting Gibson involved to the Israelis, there was a brief pause as I could see the wheels turning at the unexpected suggestion.
The most senior Israeli official in the room responded, saying that he had absolutely no problem with Mel Gibson being involved. As it turned out, the project didn't go forward, but there's an important reminder in this story to consider. Out of all the enemies in the world that Israel and the Jewish people face these days, it isn't Mel Gibson that gives the people who have to fight real Jew hate and terrorism any concern.
It's the puffed up Official Jews, sitting comfortably in their offices in Beverly Hills and Manhattan, making salaries well into six figures, who can afford the time and stupidity to try to cast innocuous celebrities as the Haman of the week. Meanwhile, Canada has a state broadcaster which thinks promoting anti-Israel propaganda is part of its mission statement and the US has a Secretary of State who is selling Israel down the river to its enemies. Yet they manage to escape the ire of North America's well-paid Official Jews. Because taking on real threats isn't something the Abe Foxmans and Bernie Farbers of this world have the balls to do.
And the thing about Gibson's drunken slur is that it came after at least an entire year of being accused of being an "anti-semite" for making a movie based precisely on the Christian Gospels. People tend to forget that fact when they talk about Mel. He'd been run through the wringer by just about every rabbi in the U.S. for having made a simple movie. These rabbis were going on, and on, and ON about how if that movie comes out, pogroms will follow. It'll be the Third Reich all over again, by gosh! He couldn't get distribution, paid for the whole thing himself, had his name and intentions dragged through the mud -- and only THEN, and while totally drunk, did he make a comment about "the Jews," whose official leaders had been tormenting him for a year.
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