Indigenous Actress Lily Gladstone Deserves the Oscar for Best Actress

Actress Lily Gladstone has just made history. This year, she became the first Indigenous person to win the Golden Globe award for Best Actress - and the first Native American woman to be nominated for Best Actress by the Oscars.

This is a beautiful and momentous achievement. When the 96th Oscars ceremony is held on Sunday, March 10, the Academy must build on this groundbreaking occasion by correctly awarding the Oscar to Gladstone!

Hollywood has long utilized racist tactics and relied on dehumanizing stereotypes when it comes to Native Americans and other Indigenous people. For decades, film houses chose to cast white actors instead to fill roles for Indigenous characters, relying on brown-face and other offensive practices.

On top of that, the Oscars and other prestigious awards have spent generations locking actors of color out of receiving these top honors recognizing their accomplishments - bestowing these favors on white actors instead.

Now, it's time for the Oscars to show that it is taking steps to address its discriminatory past. One way to do that is by acknowledging how phenomenal Gladstone's work has been.

Gladstone is being recognized and celebrated for her role in the film Killers of the Flower Moon, about a real-life series of murders in the 1920s. During this Reign of Terror, white men targeted Native Americans and killed them out of greed, in order to access oil and other mineral rights in Oklahoma.

Awarding her the Oscar would not only highlight her incredible work as an artist and commend the achievements of Indigenous actors, but it would also bring increased attention to what Native American communities have endured for generations.

That's why we're calling on the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to award the Oscar for Best Actress to Lily Gladstone! This is its chance to make an impactful decision - and correctly highlight someone whose talent deserves to be in the spotlight.