* Social media posts derail Oscar front-runners Gascon’s past posts damage Netflix’s ‘Emilia Perez’ Oscar hopes * Controversies affect multiple Oscar-nominated films this year * Oscar campaigns often involve personal and professional controversies By Dawn Chmielewski LOS ANGELES, – Netflix’s hopes for claiming an Academy Award for best picture appear to have vanished after a series of embarrassing social media posts resurfaced. The genre-bending musical crime drama “Emilia Perez” looked like the streaming service’s strongest shot yet at best picture after winning the jury prize at the Cannes Film Festival and garnering a total of 13 Academy Award nominations. But prospects for the movie dimmed after a journalist found and translated a series of Spanish-language posts, dating from 2016 through 2020. In them, the film’s Spanish star, Karla Sofia Gascon, described Islam as a “hotbed of infection for humanity” and George Floyd as a “drug addict swindler.” Social media amplified the story to global proportions. Gascon apologized, but the damage was done. “This is the year of somebody basically lighting themself on fire and taking …