{"id":198560,"date":"2026-08-23T03:51:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T03:51:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/198560\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T03:51:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T03:51:08","slug":"mark-ruffalo-rejects-paramount-claim-anti-merger-comments-antisemitic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/198560\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Ruffalo Rejects Paramount Claim Anti-Merger Comments Antisemitic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tMark Ruffalo<\/a> is rejecting Paramount<\/a>\u2018s claim that his recent comments highlighting the role Larry Ellison\u2019s Oracle played in the Israel-Gaza war were \u201cantisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe accusation that I am antisemitic is appalling and fundamentally dishonest,\u201d Ruffalo wrote on X Saturday morning<\/a>. \u201cCriticizing the actions of the Israeli prime minister, a military technology contract or the executives who supply it is not the same as criticizing Jewish people. This critical and necessary dialogue is then dishonestly framed as being anti-Israel.\u00a0To be clear, my views come from my own political convictions and should never be interpreted as hostility toward Jewish people, for whom I have deep love and respect.\u00a0Everything I know about acting, activism and humanism has been profoundly shaped by the Jewish friends, colleagues and loved ones who have been integral and family throughout every point of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tRuffalo, a staunch opponent to Paramount\u2019s $111 billion deal for Warner Bros.<\/a>, had recently shared on social media a clip from 2024 of former Oracle chief Safra Catz talking about \u201cprofoundly scary technologies\u201d Oracle had built as Catz was speaking about Oracle\u2019s tech in relation to the Israel-Gaza war. Ruffalo went on to call the war a \u201cgenocide\u201d that \u201cwas built on an apartheid system of oppression powered by Oracle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHe added in his Instagram story that these \u201cprofoundly scary technologies\u201d \u201cwill most likely be merged into one of the largest media conglomerates in the world\u201d and criticized the planned Paramount-WB merger, saying moguls \u201care crushing workers and consolidating the wealth of the world for their own power and concentrated dominance.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tParamount issued a lengthy reply<\/a> in which the company called for the temperature of the debate to be lowered and called Ruffalo\u2019s remarks \u201cantisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe are, as always, troubled when antisemitic tropes are invoked in purported service of a business dispute,\u201d the Paramount rep stated. \u201cWords like \u2018genocide\u2019 and \u2018apartheid,\u2019 applied to a corporate transaction, aren\u2019t just wrong \u2014 they\u2019re a bridge too far, and they cheapen the very real suffering those words are meant to describe. This doesn\u2019t deserve a response in kind \u2014 and to be clear, we don\u2019t tolerate prejudice of any kind, against anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tParamount added, \u201cWe understand people feel strongly about this merger and are hopeful and expect that it will be judged based on the legal merits, not underlying bias. We\u2019re asking for the same good faith we\u2019re extending: less rhetoric, more understanding. Paramount\u2019s future is being written for everyone who wants to make and watch great stories.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn his response Saturday, Ruffalo sought to make a distinction between his objections to the Israeli military and his views about the Jewish people. <\/p>\n

\n\tHe also argued that the merger \u201chas real consequences for real people and for the entire country\u201d and deserved serious scrutiny, particularly given what the deal would mean for control of CNN, HBO and other Warner Bros. assets.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cScrutinizing the Ellisons, including Oracle\u2019s business built on data, surveillance technology and government contracts and the serious threat to editorial freedom and the loss of a livelihood for thousands of families, is fair and necessary,\u201d Ruffalo wrote. \u201cThe $111 billion deal would hand one family control over CNN, HBO and Warner Bros., backed in part by foreign money whose influence on editorial decisions has never been fully explained to the public. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have called for serious national security review, and regulators still haven\u2019t given the public a real answer. Until they do, the merger shouldn\u2019t move forward.\u00a0Now is the time to dive boldly into all these issues, not step back or concede.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn his Instagram story about Oracle\u2019s \u201cprofoundly scary technologies,\u201d Ruffalo mentioned the ongoing antitrust lawsuit filed by 12 attorneys general, which Paramount said last week is the only thing stopping the deal from being done<\/a>, now that the merger has been cleared by all global regulators. Still a number of officials, including California Governor Gavin Newsom<\/a>, Attorney General Rob Bonta<\/a>, California Democratic gubernatorial candidate Xavier Becerra<\/a> and L.A. mayor Karen Bass<\/a>, have expressed support for settlement talks, which Newsom said Friday were happening \u201cin real time.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mark Ruffalo is rejecting Paramount\u2018s claim that his recent comments highlighting the role Larry Ellison\u2019s Oracle played in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":198561,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[167],"tags":[813,47137,6946,4379],"class_list":["post-198560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-larry-ellison","tag-larry-ellison","tag-mark-ruffalo","tag-paramount","tag-warner-bros"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@people\/117142793931349136","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198560\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/198561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/people\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}