This is it: Oscar Viewing Party time, aka the gay Super Bowl (you’d think the Tony Awards would be the gay Super Bowl, but no one cares about musicals unless they’re on live TV and you can hate-tweet them). This is the one night where dad movies like Bridge of Spies and The Martian square off against mom movies like Brooklyn and Room. Now, going in, you must accept that the Oscars are inherently stupid. The actual best movies and performances are never honored. Alfred Hitchcock never got one and neither did Johnny from Airplane! (the single greatest performance yet put on celluloid). Seriously, how do you not give THIS an Academy Award?

The Oscars are about the film industry patting itself on the back for self-congratulatory safe choices like The Danish Girl and anything Jennifer Lawrence does, and as such they should be treated with the same reverence you’d give a child’s beauty pageant. So we’re here to present you with the keys to ensuring that your Oscar party brings home the gold.

1. Invite Bitches

I can’t imagine an Oscar party without an eye-rolling, truth-telling bitch. When some self-serious documentarian is accepting their award on behalf of all endangered wildebeasts, someone at your party HAS to make fun of their hair! If no one is cracking jokes during the ceremony, then what’s the point of even having a party, to spend time with close friends? Fuck that! Everything during the ceremony is up for grabs for mockery: the dresses, that terrible Sam Smith song from Spectre, etc. Here’s a free “In Memoriam” joke that you can claim as your own: “Shouldn’t they have listed Bill Cosby’s career? That died last year too!” You’re welcome!

2. Invite Someone Who’s Into It

This is the person who will shush everyone for talking during an acceptance speech for Best Sound Editing (my money’s on Matthew Wood for Star Wars: The Force Awakens, that sound was really edited!) This actually happened to me at an Oscar party: a friend and I were in the kitchen, noshing, and we got shushed because THE Halle Berry was speaking. God forbid anyone miss a second of that noted wordsmith. Needless to say, we ramped up our obnoxiousness and had a great time! You need someone like this shusher because your guests will need someone to hate and it’s not going to be the host!

3. Food & Drink

For God’s sake, have food and drink. And if you’re vegan, that’s great and I respect your choice, but if I go to another party where the only food is hummus I’m going to firebomb a Whole Foods. It’s also fun to have thematic snacks. Like a “Revenant Rape Bear Claw” or “Spotlight Roaming Priestfingers” (a modified ladyfinger). And don’t forget the booze! Your guests should be pickled by the end of the four-hour ceremony. It’s the only way to endure the goddamn thing. Speaking of Spotlight, look at how proud they are of making an IMPORTANT film:

Gross.

4. Decorations

Don’t decorate. That’s just so desperate and sad. What are you going to do, raid Party City’s “Silver Screen” aisle? Have a modicum of taste and tidy up, that’s enough. Though if you don’t have time to clean just say you were inspired by The Martian and that’s why everything is so dusty. But hey, how about everyone stops critiquing your cleanliness and goes off on Best Actress nominee Charlotte Rampling’s tone-deaf comments on race?

Did you know that Prometheus is better than The Martian?

5. Talk About Racism

Speaking of Charlotte Rampling’s tone-deaf comments on race, the Oscars are all about their own racism this year! All-white acting nominees! Jada Pinkett-Smith’s threatened boycott (you do not want to endure the wrath of Jada “Fish Mooney” Pinkett-Smith!) So read up on some of the facts so you can sound informed. This year, I won’t shut up about how Jason Mitchell’s performance as Eazy E in Straight Outta Compton should have been nominated. You can use that one too, or mention Tangerine, Creed, or Samuel L. Jackson in Hateful Eight. How does garbage like The Martian get nominated? We live in an unjust world (this is the only real takeaway from watching the Oscars).

6. Gamble

You know what people love more than drinking? Gambling! Have an Oscar pool. But come up with more interesting things to bet on that who’s going to win the awards. Bet on things like how many people will thank God in their acceptance speech or how many women will be prettier than Eddie Redmayne. When host Chris Rock makes a joke about how the acting nominees are all white, will the show cut to a reaction shot of a black or white person? Or maybe they’ll split the middle and show an Asian! (not that there are any Asians nominated, but the producers will probably fly one in).

7. Watch Something Terrible as a Palate Cleanser

No doubt all your guests are worn out by the end of the ceremony. There’s no way they couldn’t be! So give everyone something to wind down to, like a previous Best Picture winner and garbage-fest like Crash! It will seriously put everything in perspective. Seriously, look at this clip:

Hooray for Hollywood!

Sources: Independent, Phactual, Open Road Films, 20th Century Fox, Universal Pictures, Deadline