That’ll teach me to advertise my website.

No sooner do I email a link to my friend, Jeff, than he’s posting comments pointing out my egregious (some might say legally actionable) errors that I made, all in the name of an innocent, wholesome, cheap shot at an otherwise perfectly upstanding celebrity. It seems he’s quite right. Despite all the mud-slinging to the contrary, media testimonies by the ill-informed, and content within the film itself that seemed to indicate otherwise, Renée Zellweger’s character in Cold Mountain was never supposed to be black. I, quite naturally, never bothered to confirm this fact one way or the other because, after all, that would require a modicum of work and the sacrifice of a couple of underhanded japes.

What’s next? Am I going to sit through The Passion of the Christ only to find out it’s not anti-Semitic? That’ll be a bummer.

This stubborn controversy, which has relentlessly dogged eyestrainproductions.com for as much as two hours now, only serves to stir up many other issues. More important issues. Issues which will, hopefully, divert attention from my very public fuck up. Namely, what’s the world coming to when you can’t believe vicious, unfounded rumours? Just because people base their libel and innuendo on facts they’ve never read for themselves shouldn’t mean that I should have to do any research to back up my own libel and innuendo.

If there’s one thing that living through this particular juncture in history has taught me, it’s the vital importance of not checking your facts. Facts only lead to uncertainty, debate, and balanced judgments, and we can’t have that. Too many facts, and before you know it you’re likely to lose all sorts of support for your unfounded war, your paranoid witch hunt, or your racist persecution of a visible minority. And then where would we be? Back in the jungle my friends, back in the jungle.

The upshot of all this is that ultimately, no, Renée Zellweger did not win an Oscar for shamelessly overacting a character that was supposed to be black, she won an Oscar for shamelessly overacting a character that was just as daisy white as her.

But…but…that still doesn’t make her British, okay?