Roseanne no more
May 29, 2018 11:13 AM Subscribe

Roseanne is cancelled after Roseanne Barr compared Obama White House adviser Valerie Jarrett to an ape. Earlier, Wanda Sykes had already announced she wouldn't return.
posted by MartinWisse (450 comments total) 60 users marked this as a favorite

Hooray for consequences!
posted by impishoptimist at 11:16 AM on May 29, 2018 [187 favorites]

Right on.
posted by y2karl at 11:18 AM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Barred from television.
posted by emelenjr at 11:18 AM on May 29, 2018 [16 favorites]

Now give National Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show.
posted by all about eevee at 11:19 AM on May 29, 2018 [137 favorites]

One of the few things that makes me happy these days is seeing some shithead racist get their comeuppance.
posted by aramaic at 11:19 AM on May 29, 2018 [73 favorites]

Wow. This was swift and unexpected.
posted by nubs at 11:20 AM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

Fox News talkshow announcement in 3... 2...
posted by seanmpuckett at 11:21 AM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

This is good.

I love everyone in the cast. I loved the original show. I totally have heart eyes for Sara Gilbert, who worked so hard to make this happen and gets so little credit (which, in retrospect, might be a good thing). But I refused to watch this travesty and support Barr in any way.

But, why not just ditch Barr, rename it The Conners and give the fans what they really want? It's not like that's never happened before in the history of television.
posted by Ruki at 11:21 AM on May 29, 2018 [93 favorites]

Nice.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 11:21 AM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Pretty amazing to learn that there was a line after all, and all her previous statements were on the acceptable side.
posted by BungaDunga at 11:21 AM on May 29, 2018 [104 favorites]

something something economic insecurity something white working class something
posted by wibari at 11:21 AM on May 29, 2018 [9 favorites]

Roseanne is another one of those millionaire conspiracy theorists peddling "down-to-earth" racist politics, of course, and by accounts this incarnation of her show reflects that, though it's worth noting it's fucked up in other ways: ‘Roseanne’ Advocating Spanking Betrays Everything The Show Used To Stand For
posted by Artw at 11:22 AM on May 29, 2018 [23 favorites]

Now give American Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show.

And Sara Gilbert.
posted by y2karl at 11:22 AM on May 29, 2018 [48 favorites]

hahahahahahhahaha!

oh wait, I should make a more intelligent nuanced statement.

hahahahahahhahaha!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 11:22 AM on May 29, 2018 [33 favorites]

@THEsaragilbert:

This is incredibly sad and difficult for all of us, as we’ve created a show that we believe in, are proud of, and that audiences love— one that is separate and apart from the opinions and words of one cast member.

"Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln..."

Meanwhile, in a pattern all too familiar when right-wing abusers have been caught out, the offender asks why we all don't realize it was just a funny funny joke.
posted by hangashore at 11:23 AM on May 29, 2018 [30 favorites]

I loved the original show. How did things turn out this way?
posted by all about eevee at 11:24 AM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Under Twitter's "Trends for you" sidebar section it has listed:

Roseanne
ABC cancels Roseanne following star's controversial comments

Holy shit, fuck off.
posted by ODiV at 11:24 AM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Sara Gilbert's reaction to the tweets is good at least. Shame for her and the rest of the cast indeed.
posted by Quindar Beep at 11:24 AM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

"I am shocked—shocked—to find that ~~gambling~~ racism is going on ~~in here~~ with the racist person we hired!" - ABC
posted by mikepop at 11:25 AM on May 29, 2018 [17 favorites]

@ChuckWendig: I swear if Roseanne ends up president in six years I'll shit actual bees
posted by zombieflanders at 11:25 AM on May 29, 2018 [93 favorites]

Pretty amazing to learn that there was a line after all, and all her previous statements were on the acceptable side.

There is no line other than what their commercial sponsors will tolerate.
posted by dilaudid at 11:26 AM on May 29, 2018 [22 favorites]

Well, in the wake of this, the country is going to have another clear, easy pass-fail test that a distressing number of people are going to fail abjectly.
posted by the phlegmatic king at 11:26 AM on May 29, 2018 [39 favorites]

She didn't quit twitter for very long did she?
posted by RolandOfEld at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I told y’all about Roseanne. I told you. So.
posted by JoeZydeco at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018 [18 favorites]

At least CNN is calling it what it is. "ABC cancels 'Roseanne' after star's racist Twitter rant"

Now of course she'll be a martyr for The Cause and Trump will say shes's a good person or some nonsense.
posted by bondcliff at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018 [13 favorites]

I'm not surprised. I didn't exactly see this coming, but at this point it's no longer shocking to me when you scratch a Trump supporter to reveal a virulent racist.

I have some friends who really wanted this to turn out differently, because of how much the original show meant to them. They wanted to believe that Roseanne was ... I don't know, mistaken? Like their Trump-supporting aunt who was hoodwinked by the economic rhetoric, but isn't really a racist, just you know, ignorant, and "old-fashioned" ... like everyone's aunts in those NYT pieces that travel to Trump country to "get to know" Trump supporters...

I'm disappointed that I'm never going to be able to watch the old show without thinking about how she turned out to be such a shithead.

On the other hand, I wonder when people will stop insisting that we take white Trump supporters at their word when they say it's not about race. How many people have to reveal that yeah, it is about race, before the plausible deniability goes away?

(I suspect this isn't the first time she's been clearly racist, but a lot of people - including me - don't keep up with celebrity news, so...)
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018 [27 favorites]

Kinda glad I sat out on the revival.

Kinda glad I'm still sitting out on Twitter.
posted by Capt. Renault at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018 [20 favorites]

Whew now I don't feel any desire whatsoever to watch the new season.
posted by Dressed to Kill at 11:27 AM on May 29, 2018

Been waiting for the wheels to come off since I first heard the show was a go. Was not disappointed. Meaning, disappointed beyond words at the stupidity of it all.

She wasn't the culture warrior the right wanted. But she's the culture warrior the right deserves.
posted by 2N2222 at 11:29 AM on May 29, 2018 [26 favorites]

Welcome to the free market place of ideas, Roseanne.
posted by codacorolla at 11:29 AM on May 29, 2018 [48 favorites]

I'm reminded of the "ESPN hires Rush Limbaugh" fiasco from a decade ago. How did they think this was going to end?
posted by NoxAeternum at 11:29 AM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

'Roseanne' Criticized for 'Black-ish' and 'Fresh Off the Boat' Joke

"We missed all the shows about black and Asian families," Dan noted, seemingly referencing fellow ABC sitcoms Black-ish and Fresh Off the Boat. That's when Roseanne offered this response:

“well their leads didn’t get them cancelled by being belligerent racist assholes like I did.”
posted by Artw at 11:30 AM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

Poor Ben Shapiro. What's he going to say now?

Ben Shapiro DECONSTRUCTS Roseanne: THE LIE ROSEANNE TELLS
posted by philip-random at 11:30 AM on May 29, 2018

I understand the desire to bring the show back, because the original show was so good, and because there's such a dearth of working-class or middle-class families in sitcoms these days -- but geez Louise, anyone who's paid a scrap of attention to Roseanne in the last 20 years knows that's she's gone hella racist and has zero filter and it's way beyond "provocative comedian sometimes crosses the line" and into "whoa, this is not a person who should be given a platform under any circumstances."

It's mystifying to me that Disney green-lighted this in the first place, given that Roseanne's public racist meltdown was totally inevitable and Disney now gets that grossness on their brand.

(Also, PS, if you want a great current working-class sitcom, go watch Netflix's One Day at a Time reboot. <3 <3 <3)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:32 AM on May 29, 2018 [66 favorites]

Ruki: "But, why not just ditch Barr, rename it The Conners and give the fans what they really want? It's not like that's never happened before in the history of television."

Sandy Duncan is still around.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:32 AM on May 29, 2018 [33 favorites]

"The writer Roxane Gay tweeted: 'I told y’all about Roseanne. I told you. So.'"

Narrator: She did tell them.
posted by octobersurprise at 11:32 AM on May 29, 2018 [46 favorites]

The show was just as racist, except they couched it in 'bothsiderism'. In the last episode, a middle eastern family bought a bunch of fertilizer and Rosanne was accusing them of making bombs, even though making bombs with fertilizer was a white people thing. Of course the family also bought groceries with an EBT card, so naturally the racist nonsense of "they are stealing our jobs/they are lazy" was again on full display as they are on EBT for food & diapers but can buy endless amounts of fertilizer off Amazon accidentally.
posted by The_Vegetables at 11:33 AM on May 29, 2018 [12 favorites]

Good for ABC. That was a very clear and unambiguous statement. "...abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values." There's no room for misinterpretation there.
posted by zarq at 11:34 AM on May 29, 2018 [12 favorites]

Now give American Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show.
>And Sara Gilbert.

Meh, aside from the crew (Go gaffers!) everyone involved in this who didn't get out when they had the chance can go piss up a rope.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 11:34 AM on May 29, 2018 [44 favorites]

@JoshMalina: There is now a 1/2 hr opening in ABC's schedule for "David Rosen: Funny-looking Ghost Lawyer."
posted by zarq at 11:34 AM on May 29, 2018 [18 favorites]

What happened to Roseanne in 1998 to make her like this?
posted by all about eevee at 11:34 AM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Now give National Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show

.. or just have John and Laurie walk out of the shower together, giggling, and it turns out Roseanne was just a bad dream the whole time.
posted by CynicalKnight at 11:34 AM on May 29, 2018 [48 favorites]

I can't be the only one who never even remotely saw her appeal. Her voice was whiny and grating, even in her standup. She made obscene gestures while singing the national anthem. She posed as Hitler in a photo shoot. And I can't tell whether her family was dysfunctional before she was in it. The only good thing from the original show is all the alumni working together in Big Bang Theory.
posted by Melismata at 11:36 AM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

I wouldn't have guessed back then that Tom Arnold would turn out to be the more acceptable one.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:36 AM on May 29, 2018 [160 favorites]

There was much sudden, shocked discussion of this where I work, and because we're in the TV biz people here know a lot of people that were on the show. The general consensus, apparently, is "why would ABC kill such a big hit?" but it's being made alongside a lot of "but what she said was horrible" statements. It's an uneasy balance for people who aren't me, because I used to provide IT support from Roseanne and her company and I can't figure out how she got anybody to put this mess back on the air in the first place.

Somebody tried the "isn't she bipolar" bit, and I pointed out that lots of my family are bipolar and none of us go around saying black people are apes, so they can take that excuse and shove it.
posted by curiousgene at 11:37 AM on May 29, 2018 [107 favorites]

She posed as Hitler in a photo shoot.

what
posted by zarq at 11:37 AM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

I can't be the only one who never even remotely saw her appeal.

Speaking from personal experience: You aren't.
posted by RolandOfEld at 11:38 AM on May 29, 2018 [30 favorites]

Okay, this weekend my husband and I watched half an episode of the old show. He loved it back in the day, but I was neutral. Within five minutes Roseanne was screaming at Dan for something inane and pointing out how wrong he was and how she was always right.

At that point, my husband looked at me and said, "Oh I get it now. The reason I liked this show was that it was like my home life. Don't need the PSTD flashbacks now." And he switched the channel.
posted by teleri025 at 11:38 AM on May 29, 2018 [28 favorites]

First Dr. Huxtable, and now Rosie Conner.

America owes a big apology to Al and Peg Bundy, the 1980s TV parents we should have been upholding as role models all along.
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:38 AM on May 29, 2018 [256 favorites]

*speechless*
posted by zarq at 11:39 AM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Roseanne as Hitler.
posted by elsietheeel at 11:39 AM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

From the snopes link: "Roseanne asked to dress up as Hitler for the spread, as she believes (or at least jokingly said that she believes) that she may be the reincarnation of the Führer himself"

This was 9 years ago, well before the current "joke".

It's great that ABC reacted quickly but this was hardly surprising. (That said --- while they _should_ have done much better, it says a lot about the country today that I'm genuinely quite surprised they cancelled the show today --- I don't know how the balance of those two feelings works out for me).
posted by thefoxgod at 11:42 AM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

I can't be the only one who never even remotely saw her appeal.

No, I never did see the appeal, but enough others did that during the shows first run I learned to shrug and say "not my taste". This revival, however, made no sense to me because it seemed incredibly apparent in the intervening years that she was beyond just obnoxious.

Anyways. What's the betting line on her getting a job at Fox, or the show's rights being grabbed up by another network?
posted by nubs at 11:42 AM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Well, the only thing I'm surprised was ABC not coming with long-winded excuses and claiming the showrunners and the network are not represented by this blah blah blah but telegraphic and the equivalent of saying "you know what, we're done, now fuck off". I hope they keep it that way. Even the rest of the cast can well give their excuses and explain why they joined the project knowing very well this was bound to happen.
posted by lmfsilva at 11:43 AM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Belligerent asshole sends racist tweet. The only surprise is that a tv network decided it was intolerable. Good for ABC. go figure.
posted by theora55 at 11:47 AM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

... or just have John and Laurie walk out of the shower together, giggling, and it turns out Roseanne was just a bad dream the whole time.

Bad dream or not, I refuse to visualize this nightmare scenario.
posted by y2karl at 11:47 AM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

The best, funniest moment from the original show has zero to do with Roseanne.
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 11:48 AM on May 29, 2018 [23 favorites]

Now give National Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show

Yeah, as I said in a deleted comment in the megathread, why are we giving Metcalf, Gilbert, and Goodman passes for their complicity in this? (Same for Wanda Sykes). None of them need the money, fame, or job.
posted by TwoStride at 11:48 AM on May 29, 2018 [37 favorites]

Dictionary.com says it out loud while Merriam-Webster just goes shady.
posted by Etrigan at 11:48 AM on May 29, 2018 [28 favorites]

> all about eevee:
"Now give National Treasures Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman their own show."

AfterRosie?
posted by rhizome at 11:49 AM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

This was 9 years ago, well before the current "joke".

She's Jewish and this was in a Jewish publication.

Other than that, I honestly have no idea how to characterize it. What can one possibly say about her dressing up like Hitler and putting gingerbread Jews in an oven?

Snopes transcribed the section of the Provenza video where they talk about it. Roseanne: It’s like a Jewish woman. And She’s dressed up like Hitler. And he’s in drag. Hitler. And he’s baking cookies. And he’s really proud of them. But he’s also looking off into the horizon because he has a dream. It was for Heeb magazine. It was their Germany issue. And who better a symbol of Germany than Hitler?

Provenza: What did your detractors have to say?

Roseanne: Oh my god. You don’t want to piss off Jews. Even if you’re a Jew, don’t piss off Jews. All Jews hate each other.

Provenza: Jews went crazy over this. Understandably.

Roseanne: I don’t think understandably. It really pissed me off. Because they were like “you’re making fun of the people in the ovens,” but I’m not making fun of people in the ovens.

Patrice O’Neal: You kind of are though. The only thing worse would have been if you made the cookies skinny.

Roseanne: There’s another, deeper layer to it. You know just the everyday. Moving off this Holocaust. There’s been about fifty of them since then. That’s what I’m kind of trying to say. Is like, Jesus Christ it’s so fucking every day now, holocausts, it’s like baking cookies.

Provenza: Were you not aware that that’s not what people would be thinking?

Roseanne: I don’t give a fuck what people think. I care what people do. I don’t care what they think. That’s what I’m trying to say. Let’s stop holocausts. When I did The Star Spangled Banner — let’s care about freedom, instead of symbols of freedom for a fucking change. You know what I mean, I don’t know. I’m just really old. When you’re post-menopausal, you’re just really crazy.

posted by zarq at 11:49 AM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

Today is a good day.
posted by freakazoid at 11:50 AM on May 29, 2018

(Also, PS, if you want a great current working-class sitcom, go watch Netflix's One Day at a Time reboot. <3 <3 <3)

And if you want to support Wanda Sykes, watch Talk Show the Game Show, which she's also a producer on (bonuses: Guy Branum! Karen Kilgariff!).
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 11:51 AM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

There's not nearly enough of this sort of comeuppance in the world these days.

But I got a good laugh out of the way my comment feeds went from "Why is ABC taking so long to issue a statement about this?" to "Wow, that was fast!" in an instant.
posted by Flexagon at 11:52 AM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

there's such a dearth of working-class or middle-class families in sitcoms these days.

Watch Bob's Burgers. Superb show.
posted by Pendragon at 11:52 AM on May 29, 2018 [97 favorites]

Feeling bad about liking the original Roseanne is the new feeling bad about liking the Cosby Show.
posted by rikschell at 11:53 AM on May 29, 2018 [13 favorites]

there's such a dearth of working-class or middle-class families in sitcoms these days.

I just watch reruns of King of Queens.
posted by freakazoid at 11:53 AM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

go watch Netflix's One Day at a Time reboot

WAIT WHAT OMG THANK YOU!!
posted by Melismata at 11:54 AM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

ABC was perfectly willing to pull an episode of Black-ish for talking about protests at the NFL...

Not surprising. ABC and the NFL have been tightly joined at the hip for longer than most MeFites have been alive. One mustn't jest at the bottom line, afterall.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:55 AM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

She's Jewish and this was in a Jewish publication.

Sorry. I should clarify.... what I mean by this is outsiders and maybe other Jews? might have given her a pass because she's Jewish and it was being printed in a Jewish magazine. Or perhaps they'd compare her to Mel Brooks or something.
posted by zarq at 11:55 AM on May 29, 2018

I did love the old Roseanne show. It was one of the only shows in that era that felt anything like what my blue-collar upbringing was like.
posted by octothorpe at 11:56 AM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

It can also be argued that Jake and Amy (although Amy seems to have a better financial planner than Jake, arguably a very low bar) are middle-class on one of the more diverse sitcoms on network now, Brooklyn 99.
posted by Mogur at 11:57 AM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

I just watch reruns of King of Queens.

I have an inordinate amount of affection for Are you Being Served?, troubled though it may be at times. John Inman as Mr. Wilberforce Clayborne Humphries never fails to entertain or distract even on the bazillionth watch. Insofar as I've even done an AskMe here about how the class issues relate, or did during the time, in that show, it's a doozy to me.
posted by RolandOfEld at 11:58 AM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

Wow. Did not think this would happen. Glad it did. Cue the whining about suppressing of edgy radical thought from the people who didn't have doodly to say about the new NFL rules in: 3...2...1...
posted by praemunire at 11:58 AM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

As a backstagey guy, I really feel for the rest of the cast and crew who aren't giant bags of shit. I have enough work to have been able to turn down many gigs on shows I don't want to work for, but I also know that many people don't. Worse, some people probably gave up other good jobs to jump over to this show thinking it might be on for a while. A bunch of people woke up this morning with jobs who now are unemployed, through absolutely no fault of their own.
posted by nevercalm at 11:59 AM on May 29, 2018 [65 favorites]

Serious question because I never really followed her, was Rosanne one of the many people who basically went far right wing insane after 9/11, or did her descent into the pits of right wingery start for a different reason?

Short version: she hates the Clintons. And Obamas. And the Bushes.

See: How Roseanne Barr Abandoned All Reason and Embraced the Alt-Right
posted by zarq at 12:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

It was one of the only shows in that era that felt anything like what my blue-collar upbringing was like.

For me it was like the set (wallpapers, couches, throws, TV, amount of dirt, kitchen status, etc) all was spot on, but the writing was too shouty or something. I could never put my finger on why it wasn't as good as the other shows, that were similar like Sanford and Son I must admit, that I did like.
posted by RolandOfEld at 12:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

It can also be argued that Jake and Amy (although Amy seems to have a better financial planner than Jake, arguably a very low bar) are middle-class on one of the more diverse sitcoms on network now, Brooklyn 99.

Yeah, sorry but cops don't count as part of the working class.
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [28 favorites]

It can also be argued that Jake and Amy (although Amy seems to have a better financial planner than Jake, arguably a very low bar) are middle-class

Top base salary for an NYPD detective (a lot of them do a lot of OT) is around $87K. They probably don't/didn't earn the top but they certainly do pull overtime, so that's not an insane number to use. A two-person household earning almost $175K...well...in NYC there's an argument for that's being middle class, but it's certainly upper-middle. Take off $25K and you're still doing pretty well, especially with a pension.
posted by praemunire at 12:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

Google 'ABC feedback' and thank them. The racist ghouls and conspiracy whack jobs are gonna put their two cents in; might as well try to nudge the scales back in the other direction a bit.
posted by Sing Or Swim at 12:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

go watch Netflix's One Day at a Time reboot

Plus it has the amazing Rita Moreno:

@therealroseanne, you break my heart -- You are a sorry excuse for a human being. How odd that you, as a comedienne, have forgotten then meaning of a "joke" and a personal comment. Your meanness is staggering and will earn you a ticket to a sad, lonely and sorry life.
posted by bibliowench at 12:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [66 favorites]

The best, funniest moment from the original show has zero to do with Roseanne.

I would love to see John Goodman just get his own sitcom already..
posted by zarq at 12:04 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I tried so hard to watch one day at a time but the laugh track made it unbearable.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:04 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

@gilbertjasono:
LAST MAN STANDING, S7, E1

TIM ALLEN: Hey everyone! Look who moved in next door!
ROSEANNE [after thirty full seconds of canned applause]: Michelle Obama runs a pedophile ring
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:07 PM on May 29, 2018 [58 favorites]

"go watch Netflix's One Day at a Time reboot
WAIT WHAT OMG THANK YOU!!"

We squeed about it in Fanfare even, come join us!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:08 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

Before the last election I would have been shocked to see a former Green Party candidate coming out as a bigoted troll like this...
posted by Trinity-Gehenna at 12:09 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

ICM has dropped Roseanne as a client.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:11 PM on May 29, 2018 [34 favorites]

Well, almost 30 years ago, Valerie Harper quit (wasn't fired) from her eponymous family sitcom "Valerie" after two seasons and the show went on, first as "Valerie's Family", then as "The Hogan Family", so there is the possibility of a similar resolution, but that totally depends on how much of "Roseanne" is owned by Roseanne. So, probably not likely.

The other possibility is for Fox, which just revived Tim Allen's totally sexist "Last Man Standing" will give it the timeslot right after... which will open up some dilemmas for everyone decent still associated with the show.
posted by oneswellfoop at 12:12 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

RolandOfEld: " It was one of the only shows in that era that felt anything like what my blue-collar upbringing was like.

For me it was like the set (wallpapers, couches, throws, TV, amount of dirt, kitchen status, etc) all was spot on, but the writing was too shouty or something. I could never put my finger on why it wasn't as good as the other shows, that were similar like Sanford and Son I must admit, that I did like."

My family was way more shouty than the Conners.
posted by octothorpe at 12:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

So fast. Oh man. This morning I saw it on the newsfeed and thought: there's yet another Trumpist showing her ass, and we'll just have to smell it until this whole wave comes crashing down. But here are some real consequences -- before COB!
posted by Countess Elena at 12:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

More re: ICM: "We are all greatly distressed by the disgraceful and unacceptable tweet from Roseanne Barr this morning. What she wrote is antithetical to our core values, both as individuals and as an agency," the agency wrote in an internal note to all employees. "Consequently, we have notified her that we will not represent her. Effective immediately, Roseanne Barr is no longer a client."
posted by zarq at 12:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [20 favorites]

Part of me really does hope that she gets the help she needs.

You don't want to know about the other part.
posted by delfin at 12:15 PM on May 29, 2018 [23 favorites]

I wouldn't have guessed back then that Tom Arnold would turn out to be the more acceptable one.

~~Samuel Butler~~ I once wrote that it was "very good of God to let ~~Carlyle~~ Tom and ~~Mrs Carlyle~~ Roseanne marry one another, and so make only two people miserable instead of four".
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:17 PM on May 29, 2018 [12 favorites]

Remember that she's also a TERF. Since that came out, I've been deeply unenthused.

It's sad and gross and I'm deeply ashamed that this kind of discourse gets tolerated at the national level, as it has since the election of Obama, but at least for once someone smacked it down.
posted by Frowner at 12:17 PM on May 29, 2018 [38 favorites]

I tried so hard to watch one day at a time but the laugh track made it unbearable.

It took me a little while, but eventually I stopped noticing it. Although now that you've mentioned it it's all that I can hear (and I happen to be rewatching One Day at a Time right now).

Also Roseanne was the Peace and Freedom party candidate for President in 2012.
posted by elsietheeel at 12:18 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Ugh how did I miss that she's a TERF too?
posted by elsietheeel at 12:19 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Seconding Bob's Burgers as the best working-class family sitcom on TV right now. Don't skip it just because it's animated - it has so much heart and compassion.
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:20 PM on May 29, 2018 [52 favorites]

I tried so hard to watch one day at a time but the laugh track made it unbearable.

I was crushed recently when I tried to go back and rewatch Third Rock from the Sun and the laugh track was so aggravating to me that I had to turn it off. It's like my brain has been rewired over the past decade-odd and now I just can't tolerate them.
posted by showbiz_liz at 12:23 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

Jared Holt has compiled a selection of tweets from various right wing media figures who have spoken out in support of Barr and her racist tweet.
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:25 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Okay, I just googled TERF and seriously!?

*insert ASCII art of flipping table
posted by darkstar at 12:25 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

If anyone's looking for a really great TV show about a working class family, might I suggest Queen Sugar?
posted by palomar at 12:26 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

I knew she had said something that outed her as a TERF at some point, but I didn't know until now how horrifying her attitudes and statements have been.
posted by zarq at 12:26 PM on May 29, 2018 [12 favorites]

Remember that she's also a TERF ...

And a QAnon-er and a Birther and a Soros-is-running-the-World-er, etc. Roseanne Barr is like a Pokémon trainer for shitty ideas.
posted by octobersurprise at 12:27 PM on May 29, 2018 [78 favorites]

A valid point:

@gregstolze:
Weird how fast Roseanne got the shitaxe. It's going to be fascinating in 2-3 years to find out what else she was doing.
I'm sure it was the right decision, but I bet we find out they'd started planning for this month's back.

Suspect a combination of it not being the ratings monster they thought it was at first and her being utter hell to work with play a part.
posted by Artw at 12:27 PM on May 29, 2018 [19 favorites]

This one from Jack Posobiec seems like a brilliant, can't miss idea:

Roseanne, Tim Allen, Kevin Sorbo, Stephen Baldwin and other blacklisted content creators should start up their own version of a blockchain-funded Netflix

Who wouldn't want to fund and watch that?
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:29 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

I was just saying to the wife this past weekend that I was surprised Sara Gilbert would want to be on the same set as Roseanne.
posted by yoga at 12:29 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

Who wouldn't want to fund and watch that?

MUSKVISION
posted by Artw at 12:30 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

Fuck racists. Speaking of which, there'a mini-controversy about language used to describe Roseanne's "joke". The Hill went with "racially charged", and Twitter's Moments described it as "controversial".

Roseanne's deep involvement with the QAnon conspiracy story is really fascinating to me. See here and here for more. She seems to exist in an entirely non-rational mindset. Usually people like that are seen yelling at demons in the streets or hidden away in some shithole house where they only go out to buy snacks and ammunition. Roseanne is front-and-center a full on right wing conspiracy nutjob.
posted by Nelson at 12:30 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Sara Gilbert's reaction to the tweets is good at least. Shame for her and the rest of the cast indeed.

Meh. The whole reboot was Gilbert’s idea, and Roseanne’s nutjobbery is not exactly new.

Roseanne, Tim Allen, Kevin Sorbo, Stephen Baldwin and other blacklisted content creators should start up their own version of a blockchain-funded Netflix

Tim Allen got himself “blacklisted” all the way to Fox’s fall lineup, so...
posted by Sys Rq at 12:33 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

Roseanne Barr is like a Pokémon trainer for shitty ideas.

Hey now, I appreciated her trenchant commentary on Joe Rogan's podcast about how chemtrails were making her farm's macadamia nuts bigger.
posted by Rust Moranis at 12:33 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

I love Bob's Burgers, Brooklyn 99, and Are You Being Served?, but what I love even more is MetaFilter suggesting them as replacement blue collar working class sitcoms
posted by prize bull octorok at 12:36 PM on May 29, 2018 [16 favorites]

Racism Watchdog is a good and useful dog.
posted by Artw at 12:37 PM on May 29, 2018 [21 favorites]

If anyone wants working class family sitcoms, The Middle is now ending/just ended, which kinda reminds me of a less chaotic version of Malcolm In The Middle. I never watched it properly, but saw a lot of episodes because I couldn't find the remote, distracted with non-tv stuff or was already half-asleep, and while it is not memorable, it was always solid.

The Middle also reminds me when the conservatives start yammering about the lack of "conservative" and "family values" shows, they don't want anything I'd call quietly conservative like it, they want a conservative multi-cam The Daily Show, because they don't want it to be understated, they want an all-white cast with guns and stereotypes and obummer and killary "jokes". Like, you know, Last Man Standing (which I saw some episodes in the same situation as The Middle, and is kind of tolerable in some occasional scenes the snitch is not involved, to the irony of the title).
posted by lmfsilva at 12:38 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I mean, they could revive It's A Living as a working class sitcom and even put the restaurant in one of Trump's buildings, but they simply HAVE to get the creepy piano guy to commit to a full schedule
posted by delfin at 12:39 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

Oh, yeah, and Superstore and Speechless. Also working class.
posted by lmfsilva at 12:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

That is happened all within basically one business day makes me think ABC probably had at the very least gamed out this contingency. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if there was some synergy with wanting to ride the nostalgia wave ("Will and Grace"), but then realizing just what they got with Rosanne. so, they simply waiting for her to put her foot in her mouth, updated the draft press release, and say "SEE YA!"
posted by MrGuilt at 12:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

Sara Gilbert's reaction to the tweets is good at least. Shame for her and the rest of the cast indeed.

Counterpoint: fuck them.

I'm with TwoStride on this. Why should we give a pass to anyone who took this gig who didn't have to? Absolutely nothing about this flame-out is surprising or different than what she was doing last year. Everyone who signed up for this without knowing that she was a QAnon-promoting bag of shit was willfully ignoring it, and if you are making a deliberate choice to ignore what you're propping up you're just as culpable as if you shrug it off. Looking at you, ABC.

Learning that Sykes had signed up as a writer is disappointing. "Hey, I'm totes quitting now that more people see what she's like" is garbage.

My sympathies to the crew, thinking you've got another year of work and then having it yanked away is awful and surely someone in that group of actual working-class folks made life choices that have now been ruined by Roseanne's actions.
posted by phearlez at 12:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [59 favorites]

there's On My Block on netflix but it's probably not white enough for people who want a roseanne replacement.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:43 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Roseanne, Tim Allen, Kevin Sorbo, Stephen Baldwin and other blacklisted content creators

How behind on entertainment news am I? What did Tim Allen, Kevin Sorbo, and Stephen Baldwin do?
posted by kingjoeshmoe at 12:43 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

I just googled and it seems Kevin Sorbo said some stupid ignorant shit about immigration policies in America and is a full on Trump supporter. Mind you, he's not been on my radar in years and years, so I don't really care about what he has to say or what tv show or movie of the week he's currently doing.
posted by Fizz at 12:46 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh no. The right is retaliating. They want Bill Maher axed, too.

I just. You guys. I don't know what to do. It seems like such a horrible price to pay. Oh noes. Not the briar patch, please.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 12:46 PM on May 29, 2018 [177 favorites]

Tim Allen
posted by zarq at 12:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

AlSweigart's prediction: Now that "Roseanne" was cancelled due to Barr's racist tweet (i.e. ABC got an excuse to fire her before she inevitably did something even worse), Elon Musk will fund her new show on his own Netflix-style startup which is subsidized by the government with funds that used to go to PBS.
posted by AlSweigart at 12:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

I tried so hard to watch one day at a time but the laugh track made it unbearable.

Just to be pedantic, but it's not a laugh track. They actually film in front of a live audience. (A podcast interview with the people behind the show were very insistent on this fact.)
posted by ultranos at 12:50 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

How behind on entertainment news am I? What did Tim Allen, Kevin Sorbo, and Stephen Baldwin do?

dared to be outspoken conservative entertainers in a country that ~~silences them~~ makes them presidents
posted by Atom Eyes at 12:50 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh no. The right is retaliating. They want Bill Maher axed, too.
Stop. Don't. Come Back.
posted by lmfsilva at 12:50 PM on May 29, 2018 [96 favorites]

Oh no. The right is retaliating. They want Bill Maher axed, too.

Who will probably have Roseanne on his show to tell her side of the story within the next few weeks, as he does with every celebrity, op-ed writer and journalist who says something offensive, racist or sexist and gets called out for it. Because once upon a time he got fired from ABC over something similar.
posted by zarq at 12:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

Oh no. The right is retaliating. They want Bill Maher axed, too.

On what grounds? Because he skewers the Right Wingers?
He had a segment where he tried to talk Rosanne out of being a Trump supporter, and how it was contrary to what real Blue collar people should ever support. ( she wasn't there, he was just doing a piece on it ).
posted by Liquidwolf at 12:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Weird how fast Roseanne got the shitaxe. It's going to be fascinating in 2-3 years to find out what else she was doing.

Guess who ABC's President of Entertainment is? Meet Channing Dungey, the first black woman to head a network.

Representation matters.
posted by chris24 at 12:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [113 favorites]

Can we set up a GoFundMe to pay them to take Maher?
posted by elsietheeel at 12:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [27 favorites]

I'm with TwoStride on this. Why should we give a pass to anyone who took this gig who didn't have to?

The way it was originally conceived and pitched may not have been how it was executed. You can see elements in the show that, in a better show, might have been used to create balance and nuance. That...clearly didn't happen.
posted by praemunire at 12:52 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

On what grounds? Because he skewers the Right Wing?

Because one time he made a joke that Donald Trump's mother "must have had sex with an orangutan" (paraphrased).
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:54 PM on May 29, 2018

Can we set up a GoFundMe to pay them to take Maher?

Shhhh! It sounds like they might take him for free!
posted by nubs at 12:54 PM on May 29, 2018 [43 favorites]

Because one time he made a joke that Donald Trump's mother "must have had sex with an orangutan"

Oh right. I guess they wouldn't get the difference between that and what Rosanne said.
posted by Liquidwolf at 12:55 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

Remember that she's also a TERF.

Does she meet some reasonable criteria for being a radical feminist? If not, isn't she not good enough to be a terf?
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 12:55 PM on May 29, 2018 [24 favorites]

that is offensive towards orangutans on so many levels
posted by poffin boffin at 12:55 PM on May 29, 2018 [34 favorites]

(sorry if I'm a bit late to the party and if this is redundant, but this is just provoking me)
This isn't quite new information, but the thing about Roseanne is that she isn't just everyday racist and anti-semitic, she is a fully unhinged conspiracy-theory spouting racist, which is just further proof of the Alex Jones-ification of American culture. I can't remember her conspiracy theories before Trump, but I do recall her spewing some paranoid nonsense years ago, but it went away because she wasn't on TV at the time and didn't cause this backlash.

Recently, she and John Goodman were on a late night talk show and man, was that awkward. John Goodman just politely and congenially sat there while she went on an ignorant pro-Trump tangent. You could tell he was like "I'm trying hard to like this woman, I really am, but...." Given her history of reactionary whackadoo thinking, he's probably been doing that for years.

It's just awful that this woman was once a blue collar icon, and now this is supposed to be the face of blue collar America?
posted by GospelofWesleyWillis at 12:56 PM on May 29, 2018 [17 favorites]

zarq: See: How Roseanne Barr Abandoned All Reason and Embraced the Alt-Right

To be clear: Roseanne Barr’s new politics and the current state of her Breitbart-dotted Twitter feed don’t necessarily negate the contributions she’s made throughout her decades-long career. We can applaud Barr as a female television trailblazer while also maintaining that her current positions are not so good. After all, if you live long enough, you’ll watch a great many of your childhood feminist idols be demoted to problematic faves—although few stars can rival Barr’s sheer number of bad or erroneous takes.

You can revise that last sentence to state "if you live long enough, many of your past idols and heroes will say or do something terrible" - it's not just feminist icons who once broke barriers or were outstanding at their peak, only to turn into their own bizarro selves later in life, or worse, be exposed to contain a bizarro self hidden behind their public self (most recent addition to the hall of terrible, terrible shame: Morgan Freeman).
posted by filthy light thief at 12:56 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

I'm with TwoStride on this. Why should we give a pass to anyone who took this gig who didn't have to?

For reals. They knew she was a snake etc. This whole reboot was pitched and conceived as a way to cynically cash in on pandering to and endorsing the views of the poor misunderstood economically anxious virulently racist intolerant xenophobic Trump base. Everybody knew it, and they were just hoping to bring home bulging bags of sweet sweet deplorable dollars.

Or as Jared Yates Sexton better said it: "Honestly, ABC was fine with Roseanne's abhorrent and repugnant behavior as long as it made them money and she didn't force their hand. They wanted to skate a line where they could monetize Trump voters and not suffer the PR hit."
posted by FelliniBlank at 12:57 PM on May 29, 2018 [61 favorites]

I guess those people might be such raging optimists that they really believed the person whose name is the title of the show would be willing to be a part of a balanced and nuanced (both sides of racism, pros and cons?) show. But even if I credit them that, they're still working in close quarters with and helping to further enrich a racist anti-semite piece of shit. I'm sticking with being very disappointed in Gilbert and Goodman.
posted by phearlez at 12:57 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Stephen Baldwin had a religious awakening after 9/11. I mentioned him a few weeks ago on the blue. Someone who runs "The Breakthrough Ministry, which involves skateboarding and extreme sports and Christian rock concerts" is already living in a hell worse than being blacklisted.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:57 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

Wait, Stephen Baldwin? Not just Adam (who, yes, isn't of "the Baldwins")?

*Googles*
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 12:58 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Because one time he made a joke that Donald Trump's mother "must have had sex with an orangutan" (paraphrased).

Noteworthy that they don't say Maher should be fired for dropping those N-bombs.
posted by Rust Moranis at 12:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [24 favorites]

Stephen is just rebelling against his older and cooler brother Alec.
posted by Liquidwolf at 12:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

> Does she meet some reasonable criteria for being a radical feminist? If not, isn't she not good enough to be a terf?

Yeah, I'd put her in the garden-variety transphobe bucket, since as far as I know, she has no history as a radical feminist, trans-exclusionary variation or no.
posted by rtha at 12:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [20 favorites]

And a QAnon-er and a Birther and a Soros-is-running-the-World-er, etc. Roseanne Barr is like a Pokémon trainer for shitty ideas.

Yep.

Roseanne on Twitter: "OMG I'm behind the times on forced vaccines-thought it was about Polio! Lots of catching up to do!"

Roseanne anti-GMO tweets regarding Papaya Ringspot virus.
posted by BrotherCaine at 1:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Yes Stephen. He and Alec together must be a hoot at Baldwin family reunions.
posted by elsietheeel at 1:01 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

On what grounds? Because he skewers the Right Wing?

I think it might be because he once used the n-word to refer to himself, but I do not know for sure.
posted by 4ster at 1:03 PM on May 29, 2018

I caught about 10 minutes of the Roseanne revival when it first aired in March or whatever and found it unbearable. I am legitimately surprised to find out it was still on the air.
posted by fimbulvetr at 1:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I just...

Of course this was going to happen? Disney and ABC deliberately tried to monetize motherfucking white supremacy by making a goddamn sitcom out of it. That is like...formally normalizing it. From fucking Disney.

No one involved in putting this tire fire on the air in the first place should get a pass.
posted by schadenfrau at 1:05 PM on May 29, 2018 [33 favorites]

Re: Kevin Sorbo. This garnered far more likes and retweets than the screencap shows.

Roseanne's being fired is cause for hope.
posted by bryon at 1:06 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

Yes Stephen. He and Alec together must be a hoot at Baldwin family reunions.

They're probably able to overcome their political differences through their shared love of treating women like shit.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 1:07 PM on May 29, 2018 [33 favorites]

Because one time he made a joke that Donald Trump's mother "must have had sex with an orangutan" (paraphrased).

Oh, it wasn't just one time.

During the Trump Birther Insanity back in 2012, Maher said on his HBO show:

“Look, I’m not saying your mother was repeatedly fucking an orangutan back in the 1940’s, I don’t know if that’s true. I hope it’s not true. But given your face, your physique and your intelligence level and of course your hair, the American people deserve some real proof that your mother did not spend most nights in 1945 covering her body in banana oil sneaking into the monkey cage and compulsively humping an orange orangutan.”

Maher then doubled down. He went on The Tonight Show and told Jay Leno he would donate $5 million dollars to charity if Trump could prove that he wasn't the spawn of his mother having sex with an orangutan.

Trump....

Let me just quote from the Law and Crime blog here: "Well, Trump, in what surely was a PR stunt, took Maher up on his offer, and through his attorney sent Maher a copy of his birth certificate that showed that his father was Fred Trump, not an orangutan.

“Attached hereto is a copy of Mr. Trump’s birth certificate, demonstrating that he is the son of Fred Trump, not an orangutan,” the letter read."
You can't make this stuff up, folks.

Anyway, when Maher refused to pay up, Trump actually sued him, then dropped the lawsuit.

Maher then brought it up in what felt like every episode of his show between 2013 and the 2016 election. With the same splitscreen graphic. Over and over again.

I've stopped watching Real Time since the election, but I'm guessing he probably still does.
posted by zarq at 1:08 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

I'm glad that Rosanne got what she deserves for her contemptible statements. While it's useful to see racists in Trump's America decide they're comfortable enough to be their full racist self in public and receive the hilariously predictable consequences for their terrible statements, it's still a bad sign that racists feel comfortable being openly racist. Even the KKK at their height knew the importance of anonymity.

Of course, most of my conservative family aren't going to see this as a mentally ill racist getting what she's asking for, but as another example of a conservative public figure getting unduly punished, just like your Tim Allens and your Stephen Baldwins.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 1:09 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Her shitty view towards trans people came out several years ago on twitter and I wrote her way the fuck off. She was a good magnet for who to block though, so I thank her for her shitheel-attracting abilities.
posted by nikaspark at 1:10 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

I guess those people might be such raging optimists that they really believed the person whose name is the title of the show would be willing to be a part of a balanced and nuanced (both sides of racism, pros and cons?) show

I know it's hard to believe in this day and age, but there are conservatives who aren't just straight-up racists. There are even anti-Trump evangelicals. I know this because I'm related to some (as well as, sadly, a larger group of Trump cultists). It's not inconceivable to imagine a show where the political divide in the family is part of the humor, and the follies of both sides (I would love to think that the left has no follies, but...no) are teased. Obviously, that is not how the show turned out. But I can see how that might have been the original vision. It's not like set-in-stone scripts are circulated months in advance on these projects.
posted by praemunire at 1:10 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

OMG poor guy
posted by infini at 1:11 PM on May 29, 2018 [18 favorites]

Malcolm in the Middle is both written and acted better, and is socialist and anti-racist. Rosanne was and is an insult to the working class.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 1:12 PM on May 29, 2018 [41 favorites]

I've stopped watching Real Time since the election, but I'm guessing he probably still does.

Not as much, there's a lot more real stuff for him to bring up now, but he still verbally eviscerates him weekly.
posted by Liquidwolf at 1:13 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Don't forget to ask all the people who'll howl over Roseanne's "first amendment rights being violated" how they feel about NFL players being forced to stand during the anthem...
posted by TwoStride at 1:13 PM on May 29, 2018 [23 favorites]

I would call her a TERF because she aligned with TERFs and echoed their viewpoints and wrote those viewpoints into a book. She's whatever kind of feminist gets the biggest headline, which today is an anti-feminist. I'm still fine with calling her a TERF as that is the group that attacked me when I spoke about her comments as they happened a few years ago.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 1:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

"The writer Roxane Gay tweeted: 'I told y’all about Roseanne. I told you. So.'"
Narrator: She did tell them.

Fuck, Roseanne told us about Roseanne. When people show you who they are believe them.
posted by supercrayon at 1:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [27 favorites]

I know it's hard to believe in this day and age, but there are conservatives who aren't just straight-up racists

But Roseanne is not and has likely never been part of that (very very small, possibly unicorn-esque) subset. This was a cynical moneygrab from the get-go with a known rabid racist.
posted by TwoStride at 1:15 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

White House in Panic Mode After TV Star with Racist Twitter Feed Loses Job

-- Andy Borowitz, NYT
posted by ricochet biscuit at 1:15 PM on May 29, 2018 [26 favorites]

> Don't forget to ask all the people who'll howl over Roseanne's "first amendment rights being violated" how they feel about NFL players being forced to stand during the anthem...

If you're doing that, ask about grabbing your crotch during the anthem too. If I had to rank kneeling vs crotch-grabbing on the "disrespectful" scale ...
posted by RedOrGreen at 1:16 PM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

@Jaboukie:
my favorite show right now is white people being shocked they can’t be racist with their outside voice
posted by TwoStride at 1:17 PM on May 29, 2018 [70 favorites]

Wait, what, this was all too much for Bill O'Reilly? Well, I'll be. Didn't expect to see that rat flee a ship.
posted by Countess Elena at 1:17 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

OMG poor guy

I am 99.9% sure that's just Brandon Wardell being hilarious.
posted by elsietheeel at 1:17 PM on May 29, 2018 [13 favorites]

White House in Panic Mode After TV Star with Racist Twitter Feed Loses Job

Darn. I didn't realize The New Yorker does Onion satire articles now.
posted by Liquidwolf at 1:19 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Shep Smith on Fox slams Roseanne Barr for her record of racism. (Video 2:38)

"Racism is not funny, and Roseanne Barr is a racist. Now her show is canceled."
posted by chris24 at 1:21 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

OMG poor guy

I....am dubious.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:21 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Darn. I didn't realize The New Yorker does Onion satire articles now.

Borowitz is very hit and miss, and I find he swings at empty air far more often than he should. But once in a while, he hits a long drive out to right field.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 1:24 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yeah, I follow Brandon Wardell on IG and he's most likely just joking around.
posted by gucci mane at 1:26 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Darn. I didn't realize The New Yorker does Onion satire articles now.

It's Andy Borowitz and he's been doing that kind of writing for decades, well before the New Yorker started hosting his column.
posted by fuse theorem at 1:28 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Tom Arnold is an abuser (his childhood abuse does not excuse him of that) and as far as I know he's never made an accounting or retribution for it.

Bill Maher is a piece of shit even if sometimes he says something that makes you laugh. I'll make a list, but I don't think anyone is looking for a retread of "r-word are like dogs" and all the rest of the fuckery he's spewed.

Prominent outspoken cis lesbians who stand on the side of openly hostile transphobic trolls do not get a pass because they hoped for reasonableness.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 1:32 PM on May 29, 2018 [21 favorites]

Even before we knew she was a racist asshole, I knew she was a generalized asshole. IIRC writer/producerAmy Sherman Palladino (Gilmore Girls) said once in an interview she was a writer on the original show, and Barr wouldn't even call writers by name. She gave them a number.
posted by NorthernLite at 1:33 PM on May 29, 2018 [13 favorites]

Bill Maher is a piece of shit even if sometimes he says something that makes you laugh. I'll make a list, but I don't think anyone is looking for a retread of "r-word are like dogs" and all the rest of the fuckery he's spewed.

Seconding this. He has a very long history of saying racist and sexist things. He's frequently made transphobic jokes and gone off on Islamophobic rants. He spent years bashing people who were overweight. Attacking women. He's had people like Milo Yiannopoulus, Ann Coulter and Dinesh D'Souza on his show repeatedly, allowing them to air their fucked up views in an attempt to normalize them.
posted by zarq at 1:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [60 favorites]

Maher is a centrist neo-liberal wet dream.
posted by elsietheeel at 1:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Wait, what, this was all too much for Bill O'Reilly? Well, I'll be.

He used an awful lot of words while still not saying "racist" though. Don't wanna upset that core demo too much.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 1:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

The sooner Maher is fired, the faster his inevitable glomming onto the Intellectual Dark Web katamari where he belongs, alongside Sam Harris and Dave Rubin.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [19 favorites]

Maher gets progressively less funny when you notice for someone who likes to have "different" ideas on the show, when he hears bullshit from a guest to his face he seems intellectually incapable of challenging them (like that interview with blonde nazi that made me quit on The Daily Show) and mostly tries to move to another subject, which is a problem for a show that is mostly guest/panel discussion. Yeah, his scripted bits are often good, I'll give him that, but if I want to hear assholes ripping on politicians, all I wanna be is El Chapo.

Yeah, I follow Brandon Wardell on IG and he's most likely just joking around.
But this could be a starting point for a sitcom. Even a decent "working class struggle" replacement for ABC if they want to go full meta with the Roseanne situation. Middling stand-up comedian from the East Coast/Great Lakes gets picked to write for reboot of popular old sitcom over their mid-00s blog analyzing the show when nobody cared and some bits on his act referencing the show, sells everything to start his new life up West, and the first alert on the phone after turning it back on in LAX: "LEAD STAR OF X IN TWITTER MELTDOWN; NETWORK CANCELS REBOOT".
Make it about being in a world that ultimately doesn't give a shit about you and your dreams, particularly if you're not loaded and well connected.
posted by lmfsilva at 1:54 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

Searched for "Channing Dungey," relieved to find her mentioned in chris24's comment, but kinda shocked it took so long for the thread to get there.

This is why representation behind the camera and in the C-suite is just as important as the diversity on-screen. If there wasn't "a line" before for Ms Barr to cross, it's because the people calling the shots could shrug off her comments. And now — finally, blessedly — there's someone with real power in the organization who doesn't look or, more importantly, experience the world just like everyone who's filled her seat before.

More like this, please. So much more.
posted by adamgreenfield at 1:56 PM on May 29, 2018 [28 favorites]

Minnie Driver:
So proud of @ABCNetwork for having the ethical compunction to cancel #Rosanne despite the show’s huge numbers. We too make a show about a middle class family , come and watch us instead #speechless @Speechless_ABC ✨

Now that The Middle is over, Speechless is right up there as one of the best sitcoms about a struggling family.
posted by General Malaise at 1:58 PM on May 29, 2018 [17 favorites]

there's such a dearth of working-class or middle-class families in sitcoms these days

watch Atlanta
posted by standardasparagus at 2:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [36 favorites]

I love you, Mike Schur.

@KenTremendous
"We were shocked and horrified to see that Roseanne continued acting exactly the way she has been acting for many many years. It was a real bolt from the blue to see her tweet things that she has tweeted versions of dozens of times in the past."
posted by elsietheeel at 2:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [102 favorites]

The wildest thing about this to me is that the show had just been picked up for a second season. I mean getting the revival back on the air was probably a slam-dunk (especially once they had locked down almost all of the original cast) but I think there was really no guarantee that it would get a second season. And yet even with all that, Barr couldn't keep her outright racism down at a socially acceptable level.

Sometimes I think of those YouTube videogame streamers who lose out on big deals because they just can't help saying the n-word. Like, you've got it made, my dudes. Just play it safe and keep it in check from here on out. But no...
posted by mhum at 2:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

🎶🎶🎶
Roseannnnnnnnneeeee
You don't have to put on the red hat
🎶🎶🎶
posted by schmod at 2:05 PM on May 29, 2018 [93 favorites]

Agree with those saying that Goodman, Gilbert, and Metcalfe are complicit. They knew who they were working with -- or at least they should have, since the rest of the country sure did -- and they went ahead anyway. I've permanently lost respect for them too, especially after Gilbert's "Oh, this is so sad, don't hold the remarks of one cast member against us" tweet. Sad -- right. Because being an unregenerate racist is best characterized as "sad." I mean, come on.
posted by holborne at 2:10 PM on May 29, 2018 [23 favorites]

Mr.Encyclopedia: " just like your Tim Allens and your Stephen Baldwins"

It's "Stephens Baldwin."
posted by Chrysostom at 2:20 PM on May 29, 2018 [65 favorites]

There is now a 1/2 hr opening in ABC's schedule for "David Rosen: Funny-looking Ghost Lawyer."

You know, I was just thinking about how much I miss The Ghost Whisperer the other day. It was some perfect combo of inane and pretty that I could never resist.

The original Roseanne's house looked like my family's house, they dressed like real people, something that just didn't happen in sitcoms. Money was always an issue. It felt more real than the other shows out there. But Roseanne herself was actually never the most important bit. The other actors made it work.
posted by emjaybee at 2:28 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Reuters Business: JUST IN: Walt Disney shares down 2.5 percent after ABC cancels 'Roseanne' show $DIS

Note that the market was down already and Disney shares did not fall after the announcement. I'm not sure what Reuters Business is up to here but it is also too easy to construct headlines like "Market up/down because of [political event]" and there is little accountability for these statements.
posted by vacapinta at 2:39 PM on May 29, 2018 [16 favorites]

Let's run that closing theme.
posted by Halloween Jack at 2:41 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

I wish they could have just written Roseanne out of the show.
posted by robcorr at 2:41 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Regarding that second season: while cutting no slack on ABC for that decision, or for hiring on Roseanne in the first place, I have to imagine they'll be paying out a lot of contract-breaking fees for this to the supporting cast. Although that leaves me with another thought: is there language in actors' contracts now for "job canceled because critical lead cast member/producer/director/etc was caught in an epic meltdown/scandal?"

I have to imagine this is becoming a contract issue in the wake of things like #MeToo and the people it has brought down. Sooner or later, someone in Hollywood is going to wise up to the vulnerabilities posed by not bothering to vet their stars. [Also, not to say they're all perfect human beings, but the casting people at Marvel Studios, the DC Television shows, Supernatural, etc. have to be down on their knees in thanks for having hired on such generally wonderful people. It really counts for a lot.]
posted by scaryblackdeath at 2:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Odds that Trump tries to give her a position in his administration?
posted by Golem XIV at 2:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

I wish they could have just written Roseanne out of the show.

She probably owns a hunk of the show and has intellectual property rights as well. So they couldn't just can her and create The Conners or something.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:43 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

Ok, so I never watched the reboot, but I'm startled by this comment in the Boston Globe article:

"I enjoyed it the first time around. I watched the reboot once. Roseanne called her onscreen granddaughter “ a little b!]ch” when she was mouthy. The granddaughter then called Roseanne “ a stupid hillbilly” and Roseanne pushed the kid’s head into the sink and sprayed water on her. The audience roared with laughter. A nauseating attempt to pander to Trump’s base, IMO. I Can’t remember the original show ever using physical abuse. That was enough for me."

Is this true?? Good lord.
posted by Melismata at 2:46 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

Odds that Trump tries to give her a position in his administration?

You joke, but I definitely think he would have her open at his rallies, and a bullshit social-ambassador position might not be out of the question.
posted by Countess Elena at 2:47 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Yeah, any Roseanne show that goes on will pay her. She poisoned the well.

I am also super curious about a decade from now when everyone has talked and everyone has rounded up the stories from long ago, and we get the big book or longread or podcast or whatever about the intricacies of Roseanne and ABC and how this all went down from beginning to end. For old people who read gossip stuff and tv insider news stuff, there's a loooooooooot of history to go through.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 2:47 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Yep.
posted by praemunire at 2:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

(or I suppose she's a well filled with poison that everyone kept pulling buckets out of thinking a little exposure would be ok)
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 2:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Corporal punishment for children is generally praised by conservatives and considered humorous. Hell, I still joke about it if I forget we don’t do it anymore.
posted by Countess Elena at 2:49 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

> A bunch of [crew] woke up this morning with jobs who now are unemployed,
> through absolutely no fault of their own.

I'm not prepared to give them a full pass. They were contractors on the Death Star in that they knew what they were getting into.

Still, never nice to be out of a job. I hope everyone lands on their feet.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 2:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

The original show explicitly stated that Roseanne and Jackie's dad beat them and that it messed them up for life. Roseanne did not use corporal punishment on principle.
posted by praemunire at 2:51 PM on May 29, 2018 [40 favorites]

Yeah, any Roseanne show that goes on will pay her. She poisoned the well.

About that: 'Roseanne' Reruns Pulled From Paramount Network, TV Land and CMT (The Wrap).

Now where did I put my crying towel?
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:53 PM on May 29, 2018 [20 favorites]

>Corporal punishment for children is generally praised by conservatives
>and considered humorous. Hell, I still joke about it if I forget we don’t do it anymore.

The fact that we don't do it any more is the only thing that makes it a good punchline for me. The inappropriate is humorous until someone starts actually doing it.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 2:53 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

I don't think the majority, at least from my neck of the mid south, ever stopped doing it. The punchline down here was absolutely she agrees that kids should get hit for their own good. I saw family members who I've seen hit kids posting about how funny it was.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 2:55 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

I wonder if it'll get punted by Amazon Prime, too.

A few weeks ago, it popped up on the "on Amazon Prime for Free" list, and my wife watched some episodes from the first season, picking and choosing those with George Clooney on them.

I wonder if he's trying to get them to stop admitting he was ever on the show now.
posted by mephron at 2:57 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

The original show explicitly stated that Roseanne and Jackie's dad beat them and that it messed them up for life. Roseanne did not use corporal punishment on principle.

One of the stellar bits from the original show (which I still use all the time in real life) was when daughters Becky and Darlene were having a bitter teen argument, and Roseanne broke it up by pointing them at each other and saying, "OK, now fight to the death," which instantly deflated things.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Amazon Prime LOVES supporting abusers. Woody Allen, that pedophile from the Aaron Spelling show about the good christian family, the Cosbys. It's almost like they seek out those contracts. And you know, their whole abusive head of the Amazon Video department thing. But even after he left, the issues remain.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 2:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Whitney Cummings sure timed her rat fleeing the sinking ship moment well.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 2:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

A few years ago I remember seeing a bunch of "I got spanked when I was a kid and it made me " where was basically "a better person" or "have respect" or whatever.

This was basically from high school acquaintances from the South. Given that I'm 40 and most of these people have kids, it was a little sad/disturbing. (Between that and the 2016 election and various other things, many of these people have been hidden/defriended/whatever so I don't really see it anymore).
posted by thefoxgod at 3:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I am so surprised by this—apparently, I'm the last to learn that Roseanne Barr is an unmitigated jackass.

I've been assuming that there was a lot of Roseanne Connor in Barr and I have such good memories of what I saw of that show. (I was a fan, but too busy with little kids and full-time work to regularly watch. Haven't seen the new show.)

One memorable episode, David wanted to back out of a school play because it called for him to kiss another character who was played by a black classmate. Dan was not comfortable with forcing David to participate. Roseanne, however, was horrified at David's attitude, which I believed she referred to as "racist, white trash".

How did she get from that to this?
posted by she's not there at 3:04 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

Via Vox: Why ABC had to cancel Roseanne [It’s not (just) because it was the right thing to do.]
posted by elsietheeel at 3:06 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

The original show explicitly stated that Roseanne and Jackie's dad beat them and that it messed them up for life. Roseanne did not use corporal punishment on principle.

That was one of the more jarring changes in the new version of the show. They talked about it in a number of episodes of the original, including in the series finale. Roseanne (the character) wanted to give her kids a different upbringing than what she and Jackie were subjected to. She had a line in an episode of the original show where she said that the reason she was overweight and Jackie had terrible relationships was their awful abusive childhood. She said it jokingly, but it was also the truth.

It's such a small thing. A show where the parents don't raise their kids in fear. Where they don't hurt their children to make them obey. They deftly used humor, talked things out and worked to to help defuse anger and de-escalate situations.

I grew up in a house where I was spanked and hit with open hands, closed fists, a riding crop, a wooden spoon or a belt as punishment. Or worse. I spent most of my childhood wearing bruises in places that didn't show. When the show originally aired I was not a fan, but I watched some episodes. I knew the Conners didn't hit their kids, and that tiny seed of knowledge planted an idea in me over time. My wife and I now choose to raise our kids in a home where they are never struck by their parents. We don't hit them, ever. They're 10. They've never been spanked. The very idea of one of us raising a hand to our kids or having them live in fear of us makes us both nauseous.

That tv show isn't the reason why we made that choice. But maybe in some way it was a small factor. So many people here are noting that the show had a family and a home that looked a lot like theirs. In one important way, it didn't look like mine. At all. But seeing parents on tv say they wouldn't hit their kids? That alone made them a family I would have liked to grow up in. When I grew up, I deliberately broke the cycle for my own kids.

So in the new Roseanne she became a grandmother who openly advocates for corporal punishment of her grandkid.

It was goddamn heartbreaking.
posted by zarq at 3:09 PM on May 29, 2018 [117 favorites]

I don't think the majority, at least from my neck of the mid south, ever stopped doing it.

I'm sure there's a lot of [hitting children] going on still, but it is no longer the default and seems to have been designated as "Something Only Conservatives Do, and Not Even All Of Them".
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 3:33 PM on May 29, 2018

For obscure reasons, I read both of her autobiographies a few years ago, and while her earlier one (1989) was not a great read for prose and structure reasons (please Goddess never make me read another piece of freeform 70s-era poetry on the subject of womynhood ever again) the newer one (2012) was uncomfortably casual-stereotypy enough that I had trouble getting through it even assuming good faith. I note with regret that there was no actual good faith there.
posted by restless_nomad at 3:39 PM on May 29, 2018

I know lots of liberals who hit their kids. Here are the states where it's still legal to beat kids in school. Lots and lots of people still think spanking, swatting, picking up a shoe or a wooden spoon or the wire end of a flyswatter or hanger is still totally acceptable. I hope you're right that in your area it's a small portion of the population, but a lot of us are still living in regions steeped in socially accepted, and nearly mandated, child abuse.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 3:39 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

I'm sure there's a lot of [hitting children] going on still, but it is no longer the default and seems to have been designated as "Something Only Conservatives Do, and Not Even All Of Them".

I do know of people raised by liberal parents who were physically punished, but it was an act of anger or a family secret, not a civic virtue. It's conservatives who think that millennials have turned out as they have because they weren't beaten enough. I hate that I know this, but it's because of my tendency to read Facebook comments.
posted by Countess Elena at 3:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I wish my facebook were only conservatives hailing this as a virtue but it goes from far left to far right. These are people who watched while I was hit. These weren't secrets. I see grandparents and aunts/uncles hitting kids, parents hitting kids. It happens openly at the grocery store by the mom wearing the Bernie shirt. It is not rare. It is not eradicated. It is not socially unacceptable. Not everywhere. Not in the places where Roseanne got the huge ratings. The people who beat me watched every single episode. I know this because we share a Hulu account.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 3:44 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

Honestly this is starting to sound a lot like "no, Louis CK is joking about what ~other guys~ do and condemning it! It's funny because everyone knows it's ridiculous!" Sometimes, often times, abusers just love outing themselves and delighting as people who think they align philosophically applaud their delicious satire.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 3:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I'm so sorry, I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today!
posted by Countess Elena at 3:49 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

From the Vox article:

This gives you a sense of how drastically the boundaries of the culture war have shifted in the intervening 45 years; conservative outrage led to the end of Bridget, but progressive outrage led to the end of Roseanne.

I just reject that framing. I have no idea about the show "Bridget loves Bernie", never saw it, but this isn't "progressive outrage", as the fucking article itself notes: it goes on to try to make the case as to why the show needed to be cancelled from a business perspective. So, fuck this framing - note that "Bridget loves Bernie" was cancelled because of campaigns of two faith groups, and "Roseanne" was cancelled because the star was a racist conspiracy theorist and publicly flying that flag for all to see.
posted by nubs at 3:53 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

I am now leaving Twitter. .

Did Twitter disappoint you, Roseanne?
posted by waving at 4:20 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Since the reboot started, a lot of my friends have been wondering how Roseanne could have become this awful conservative saying awful things on twitter but it's always seemed in keeping with what I have known of her personal life, which is that she is someone who had a traumatic brain injury at 16 and has described herself as having dissociative identity disorder. That doesn't excuse what she said at all of course but she's a pretty troubled person with a history of poor impulse control. The awfulness hasn't surprised me, but nothing from Roseanne really surprises me. She is not a stable or predictable person.

That said, Roseanne was really important to me as a kid as remains so, and I appreciated their inclusion of a gender nonconforming kid in the new show. Sad that there's probably no way to continue without her.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:24 PM on May 29, 2018 [10 favorites]

This is the first I heard that there was even a revival.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 4:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

*looks at TV Guide* Roseanne is on in 5 minutes. I wonder if that’s true?
posted by Melismata at 4:55 PM on May 29, 2018

Ha ha ha ha ha ha. Wikileaks is repping Roseanne:

Who is former Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett, who is in the news today after @theRealRoseanne, lead actor in America's #1 sitcom, was axed by ABC after Tweet containing racist trope: 1,016 WikiLeaks docs ...

posted by octobersurprise at 5:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Bryan Fuller Pitches ‘Pushing Daisies’ Revival To Replace ‘Roseanne’ On ABC
posted by octothorpe at 5:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [43 favorites]

And it’s been preempted!
posted by Melismata at 5:04 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Bryan Fuller Pitches ‘Pushing Daisies’ Revival To Replace ‘Roseanne’ On ABC.

I endorse this . . . in part because Hannibal Season 4 will never fly during "family hour" and also needs to be on cable/streaming where there's full frontal nudity and cusswords.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:04 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Bryan Fuller Pitches ‘Pushing Daisies’ Revival To Replace ‘Roseanne’ On ABC.

If this happens my brain (and heart) will explode.
posted by elsietheeel at 5:09 PM on May 29, 2018 [9 favorites]

Pushing Daisies was awesome! Bring back Wonderfalls while you're at it! My brain and heart will likewise explode.
posted by foonly at 5:11 PM on May 29, 2018 [18 favorites]

I can't imagine them being able to pay for two of the four leads beyond 2 or 6 episides for what it will make. I'd LOVE to see it, it just seems like too much time has passed, sadly.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 5:18 PM on May 29, 2018

>I wish my facebook were only conservatives hailing this as a virtue but
>it goes from far left to far right. These are people who watched while I was hit.

I don’t doubt hitting children was the norm a generation ago as I too was on the receiving end. "It was just what people did in those days."

It’s disappointing to hear that it is still acceptable around the country though. It’s been solidly rejected in my own circles and it has become shorthand for "bad parent" in movies and TV. I guess I’ve been engaging in wishful thinking about how much those reflect the big picture. :-(
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 5:27 PM on May 29, 2018

I managed to raise a well-adjusted kid without hitting him. I certainly yelled at him a few times but hitting would have seemed like failure.
posted by octothorpe at 5:33 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Personally, I saw Roseanne's pre-first-series stand-up comedy and considered her to be "a fat Phyllis Diller at her best, a fat Joan Rivers at her worst" (from the POV of a Fat Guy married to a Fat Lady who was occasionally funnier than Roseanne without trying). When the original show began, I was very pleasantly surprised and felt she was being very well supported by experienced actors John Goodman & Laurie Metcalf and executive producers Tom Werner, Marcy Carsey and Matt Williams (credited as co-creator), the three of whom got primary credits on half of the most successful sitcoms from the '80s thru the '00s.

On the sub-topic, my own experience was that my parents never raised a hand on me growing up but I was scared totally sh*tless by my father for my entire childhood and well into my 20s... because non-physical abuse can be very effective too. In fact, my father reminded me of another discredited sitcom parent's comedy line "I brought you into this world, and I can take you out".
posted by oneswellfoop at 5:34 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I'm still reeling from this "Bridget loves Bernie" revelation. I was 12 when it was on, and even I recognized its depictions of Catholics and Jewish people as toothless and hackneyed. Who on earth was offended?

As for "Roseanne", another cherished sitcom memory down the drain.
posted by acrasis at 5:37 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

> Bryan Fuller Pitches ‘Pushing Daisies’ Revival To Replace ‘Roseanne’ On ABC.

I can just see the headline now...

Bryan Fuller Out As Showrunner on 'Pushing Daisies'
posted by guiseroom at 5:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [15 favorites]

Please don’t bring Roseanne’s weight into this. It’s so not the thing to focus on or even note.
posted by mochapickle at 5:41 PM on May 29, 2018 [19 favorites]

Now we're deciding that Metcalf, Goodman et al. didn't need the money and share the blame for Barr's misbehavior? Wow. Let's all quit our jobs right now because our boss or coworker happens to be racist or sexist. Pretty sure that covers all of us who are not self employed and even a few who are, wink, wink. OK, if you're two paychecks or less away from penury you get a temporary reprieve but you'd better be polishing up that CV right fucking now.

I'm mean yeah they have some soul-searching to do but to me at least there's a hell of a difference between working with a racist, and explicitly working to sanitize their image. Gilbert is no Huckabee Sanders. You can't even say that through "Roseanne," Barr's image was effectively sanitized, since if anything, the spotlight has brought more attention to her racism, and to the racism infecting the right wing body politic than if she were still another random jobless comic like Dennis Miller.
posted by xigxag at 5:42 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

Yeah I'm not buying the "oh it's so good that Roseanne's racism is public!" argument. I doubt that the targets of Roseanne's rants and slurs really feel relieved that she publically attacks them on huge platforms (a platform she had on Twitter even before getting another shot at a tv show on a major network... the same network, we've been reminded, that refuses to air a Blackish episode about NFL players kneeling...)

And I absolutely stand by the idea that Metcalf's and Goodman's "National Treasure" statuses are in question if not outright revoked. Please--this is not the case of the poor penurious worker forced to work for a racist that they just discovered after the fact. These are two A-list actors with a wide choice of projects available to them and they chose the known racist. And gee, Gilbert is "sad" that Roseanne tweets racist things? That's right up there with some "thoughts and prayers" about fixing problems.
posted by TwoStride at 6:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [30 favorites]

Wow. Let's all quit our jobs right now because our boss or coworker happens to be racist or sexist.

Oh please. Metcalf was just nominated for an Oscar and has been getting rave reviews on Broadway, both within the last year; Goodman has been working steadily on high-profile and respected projects for the past 25 years or so; and Gilbert spent years appearing on one of the most popular sitcoms in the country, and that's in addition to producing a daily talk show for five years. These weren't some regular working people who were two paychecks away from being out on the street; these are legit show business stars. Every single one of them has money and influence and can afford to pick and choose the projects they take on. They exercised that choice by working with an openly racist right-wing conspiracy theorist who had been making "jokes" about black people for several years before the reboot of her show, and they made a statement in doing so. Now they're being judged on that choice. Tough shit for them. Thanks, but I'll save my sympathy for people who actually don't have money and options.
posted by holborne at 6:00 PM on May 29, 2018 [77 favorites]

I wouldn't have guessed back then that Tom Arnold would turn out to be the more acceptable one.

I told that to him on twitter some months back, slightly different words, because I wasn't trying to troll him. He agreed. He quote tweets everything all the time, and is still funny and hard to keep up with his thoughts spilling out, so he's not that different. But I follow him on Twitter because he's not a toxic, racist mess and will actually call it out without hesitation.
posted by krinklyfig at 6:18 PM on May 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Think Progress: Watch ABC kick off pitch to advertisers with jokes about Roseanne’s offensive tweets (relevant bit of video starts at about 2:00), featuring Disney/ABC Group president Ben Sherwood.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:40 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

What's the betting line on (...) the show's rights being grabbed up by another network?

I'd be kind of surprised if the show does find another home, because she was comparing a POC to a goddamned ape and that's so fucking racist that any network that grabbed up the show would be widely seen as endorsing straight-up hate speech. I mean, there's no spinning what she said to make it less offensive. It's certainly possible that her career could recover in a few years, ala Mel Gibson, especially if she goes on an apology tour and makes a case that she was wacked out on painkillers or whatever. But for the indefinite future I think the only companies that will want anything to do with her will be the ones who are actively courting the Nazi demo, your Fox Newses and such.

Its worth remembering that as good as the original series was at times, Barr was kind of a mess personally even then and by the time the show ended it had become incoherent, self-indulgent and pretty awful. (Remember when they won the lottery and every episode played like a weird dream sequence?) If the reboot was any good at all, that's kind of a miracle. Barr was going off the rails 20 years ago, and she hasn't been anywhere near the rails for a very long time.

Every now and then I play a mental game where I imagine if some celebrity became president and I try to figure out if it would me more or less shocking and ridiculous than Trump. Like, President Vanilla Ice? Maybe a little more believable than President Trump. President Hulk Hogan? Maybe a little less believable than President Trump. President Roseanne Barr is slightly more believable than President Trump, but I'm not sure if she'd do any better or worse at the job. They're both attention-seeking, moody, racist, grudge-holding nuts.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 6:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

Tom Arnold is extremely cool and usually gets a raw deal. He caused me to pencil in Ottumwa, IA, where he's from, as a vacation stop. The Lanford Lunchbox diner in the original Roseanne series is based on a restaurant called Canteen Lunch in the Alley there.
posted by rhizome at 6:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

Interesting factoids about "Bridget Loves Bernie"... it was loosely based on "Abie's Irish Rose", a hit Broadway show in the 1920s that was made into a mostly-forgotten movie in the '30s and radio show in the 40s, all with much less controversy. The show was created by Bernard Slade who was on a TV winning streak, having previously produced "The Flying Nun" and "The Partridge Family". Despite major efforts to be non-controversial, it was under fire specifically from the Jewish Defense League and its founder Meir Kahane during the same timeframe Kahane was trying to establish an ultra-orthodox political party in Israel and was arrested for "conspiracy to manufacture explosives". The stars, Meredith Baxter and David Birney, got married in real life a year after the show ended, and, as Meredith Baxter Birney, she later starred in the longer-running sitcom "Family Ties" as Michael J. Fox's mother.

Yes, it was a different world, a couple times there...
posted by oneswellfoop at 6:54 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Sadly, Greatest American Hero was passed on. I would have loved to see it.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 7:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

But, why not just ditch Barr, rename it The Conners and give the fans what they really want? It's not like that's never happened before in the history of television.

I thought the same thing. This is just punishing the lot for one person's idiocy. Hardly fair.

And it is not unprecedented. Valerie became the Hogans, Kevin Spacey was booted, but House of Cards marched on merrily without him. Even when the leads leave because they had enough, we get better shows like Major Crimes and The Good Fight.

You have three very strong actors who could have taken over the lead and taken that show in a completely new direction -- ABC was probably itching to get rid of the show that speaks to the Great Unwashed, and Barr gave them the excuse to do it.

Unfortunately, for those people who worked on that show, they are paying a bigger price than Barr ever will.
posted by Alexandra Kitty at 7:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

I would freaking love to see the Greatest American Hero reboot, number 1 show i was looking forward to. I was just mentioning where it is in the process.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 7:09 PM on May 29, 2018

Every single one of them has money and influence and can afford to pick and choose the projects they take on. They exercised that choice by working with an openly racist right-wing conspiracy theorist who had been making "jokes" about black people for several years before the reboot of her show, and they made a statement in doing so.

Yes, this.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 7:09 PM on May 29, 2018 [14 favorites]

Tom Arnold is extremely cool and usually gets a raw deal.

Obligatory
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:12 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I am one of those weird people who cares about comedy enough where it sometimes feels personal. But I've let go of my heroes. It's just that I've seen shitty, abusive behavior and how it usually ends up, with the victims shunned and abusive men supported, because it's how it usually works everywhere.

So today, I'm just grateful that the people I admire now and who are great at their craft are Tig Notaro, Wanda Sykes, Cameron Esposito, Rhea Butcher, Nicole Byer, Maria Bamford, Eliza Skinner, Karen Kilgariff, Michelle Wolf! and that's off the top of my head.

You know who's not doing that great? Louis CK. Bill Cosby. Roseanne Barr. They are all talented and have been very successful in their careers. But maybe that's not enough anymore to keep abusers landing on top while the decent people get chewed up and spit out. Maybe. Today felt good.

This is a great time to be in comedy, especially for established comics. There's a popular wave that's been going on for a while. But it's so heartening to know after the garbage fire, Wanda Sykes career is doing just fine, and Roseanne's is not. I don't want people to suffer and fail and hurt a lot of people as they flame out. I do want funny comics who put in the work not to get destroyed by the behavior of shitty men with power (and yes women too but not the vast majority). But I'm so glad that the worst behaviors of these people aren't taking down anyone else except themselves. Not today.

The funniest comics in the US are all women, IMO, not to be binary but to answer the men who claim women aren't funny. And they're doing just fine.
posted by krinklyfig at 7:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

Love stories and jokes about super cool chill women abusers, just the best.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 7:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Rage, rage against the dying of the white...privilege.
posted by medusa at 7:16 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

I mean, there's no spinning what she said to make it less offensive.

As opposed to what she's said about the Israel Nazi state, Muslims as pedophiles, 9/11 as an inside job, vaccinations hurting children.... She's been tweeting stuff like this for years. If I had been working for the show I would have thought the chances of something like this happening were about 50/50.
posted by xammerboy at 7:16 PM on May 29, 2018 [20 favorites]

Since the reboot started, a lot of my friends have been wondering how Roseanne could have become this awful conservative saying awful things on twitter but it's always seemed in keeping with what I have known of her personal life, which is that she is someone who had a traumatic brain injury at 16 and has described herself as having dissociative identity disorder. That doesn't excuse what she said at all of course but she's a pretty troubled person with a history of poor impulse control. The awfulness hasn't surprised me, but nothing from Roseanne really surprises me. She is not a stable or predictable person.

I just want to gently push back on this a bit, because while it is true that she's always been a pretty troubled person, there have been plenty of troubled people who have not gone down the rabbit hole like she has. One can be mentally ill without being ferociously racist. So I'm uncomfortable with the idea of ascribing her behavior to traumatic head injury or dissociative identity disorder because it furthers the stigma of mental illness for the rest of us and there are plenty of people out there right now saying the same things without that traumatic background.
posted by Ruki at 7:20 PM on May 29, 2018 [38 favorites]

If I had been working for the show I would have thought the chances of something like this happening were about 50/50.

frankly, after the QAnon incident back in March I would have been looking to jump ship to a different project, renewal or not; odds were way higher than 50/50
posted by halation at 7:21 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

Shameless (Netflix), set in Chicago, I think qualifies as a decent lower working-class-oriented show.
posted by lathrop at 7:30 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

because while it is true that she's always been a pretty troubled person, there have been plenty of troubled people who have not gone down the rabbit hole like she has.

I imagine having achieved big deal fame and its attendant power doesn't exactly play to anyone's better angels, let alone someone who's been wrestling with dissociative identity disorder for several decades.
posted by philip-random at 7:43 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

"But, why not just ditch Barr, rename it The Conners and give the fans what they really want? It's not like that's never happened before in the history of television."

Wasn't one of the ongoing issues after the original series got popular, and for getting the reboot up, that Barr herself held some of the naming/concept/character rights? If so, good luck getting a spin-off up and running without either her involvement or a dump-truck full of money pulling up in her drive…
posted by Pinback at 7:44 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Here's How The Same #BoycottABC Hashtag Was Used By The Right And Left (Charlie Warzel, Buzzfeed)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:59 PM on May 29, 2018

From the Guardian link: Barr was replying to a post from a user that accused Jarrett, a long-serving adviser to the president, of covering up the Obama administration’s alleged “misdeeds”.
posted by lukemeister at 7:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Because the Mirror Universe Media Machine loves to hold up obscure, yet easy targets for various Two Minutes Hate Drills. She likely heard some radio C-lister talking about her, or some Twitter thread bringing her up as part of the Grand Obama Soros Islam Conspiracy, or some similar spawning pit recycling unsubstantiated claims about Jarrett wanting to raze all McDonald's restaurants and put mosques in their places.
posted by delfin at 7:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I just keep thinking of that band from the 1980's... Pop Will Eat Itelf
posted by Fupped Duck at 7:59 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

She's back on Twitter tweeting things like "i thought she was saudi" and retweeting all kinds of racist nonsense.

Guess her "I apologize. I am now leaving Twitter" 12 hours ago was more of a last-ditch effort to keep her show than a sincere message.
posted by zachlipton at 8:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [16 favorites]

The linked Guardian article displayed in my browser an ad about the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund from Oracle. Proving yet again the risks of keyword based advertising. At least I'm hoping it's that and not somebody at the Guardian's attempt at snark.
posted by xigxag at 8:03 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

I wish they could have just written Roseanne out of the show.

She probably owns a hunk of the show and has intellectual property rights as well. So they couldn't just can her and create The Conners or something.

I am certain that as creator and producer, she has a financial interest in the show whether or not she stars in it. Booting her and continuing the show with her removed would be an odd way for the network to send her... slightly fewer millions each year.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 8:12 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

Oliver North is probably trying to get a hold of her to move the show to NRA TV, the home of false patriots.

When I heard about the Greatest American Hero reboot I wondered how dog food marketing executives reacted.
posted by juiceCake at 8:18 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Don't mean to derail the thread, just want to pass on anti-spanking comment from another character in a TV comedy—King of the Hill's Dale Dribble, who after declaring that spanking is wrong, added "I say, spare the rod, spoil the child!"

Dale was wrong about almost everything, but he nailed this.
posted by she's not there at 8:46 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

She's back on Twitter tweeting things like "i thought she was saudi" and retweeting all kinds of racist nonsense.

She's a repugnant hypocrite on every level. First she tweets an obviously insincere apology to Jarrett, but once her show's been rightly cancelled, she retweets a despicable Islamophobic hoax about her. She and Trump deserve each other.
posted by Doktor Zed at 8:53 PM on May 29, 2018 [8 favorites]

What to call racist remarks instead of calling them racist remarks (Alexandra Petri, WaPo)

…for anyone still struggling on this point, here are some further euphemisms for “racist” to add pizzazz to your headlines! Don’t worry, everyone will know what you mean.

Remarks with that special something

Very Fine Remarks

Heritage-Loving Remarks

Remarks that seemed anxious about the economy

Remarks that some people still think would make a good Halloween costume

Remarks that march to their own drummer against the tide of political correctness and should be photographed looking dapper against an exposed brick wall

Remarks whose motivation we can never truly understand, for who can penetrate into the deep recesses of the human heart? Who can say why anyone says anything?

Remarks that would be upset if you called them racist

Remarks that would still be acceptable as a logo of a major sports franchise

posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:54 PM on May 29, 2018 [84 favorites]

I wish my facebook were only conservatives hailing this as a virtue but it goes from far left to far right.

Not to continue a corporal punishment derail, but just for information's sake, spanking and the like are considerably more common on the right, especially recently. This article at 538 does a fairly good job discussing the data, and the multiple regression table it includes captures the Republican effect more clearly, since the raw partisan gap is slightly confounded by the fact that African-American families tend to support corporal punishment at higher levels. It's also notable that a now-standard measure of authoritarianism actually uses a set of four questions about child-rearing (since people are more honest answering these, but they predict authoritarianism well), and as some may recall, during the primaries the best predictor of a Trump voter was a strong authoritarian score as measured by these four child-rearing questions. Since belief in physical punishment is even more strongly correlated with authoritarianism (though not one of the standard four child-rearing questions), we can be pretty sure that Trump voters in particular are some of the highest supporters of the practice.
posted by chortly at 9:01 PM on May 29, 2018 [11 favorites]

@therealroseanne: guys I did something unforgiveable so do not defend me. It was 2 in the morning and I was ambien tweeting-it was memorial day too-i went 2 far & do not want it defended-it was egregious Indefensible. I made a mistake I wish I hadn't but...don't defend it please. ty

That the new "ignore everything I've been saying for years; the ambien made me racist" argument comes amid a barrage of awful retweets (including these photoshop jobs) and the idea that it would have been ok if Jarrett was Saudi either points to a long-term problem and/or further undercuts her sincerity.
posted by zachlipton at 9:44 PM on May 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

"Racism" is indeed one of side effects of Ambien.
posted by guiseroom at 9:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [9 favorites]

"Racism" is indeed one of side effects of Ambien.

'Ask your Grand Cyclops if Ambien is right for you...'
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 9:52 PM on May 29, 2018 [53 favorites]

It's a new controlled release formulation that lasts for years and years.
posted by zachlipton at 9:53 PM on May 29, 2018 [34 favorites]

She's also blaming Michelle Obama for getting her fired, because need more racism.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:56 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

I'm beginning to think it doesn't actually work for insomnia.
posted by AFABulous at 9:56 PM on May 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

Yeah, I've Facebook-posted on Ambien before. It's usually about my invisible socks and new middle names for the cats.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:02 PM on May 29, 2018 [39 favorites]

She keeps alternating between apologetic tweets and racist tweets
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 10:07 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

The first time I took Ambien I woke up in my neighbor's pool. I never took Ambien again.
posted by guiseroom at 10:07 PM on May 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

Yeah, the Ambien thing is bullshit. She was throwing around her racism and batshit conspiracy stuff before this. Going full MAGA wasn't about the Ambien. Looking at her Twitter page now, though, it does show a lot of lurching between acknowledging she fucked up, apologizing, looking for someone else to blame, amplifying voices critical of her, "Hey this other guy did it, too" (Olberman, and I'm pretty sure it's fake but even if it isn't that changes nothing). She looks like she's in the sort of meltdown a rational person would have after a morning of total self-destruction.

I more than half expect to hear about some worse bit of self-destruction before this is over. I also expect a narrative of "People were too hard on Roseanne, look how she was suffering because of X" within days.

And none of it will change the fact that this is part of a pattern of behavior.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 10:10 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

How did this get to be a two minute hate for anyone crappy on TV? In any case Bill Maher is, always has been, and no doubt will continue to be mostly a small-l libertarian and not a centrist neoliiiiberrrual. Which shouldn't be surprising given his often questionable views on hot button topics.

Look, obvious red flags aside, I'd almost be ok with him if he at least had better writers, or if they tried a bit harder not to underestimate their audience. For a guy who has worked as a standup for so many years and has worked with a lot of talented people, he's sure got a bunch of hacky jokes to offer as biting political satire. and his previous show wasn't really like that - they didn't pander as much and did try to make it funny, and also piss people off, because that's his deal. There is usually a moment that's funny during the show, and it comes from the conversations with a panel of guests, but the real laughs don't come from the writers room. The biggest laughs do tend to be when someone really lands a hard truth in Bill's lap after some ignorance from him about some foolish thing he won't let go, especially, e.g., Islam, feminism, the kind of thing about which he is so awful at understanding the basic concepts. But when someone really lands a good one on him and calls him on his bullshit, especially if it's funny, his own audience loves it. He knows this. It definitely works. Why is he still so prickly when it's about him?

What he is good at is delivering those hacky written jokes in a way that's really emotionally satisfying for his audience, if not necessarily funny. I mean, it's an aging crowd but he does have his fans, mostly his generation, and that's what comedy is about for them, because everyone gets the references. It's fine if it's what people want, but if the writers don't seem like they're making themselves laugh with the jokes they write for a living, then it's just sad to listen to. But Bill does know his audience, and for them, he delivers. It's not really for me anymore. I will still listen to the audio sometimes, but he's often frustrating rather than funny.
posted by krinklyfig at 10:13 PM on May 29, 2018

Wow. Let's all quit our jobs right now because our boss or coworker happens to be racist or sexist.

First of, entertainment and sports jobs are not like your regular 9 to 5.
Second, they chose working on this project, and IIRC Gilbert was the one making a bigger push for it to happen. This isn't a "well, turns out the star is a creep"Transparent / House of Cards scenario where everyone is scrambling to deal with this midway production. They knew.
I mean, in one of their joint media promotional appearances, Goodman looked mighty uncomfortable anytime Roseanne started talking.
Everyone had a chance saying "no".
posted by lmfsilva at 10:14 PM on May 29, 2018 [18 favorites]

I know we're all focused on the Ambien, but don't let that distract you from "it was memorial day too."

I'm imagining she thinks you get special holidays from having to not look racist or something, as if it's so exhausting to not be racist during the week now, so she deserves some time off?
posted by zachlipton at 10:28 PM on May 29, 2018 [22 favorites]

I'd be kind of surprised if the show does find another home, because she was comparing a POC to a goddamned ape and that's so fucking racist that any network that grabbed up the show would be widely seen as endorsing straight-up hate speech. I mean, there's no spinning what she said to make it less offensive.

Season 2 of Rosanne, coming soon to NRATV.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 10:37 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

with Dana Loesch as New Jackie
posted by ActingTheGoat at 10:39 PM on May 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

call me when they fire amy schumer and sarah silverman
posted by yaymukund at 11:29 PM on May 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Second, they chose working on this project, and IIRC Gilbert was the one making a bigger push for it to happen.

There are a lot of people who work on television shows who aren't actors. A lot of them are people who don't have the luxury of choosing to turn down work because the lead actor of the show they are the lighting tech on transformed into a massive asshole.
posted by PenDevil at 11:48 PM on May 29, 2018 [7 favorites]

PenDevil the "they" in the comment you quoted specifically refers to Goodman, Metcalfe, and other actors. Nobody's saying the lighting tech is an asshole. Lighting techs are great. Some of my favorite people are lighting techs.
posted by yaymukund at 12:05 AM on May 30, 2018 [16 favorites]

The owner of a nearby restaurant has been accused by multiple wait staff of sexual assault. I suppose I should continue to patronize the place to keep the dishwashers employed.
posted by benzenedream at 12:25 AM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

A lot of them are people who don't have the luxury of choosing to turn down work because the lead actor of the show they are the lighting tech on transformed into a massive asshole.

They're all union, working on a major network TV show. They'll be fine.
posted by rhizome at 12:30 AM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

Keep in mind that when a show gets cancelled, the crew has to find work and yet somehow no one gets upset for the lighting techs when that happens.

A friend of mine used to work in tv production and looking for a new job when an old one ended was part of the gig.
posted by miss-lapin at 1:10 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

Sure, and the deal with a TV series is that it will be replaced by another series that also has lighting techs employed. ABC isn't going to have dead air for the half hour Roseanne used to be on. People will still be employed, just not in the service of a show starring a racist ass.
posted by gusottertrout at 2:15 AM on May 30, 2018 [4 favorites]

I don't think the moral of this story is; fuck those lighting techs, they're fungible.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 3:02 AM on May 30, 2018 [11 favorites]

Pardon me if this has been asked and answered, but why the hell was Barr even thinking about Jarret?

As mentioned above, she was replying to a conspiracy tweet about Jarrett, but why was Jarrett mentioned in that tweet? For the same reason Susan Rice and Loretta Lynch are perpetual targets for the racist right, they're black women. Jarrett, Lynch and Rice have always received outsized attention as Obama officials and it's as racist and misogynistic as you'd imagine.
posted by chris24 at 3:31 AM on May 30, 2018 [19 favorites]

She's back on Twitter tweeting things like "i thought she was saudi" and retweeting all kinds of racist nonsense.

Like literally retweeting something that links Wanda Sykes to Planet of the Apes.

And amazingly, this came from a former Cruz staffer who now works for nutjob rightwing group Judicial Watch.

Charlie Kirk: Wait, Bill Maher makes comparisons to Trump being a gorilla all the time? They get classified as "jokes" by the media and he is of course allowed to keep his show and not have his life ruined. The difference? Bill Maher is a liberal, Roseanne is a free-thinking Trump supporter

Jerry Dunleavy
‏Retweeted Charlie Kirk
I need y’all to stop acting so obtuse about this “Planet of the Apes” thing ASAP. Comparing black people to apes is classic racial bigotry — The Left’s tendency to call Bush & Trump gorillas or chimps is mean... and also has jackshit to do with calling a black person an ape. JFC.
- Gaslighting people about racial bigotry to own the libs.

---

Bit of course not all Rs were so honest or good. Eric Bolling tweeted that she didn't need to apologize before deleting it.
posted by chris24 at 3:47 AM on May 30, 2018 [15 favorites]

The tweet where she blamed ambien has been deleted, now she's claiming her coworkers threw her under the bus, and the show was cancelled because Wanda Sykes tweeted about quitting.
posted by Roommate at 4:07 AM on May 30, 2018 [7 favorites]

She also doubled and tripled down on Soros being a Nazi, retweeting more vile lies.
posted by chris24 at 4:21 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

I'm trying to think positively. At least now that the reboot is canceled, we won't have to spend the next years watching various ABC executives and likable cast members mutate fully into dignity wraiths as they try to deflect, play down, or dismiss/ignore Barr's ongoing hateful comments and behavior.
posted by Fiberoptic Zebroid and The Hypnagogic Jerks at 5:41 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

Twitter should take this shit seriously and ban her account.
posted by h00py at 6:00 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

Keep in mind that when a show gets cancelled, the crew has to find work and yet somehow no one gets upset for the lighting techs when that happens.

Did you happen to see that six comments above yours discussed the fate of the crew and the many other comments in this thread treating the crew as generally innocent in this instance?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:11 AM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

I guess it’s possibke that Whda Sykes et al took all the stuff about the show being a dialogue about the state of working class America post Trump victory etc... etc... seriously. If nothing else the Roseanne tweets have made it clear that dialogue has ended/never began.
posted by Artw at 6:26 AM on May 30, 2018

She should probably note that the Mel Gibson excuse only works if you stop doing horrible things long enough for your peers to turn a blind eye and rehabilitate you.
posted by Artw at 6:30 AM on May 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

The other factor is Mel Gibson was bringing in movie millions while Barr was only raking in TV millions.
posted by rdr at 7:24 AM on May 30, 2018

"And ... I had to buy the medium-sized jacuzzi!"--Weird Al
posted by Melismata at 7:26 AM on May 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

I don't think the moral of this story is; fuck those lighting techs, they're fungible.

At least they're in show business!
posted by thelonius at 7:26 AM on May 30, 2018

Twitter should take this shit seriously…

Hahahahahaha—oh I'm sorry, you weren't finished.

…and ban her account.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Twitter is run by nazis.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:43 AM on May 30, 2018 [18 favorites]

In Roseanne’s defense, it’s hard to know the difference between racism that gets you fired versus racism that gets you elected President of the United States.
posted by cooker girl at 7:45 AM on May 30, 2018 [48 favorites]

yeah, the difference is you have to have the Russian chaos agents working for you, instead of just believing what they say
posted by Countess Elena at 7:47 AM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

There are a lot of people who work on television shows who aren't actors. A lot of them are people who don't have the luxury of choosing to turn down work because the lead actor of the show they are the lighting tech on transformed into a massive asshole.

As mentioned, I think it was pretty clear we're talking about the cast, not the crew. All it took was Goodman or Metcalf saying "Look, I love you all, but I don't think we should do this", and it would likely leave ABC slightly cold over it, and they would go back to their successful careers. Instead, Gilbert insisted on it and they followed.
The crew? Instead of this shitshow, they would be working on any pilot ABC didn't pick over it. The ABC Tuesday whatever PM slot had to be filled anyway, the reason they're now out of a work it's because the cast decided to work with a racist with a tendency to make everyone sure of that.
posted by lmfsilva at 7:49 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

This is amazing. Sanofi makes Ambien.

Sanofi US
People of all races, religions and nationalities work at Sanofi every day to improve the lives of people around the world. While all pharmaceutical treatments have side effects, racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.
posted by chris24 at 7:50 AM on May 30, 2018 [105 favorites]

Ambien disinhibits people. The echo chamber of social media disinhibits people. Trump’s election has disinhibited a nation of bigots who think it’s now ok to speak openly about thoughts they have always held but previously were too ashamed to share publicly.

My personal arc born into a blue collar white racist family hearing all the racist jokes with pictures of white Jesus on the wall, was that sometime, maybe around ten years old in a school that included a lot of Hispanic- and Asian- and African-American kids, maybe I shouldn’t freely say the things that were automatically conditioned to pop into my head because it would hurt my friends and create adverse repercussions for me.

Inhibition is a good thing because it allows you space to step back and think about that thought that popped into your head and what saying it would mean. I’ve spent the last 38 years trying to deprogram myself. Having mixed race kids just before Trump was elected and watching my parents come out of their shells to become little mini Roseanne Barrs has hopefully solidified the rooting out of my own bias.

The opposite of inhibition is not thinking about what you say and do. It’s not just racism, it is, on a very basic level, stupidity.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 7:51 AM on May 30, 2018 [27 favorites]

That comment from Sanofi US is one of those times when I really, really want that Facebook Ha-ha emoji, instead of just a favorite button.
posted by Melismata at 7:53 AM on May 30, 2018 [11 favorites]

I am sorry to say that Ambien does not only not make you retroactively racist, it also does not make you buy yaks. (Still -- the tweet's cute, but I'm never going near that stuff.)
posted by Countess Elena at 7:59 AM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

I've been kind of hesitant to comment about Goodman, Metcalf, Sykes et al. out of fear that people might think that I was trying to excuse (not explain) their behavior, but the comments about Mel Gibson helped me focus that. While the support that some people have offered Gibson is explicable, if not exactly excusable (IIRC, Robert Downey, Jr. has talked about how Gibson had paid his insurance for Air America when Downey, because of his chronic substance abuse problems, was otherwise uninsurable and therefore unemployable), I've wondered how Jodie Foster has rationalized supporting Gibson, a notorious homophobe (among his other problems). I think that it's probably a combination of personal loyalty for whatever reason, and believing that, whatever bad behavior the person is displaying, it's somehow fixable.

Yeah, Goodman and Metcalf are big stars now, but not so much in 1988, despite having decent dramacred; Goodman only got sober in 2007. All of the regular cast are probably still getting checks for the original run. So they might have looked at Roseanne's behavior and thought, well, we've worked with worse people, and maybe she'll come around. And she still seems to be toggling between "yeah, I was wrong and awful", "The Ambien made me do it", and "Let me share with you the latest bullshit that my enablers have been feeding me." For someone more inclined to think of her kindly, it might be like watching Gollum and Sméagol talk to each other.
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:00 AM on May 30, 2018 [13 favorites]

.
posted by zaelic at 8:13 AM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

Twitter is run by nazis.

WTF? Don't say stupid shit like this. Or if you do, provide some evidence. I know the folks who run Twitter. They have many failings, but they are not nazis.
posted by Nelson at 8:16 AM on May 30, 2018 [4 favorites]

Not nazis, just okay with nazis
posted by phearlez at 8:21 AM on May 30, 2018 [41 favorites]

Nazi enablers, then.
posted by threetwentytwo at 8:22 AM on May 30, 2018 [41 favorites]

Twitter almost never bans nazis, except where law forces them to, in which case they ban nazis really well. Which is to say they can stop the nazis on twitter whenever they want to, but they almost never want to. We know this because they can do it, but they don't.

Twitter does, however, seem very quick to ban or punish people who are saying mean things about nazis. Which is to say that twitter wants to limit and punish people who oppose nazis.

Do you know what you call something that supports and nurtures nazis while limiting and punishing people who oppose nazis? You call it a nazi organization.

Twitter is run by the people who run twitter. You know what you call the people who run a nazi organization? Nazis.

If they want to stop being called nazis and racists and bigots and misogynists, they should do something crazy like limit and punish the nazis and racists and bigots and misogynists instead of limiting and punishing the decent people who oppose them.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 8:26 AM on May 30, 2018 [84 favorites]

If they don't want to be called nazis, they can stop acting like goddamn nazis. They have the power.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 8:31 AM on May 30, 2018 [18 favorites]

There's a part of me that feels bad when my knee-jerk aesthetic impressions of pop-culture figures happens to line up with well-documented, public ethical bankruptcy. I don't want the world to work that way. But, in this case, I can't complain about the result.
posted by eotvos at 8:33 AM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

@jackboot more like. See every single MeFi FPP about their terrible decision making for details.

/continues using the thing despite demonstrable horribleness but feels a bit bad about it. Perhaps next time they do something awful to bolster white suprrmisists will be the time I leave? Perhaps.
posted by Artw at 8:35 AM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

And hey, since you know them, maybe you could tell them that the way they're running their company makes them look like a bunch of nazis. If that's not who they are, maybe they'd want to do something about that.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 8:35 AM on May 30, 2018 [35 favorites]

Here comes the unsurprisingly gross hot take.

@realDonaldTrump
Bob Iger of ABC called Valerie Jarrett to let her know that “ABC does not tolerate comments like those” made by Roseanne Barr. Gee, he never called President Donald J. Trump to apologize for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC. Maybe I just didn’t get the call?
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:38 AM on May 30, 2018 [8 favorites]

Harsh, but also accurate. They selectively enforce their rules to support nazis and oppose anti-nazis. It's more than just malign neglect, it's definitely active collaboration.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 8:50 AM on May 30, 2018 [14 favorites]

Yeah, the Ambien thing is bullshit. Well, at least it wasn't the salvia divinorum thing. On the other hand, the PCP thing might have been a tad believeable...

... Here’s the sad thing. Ms. Barr’s tweet, while shocking, was not unbelievable. What was truly surprising was that a commercial TV network took action against a valuable star, quickly and definitively, and in plain words.

“Roseanne’s Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values, and we have decided to cancel her show,” the ABC entertainment president, Channing Dungey, said in a statement.

You could criticize ABC for working with Ms. Barr, who has a long history of offenses, especially since she joined Twitter. You could argue that the network was just trying to stave off bad publicity or boycotts. You could wonder if behind-the-scenes troubles or declining ratings (common to many TV revivals) played a role.

But credit where due: ABC canceled its highest-rated show, a linchpin of its fall schedule, as a stand against its star’s racism. That decision will probably cut into the network’s advertising profits. There may be no perfect moral actors in this world, but that’s still a moral action.
Roseanne Barr Crosses a Line, and ABC Draws One

posted by y2karl at 8:54 AM on May 30, 2018 [8 favorites]

Rust Moranis: "Here comes the unsurprisingly gross hot take.

@realDonaldTrump
Bob Iger of ABC called Valerie Jarrett to let her know that “ABC does not tolerate comments like those” made by Roseanne Barr. Gee, he never called President Donald J. Trump to apologize for the HORRIBLE statements made and said about me on ABC. Maybe I just didn’t get the call?"

Of course he made it all about himself.
posted by octothorpe at 8:57 AM on May 30, 2018 [12 favorites]

So part of my knee-jerk thing about "Twitter is run by nazis" is that it insults people I know. I should just let that go. The larger problem is that saying something so reductive and ill-informed makes the problem sound simple. But it's not simple. The terrible thing about Twitter is how a company run by well-intentioned mostly-not-racist people can end up being such a powerful tool for racists, demagogues, and actual Nazis. The folks who work there are distraught by that problem too. And are working to make it better. Not very effectively, IMHO, from the half-time CEO on down. But that just makes it worse to me. What if all large Internet communication mediums are doomed to be taken over by Nazis? That's what scares me about Twitter and Facebook policy right now.

This whole Twitter-Nazi thing is a bit of a derail from the Roseanne discussion. But I do wonder how they continue to allow an account like hers. She mostly avoids outright racist jokes other than the occasional show-ending exception. But the broader thing of her spreading QAnon conspiracies and right wing hate is awful and I hate to see Twitter play a role in it.
posted by Nelson at 8:58 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

Your mates need to step the fuck up. The end.
posted by Artw at 9:01 AM on May 30, 2018 [75 favorites]

I mean, if the people you know are high enough level to have input into how twitter is run, maybe talk to them about how they are collaborators with Nazis and if being called Nazis makes them so sad, they should probably not have let the Nazi problem on twitter continue for so many years.

If they're not that high a level, no one is really talking about them.
posted by jeather at 9:02 AM on May 30, 2018 [37 favorites]

They are 100% capable of effectively shutting down nazis, because they do it quite successfully in countries (Germany) where they are legally required to. It's not inability, it's unwillingness. Online communication does not inevitably devolve into a swamp of violent misogyny, criminal harassment, and unchecked authoritarianism. (Just look at MetaFilter.) The state of Twitter is the result of conscious choices made by the people who run it.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 9:05 AM on May 30, 2018 [56 favorites]

I have reasonably assumed that the returning cast of Roseanne isn't getting a whole lot of jobs elsewhere and also needed the work.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:05 AM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

Just a nudge here, it's fine to criticize Twitter, but let's not turn this into a multi-round escalating "but they're my friends"/"you must answer for your friends" thing focusing on one member here personally; it's a bad direction for a thread to go, so Nelson and others please let's drop that angle. Let's keep the focus on the Roseanne situation.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:08 AM on May 30, 2018 [12 favorites]

For those who think that crew members can just easily go on to some other job on some other show (and/or that "they're fine" because they're in a union):

Q: Everyone on staff is now in an unusual predicament where staffing season for broadcast has largely been completed. Do you know if you're going to be paid for the canceled season? Severance pay? Has ABC told you if the writing staff, rest of the cast and crew will be compensated?

A: No. Everybody is still in shock at how quickly this all went down. It's unfortunate because the writers did pass on other jobs to take this job and nobody really knows yet what kind of compensation they're going to get. Everybody is a little bit on edge about how it's going to turn out. But we all know it's a wasted opportunity to write more episodes.

posted by the return of the thin white sock at 9:09 AM on May 30, 2018 [4 favorites]

I wonder if Metcalf, Goodman, and Gilbert have been so steeped in abusive showbiz environments (including the original run of Roseanne) that they did a poor job of distinguishing between what's normal and Roseanne. I mean, we've all heard some horrific stories, and not just of sexual abuse.
posted by Mavri at 9:11 AM on May 30, 2018 [9 favorites]

Shonda Rhimes has thoughts, y'all. She's also retweeting a bunch of choice stuff, so she's all over this.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:13 AM on May 30, 2018 [9 favorites]

Shonda Rhimes and Channing Dungey are friends, so no surprise that she's on this.
posted by Sophie1 at 9:22 AM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

I am enjoying Shonda enjoying this.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:23 AM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

For the "The crew is in no way personally or morally responsible for their actions in becoming involved with this shit show" crowd:

Just how ugly does a production have to get before you *do* hold people to have some responsibility? E.G. Can I take work on a KKK propaganda flick because I’m just a lighting tech and I need work?

Not to say that Roseanne falls in that category, I’d just like to know if there’s a line where needing work collides with the morality of taking that work.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 9:26 AM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

ABC Exec: Reboots of classic shows are all the rage. How about we bring back Roseanne?
Intern: Isn't she... kinda racist now?
ABC Exec: Yeah, but we'll hire the co-creator of Two Broke Girls to work with her.
Intern: Ummmmmmmm...
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:30 AM on May 30, 2018 [10 favorites]

Ambien Maker Denounces Roseanne Barr For Blaming Racist Tweet On Insomnia Drug

People of all races, religions and nationalities work at Sanofi every day to improve the lives of people around the world. While all pharmaceutical treatments have side effects, racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication.

posted by kirkaracha at 9:35 AM on May 30, 2018 [15 favorites]

Just how ugly does a production have to get before you *do* hold people to have some responsibility? E.G. Can I take work on a KKK propaganda flick because I’m just a lighting tech and I need work?

My son is a lighting tech, mostly in stage but he's done film and TV work. There was a controversy about a white supremacist metal band in the area and I asked him what he'd do if he found out the band he was hired to light for was racist. He said he'd walk immediately, "I don't work for Nazis".
posted by octothorpe at 9:36 AM on May 30, 2018 [31 favorites]

"....racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication."

DAAAAAAAAAMN. That's good.
posted by zarq at 9:37 AM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

@IChotiner:
Interesting to think about how the country would be different today if NBC had fired Trump after his birther remarks, and if he’d then become persona non grata on tv generally. Actually it’s not interesting: Trump simply wouldn’t be president.
posted by Atom Eyes at 9:39 AM on May 30, 2018 [66 favorites]

For a good listen, check out the latest episode of Make Me Smart, in which Molly and Kai bring on a business ethics professor to discuss Roseanne's tweet and what ABC's response should be, and then find out mid-conversation that they have already condemned her and cancelled the show.
posted by Flannery Culp at 9:49 AM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

Just how ugly does a production have to get before you *do* hold people to have some responsibility? E.G. Can I take work on a KKK propaganda flick because I’m just a lighting tech and I need work?

Not to say that Roseanne falls in that category, I’d just like to know if there’s a line where needing work collides with the morality of taking that work.

If you concede that Roseanne isn't the same as a KKK propaganda flick, then your question is a derail. (And if your hypothetical professional lighting tech is in IATSE, then the question is almost certainly moot, because the Klan's not exactly inclined to stage a union shoot.)
posted by the return of the thin white sock at 9:57 AM on May 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

I mean . . . my spouse and I watched and enjoyed the reboot (am I allowed to say that?) We actually watched the remaining episodes last night knowing it was going to probably be taken off OnDemand soon. It was a generally progressive show that seemed poised to make a progressive statement without alienating conservatively-aligned viewers. I can easily imagine that people--like Sara Gilbert, an out queer woman!--thought they'd be doing good by working with her.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 10:08 AM on May 30, 2018 [7 favorites]

It was a generally progressive show that seemed poised to make a progressive statement without alienating conservatively-aligned viewers.

If that's the case, they ran a gambit that didn't play out, as gambits sometimes do.
posted by rhizome at 10:12 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

From Joss Whedon, one time writer & story editor for Roseanne

@joss: Excited for the literally anything else that Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman will do now

posted by ZeusHumms at 10:32 AM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

Not that interested in what a serial predator has to say about a serial racist, to be honest.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 10:38 AM on May 30, 2018 [38 favorites]

The Onion: ABC Criticized For Unrealistic Portrayal Of Racists Actually Facing Consequences
posted by zombieflanders at 10:44 AM on May 30, 2018 [45 favorites]

I mean, in a just world Whedon would be no more employable than Roseanne is. This is a man who serially exploited his young female fans for sex, while continuously lying and concealing his adultery from his wife, for fifteen years. He's certainly persona non grata in my house.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 10:59 AM on May 30, 2018 [28 favorites]

I mean, and it's a telling fact that this comment hasn't popped up as a, ya'know, actual possibility in the real world we live in [because it's not] but re: the paychecks of however many writers, crew, and others involved that are impacted here.... ABC could just, and I'm just going to say it, fucking pay them anyway.

I don't think anyone here, in this particular thread, would say that ABC didn't roll the dice with starting this, rather dangerous but potentially very profitable, train rolling down the track. That being the case, and yes I know they're already doing a good thing by canceling and taking the hit fiscally for lost ads and what things may come, imagine the press and goodwill they'd generate if they pegged the dial in the other direction from exploiting racist conservatives for their sweet, sweet dollars and said something on the order of

"We look forward to honoring any and all working agreements with employees or contractors who are facing negative consequences due to our, in hindsight very ill advised and short-sighted, involvement with Roseanne Barr. We look forward to paying you for the work you've already done as well as any work you would reasonably have expected to do for the upcoming season. Worst case scenario we might ask you to donate some hours in your field of expertise to local charities, on our dime, while you figure out what works best for you next."

Imagine if we lived in that world. I don't know enough about the industry to know how much that would likely cost, nor am I an expert in finances as they appear for the company just now, but I like to think that's what I'd do if I was in charge of things. That probably explains why I'll never be in charge of things, I suppose.
posted by RolandOfEld at 11:02 AM on May 30, 2018 [19 favorites]

ABC might put costars in new show

There could be a scenario in the works where ABC salvages significant parts of Roseanne without having to say goodbye to some of the best actors on television(here’s looking at you, Laurie Metcalf and John Goodman). Though ABC made a swift decision Tuesday to cancel the successful reboot, EW has learned that ABC has not exactly washed its hands of the family comedy.

After ABC ordered a second season of Roseanne in March, EW confirmed that the cast options were picked up for another 13 episodes. Carsey-Werner, which produces the sitcom for ABC, is still on the hook for paying those salaries. And since ABC ordered a new season, it bears its own financial brunt from the cancellation. So keeping some kind of show intact wouldn’t be the worst decision for ABC.

posted by guiseroom at 11:21 AM on May 30, 2018

One deleted. If you're not trolling, act like it, and if you're not familiar with Jarrett or the history of 'ape' as a racist dogwhistle, probably better to let this one go by.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 11:31 AM on May 30, 2018 [18 favorites]

Maybe Dan can wake up from a dream and it's revealed that Roseanne passed away after suffering a massive coronary while screaming racist chants at a Trump rally.
posted by PenDevil at 11:31 AM on May 30, 2018 [31 favorites]

Cast options I notice. I certainly hope Carsey-Werner, whose list of shows might indicate they're not doing all that badly, are making good on the employment for the "grunts" too.
posted by phearlez at 11:45 AM on May 30, 2018

Also from the Onion: Showrunner Disappointed World Will Never See Episode Where Roseanne Blows Open Seth Rich Murder
posted by neroli at 11:47 AM on May 30, 2018 [15 favorites]

So I've been following the Roseanne cancellation since it happened. Like, yesterday, I was trolling down the politics megathread, as one does, and I saw "Roseanne is off the air", and I literally shouted with joy. "YES! OMG [girlfriend who isn't American's name] THIS IS THE BEST NEWS! MY PEOPLE AREN'T SHIT!" Then we talked about what the show meant to me, watched some clips from the original, tried to find some choice nastiness from the new one but failed but did look at Twitter...and that's where I just...I mean how do you explain this shit to someone who's not in the loop on the American context? She got the gist of what's up with Roseanne, but didn't get the sheer bile. She was like, "So a famous person goes crazy, so what? Happens all the time." I said "hold my beer."

Today, this comment:

She's also blaming Michelle Obama for getting her fired, because need more racism.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:56 PM on May 30 [3 favorites +] [!]

Her, "OMFG. What the fuck. They let this person on TV? What's wrong with Americans! And obviously other countries are stupid but that is just not even anywhere close to true or okay! WTF!" Similar reaction when I told her the president of ABC is a black woman. "If your boss is one of the minority, and cynically agrees to the racist cash-in, WTF! That's the stupidest of stupid! Stop being racist at least long enough to get the paycheck you stupid human!"

So like, granted, this is a person who knows who Michelle Obama is, but beyond that, this is a human isolated and apart from the American cultural context, and it took all of half an hour for Roseanne to completely make an ass of herself, with all the distaste I've felt for years. We had an interesting conversation about shitty politicians, pundits, and celebrities from her country, and while I can't say I feel her visceral dislike of them, I can say I know exactly what visceral dislike feels like. Thank you, Roseanne, for all you do to make humans of every color, creed, and nation hate shitty people, and for your ur-typing of just the shittiest of people.
posted by saysthis at 11:58 AM on May 30, 2018

It was a generally progressive show that seemed poised to make a progressive statement without alienating conservatively-aligned viewers.

My Muslim friends did not see it that way. The terrorism episode just reminded them that they are othered by a substantial portion of this country and are expected to be subservient or face harassment.
posted by Candleman at 12:10 PM on May 30, 2018 [32 favorites]

On top of the Islamophobia (as if that isn't enough), the show wasn't making a progressive statement, as the finale made clear: The Roseanne Season Finale Is a Fairy Tale. The plot hinged around everything going wrong as Roseanne rejected the kinds of government policies that mean people in other wealthy countries don't have to worry about affording medically necessary surgery, but then the family celebrates when they learn their flooded house means they'll get FEMA money. Disaster relief funds are apparently for the deserving, but not money for health care. Oh, and instead of speaking some real truths about a pressing issue that ought to transcend partisanship, her painkiller addiction just disappeared.

There's nothing remotely progressive about the message that it's ok if struggling working class families can't afford health care, but they can wait around for a flood.
posted by zachlipton at 12:34 PM on May 30, 2018 [15 favorites]

I have more to say, this about concern for the crew.

So I work in the film industry...well it sounds like I do, and I technically do, but actually I just translate stuff from one country's film industry to another's. Literally I am "the messenger". Shitty or not, fail or success, I get paid, I'm on a per-project basis, and my income is varied enough that I'm not bound to any one employer, or even 2-3. I have dozens. I pick and choose. None of them are gonna make or break my paycheck (except exceptions, in which case I judge them accordingly).

I've seen Clerks and know clearly the Death Star contractor position. What I have to say in that regard is this: when I practice my craft, I work for lots of people, some highly professional, some less so, most not risky, some honestly risky, a good portion not odious, but occasionally I even translate for Asian racists who target white Americans, of which I am one, as well as blatant apologists for authoritarianism and opponents of democracy, of which I am both a participant and a proponent. For me, before the cleave of "should I be helping this person at all", the preceding judgment is "will the audience understand". Not "approve", just "understand". People aren't stupid. My job is to deliver a message, a message I see the entire content of, and which I am entirely free to refuse to deliver.

From what I've seen of other Hollywood technical types, they're doing the job they're hired to do, and they're mostly content-agnostic as long as the money is right. That is, of course, unless you're delivering something horrific and your refusal to do so will make a difference. It's the making the difference that's key. I have definitely turned down jobs from certain vile people and accepted them from others. I cannot realistically silence the Chinese government, so I take the money and hopefully spend it where I can make a difference. There is the occasional pundit employed by them who reaches out to me with a personal project, and I politely say no when the personal project is nasty vile shittiness. I have a reputation for being able to bring long shots to the non-Chinese world, and I curate that reputation. Time traveling Genghis Khan yes, Venezuelan natives should unite around Xi Jinping and overthrow their oppressors no. I don't know what I'm looking at until I'm actually deep in contract negotiations and reading the document, but I also don't know how will things will turn out until we're far past me committing to a job.

My moral compass comes down to whether I think I can realistically bend the moral arc of the universe in the right direction. If I can't, that's up to the audience. I don't know how that impacts your feelings for the people who work on the show, but I offer it for contemplation.
posted by saysthis at 12:38 PM on May 30, 2018 [16 favorites]

@therealroseanne
you guys make me feel like fighting back. I will examine all of my options carefully and get back to U.

This is a great case study on Twitter's positive feedback loop of radicalization, and that of social media as a whole. It's not just that being banned would keep her from embarrassing herself further and from influencing her followers more: not banning her also allows her to be influenced by her followers into doing whatever horrible shit she's now "examining among her options." Twitter is responsible for letting this happen.
posted by Rust Moranis at 12:52 PM on May 30, 2018 [28 favorites]

...I have, as of late, been thinking a lot about such policing and how, historically, black people have negotiated white entitlement to their bodies. The “Negro Motorist Green Book” was an annual guidebook curated during the Jim Crow era to let black people know where they could safely find gas, food and lodging while traveling across the United States by car. The “Green Book” was created out of necessity, and though it ceased publication in 1966, recent events have made it clear that there is still a need for some kind of guidebook detailing where it is safe to be black. Recent events have made it clear that such a guidebook would be a very slender volume indeed.

Lolade Siyonbola, a black Yale graduate student, was napping in her dorm’s common room when a white woman came upon her, told Ms. Siyonbola she couldn’t sleep there and called the police...

In Southern California, three black women were checking out of an Airbnb rental and loading their luggage into the car when they were suddenly surrounded by police cars..

Three black teenagers in St. Louis shopping for a prom at a Nordstrom’s Rack were followed by two store employees throughout their time there. When the teenagers left the store with their purchases, the police were waiting.

Five black women were golfing in Pennsylvania when the police were called because the women were, purportedly, golfing too slowly.

Some black people were having a barbecue in an Oakland, Calif., public space and a white woman called the police on them for using a charcoal grill.

In Philadelphia last month, two black men waiting for a business meeting with a third person in a Starbucks were arrested for sitting in a Starbucks while black...

In each of these encounters, white people took it upon themselves to police black bodies in public spaces. They felt entitled to do so because of racism, which they used to delineate the borders of what they arbitrarily determined as acceptable behavior for black people. They felt this entitlement because that’s what racism does — it allows one group of people to feel superior to and imagine dominion over another.

‘Roseanne’ Is Gone, but the Culture That Gave Her a Show Isn’t
posted by y2karl at 12:53 PM on May 30, 2018 [34 favorites]

This TV Guide cover hasn't aged well.
posted by octothorpe at 1:26 PM on May 30, 2018 [11 favorites]

This is fake right?

Facebook page for USAPressSecretary:

If Roseanne is interested in working in the White House, the President will make sure she has a place here. He remains her biggest fan, because she’s not afraid to say what real Americans are thinking

Please someone tell me this isn't real.
posted by papercrane at 1:31 PM on May 30, 2018

"Real Americans are racists." Got it.
posted by rhizome at 1:34 PM on May 30, 2018 [4 favorites]

This is fake right?

I'm dubious... no blue checkmark. The about page says: "My official page was hacked on April 30th, so I've created this personal page for the time being. Thank you for visiting and God bless!" I would assume it's fake until proven otherwise.
posted by Roommate at 1:36 PM on May 30, 2018 [7 favorites]

My Muslim friends did not see it that way. The terrorism episode just reminded them that they are othered by a substantial portion of this country and are expected to be subservient or face harassment.

We watched that episode last night and it ends with Roseanne defending her Muslim neighbor and letting her use her food stamps because she's realized she's wrong. And like, I get that many of us want to be beyond the necessity of racists being taught other groups have humanity (like I would rather not there need to be an ongoing plotline about a gender non-conforming kid both really being a boy and having a right to express himself however he sees fit) but every interaction with my mother in law says otherwise. I do think that we need shows that can bridge this gap--as a queer gendernonconforming person myself--and maybe this wasn't the show or the celebrity to do it but I can still really, really see how Gilbert and others thought they were doing good here.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 1:41 PM on May 30, 2018 [4 favorites]

I'm dubious... no blue checkmark. The about page says: "My official page was hacked on April 30th, so I've created this personal page for the time being. Thank you for visiting and God bless!" I would assume it's fake until proven otherwise.

Thank you, I've reported it Facebook. Hopefully, it will get enough attention that they'll delete it. Odd that they don't have a clear "Impersonating someone" option, best match is choosing "This is a scam" and then "This is fake". Not a great UX if you want to encourage people to report things like this.
posted by papercrane at 1:44 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

I felt the same way about the show, Pho, but I now realize that I was wrong. And it sucks. Not because being wrong sucks, but because I want to believe that people are doing their best.

Unfortunately, sitting in silence when your old racist auntie is talking isn't doing your best...especially when your old racist auntie isn't related to you and you two are sharing a national platform on which they spout their utter nonsense.
posted by elsietheeel at 1:50 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

We watched that episode last night and it ends with Roseanne defending her Muslim neighbor and letting her use her food stamps because she's realized she's wrong.

I don't disagree that there needs to be room for people to be wrong and improve - fictional people too, both for the sake of entertainment and so people can learn - but I question whether this was a case where improvement and acknowledgement happened in a real way. So she comes around to helping these people, who she originally assumed were making bombs because they're Muslim. Does she acknowledge her racism, or is this just another oh look, when it's one on one the bigot can learn to love sort of narrative? Because I'd argue there's nothing progressive about the latter. That's apologia. It's hey look we may assume the worst about you but once you invest the time to placate us and assure us that our worst assumptions about you aren't right then we'll be cool.

"We'll be nice to you if you're One Of The Good Ones" isn't progressive.
posted by phearlez at 2:16 PM on May 30, 2018 [47 favorites]

the necessity of racists being taught other groups have humanity

The problem is that it doesn't do that, it sort of teaches that other groups have humanity if they do stuff for you rather than simply for being human. A progressive way to show that other groups have humanity would have been to have neighbors that were Muslim and have it be completely unremarked on by the Tanner family, other than maybe wishing them Ramadan Kareem or whatever.

I'm curious if they consulted with any Muslim American groups for potential problems when they wrote the script, because I can't imagine any group that's dedicated to improving cultural relations from the Muslim side giving this a thumbs up. And if not, I hope they learned a lesson going forward.
posted by Candleman at 2:37 PM on May 30, 2018 [5 favorites]

There's also no acknowledgement that you can't separate being nice to a Muslim family once you get to know them and stop thinking they're terrorists from having a MAGA hat on your set. If you put on that hat, you're aligning yourself with someone who called to ban all Muslims from the country and who has repeatedly sought to put that into practice to the extent he practically could. Being nice to your neighbors is swell, but it doesn't cancel out the harm you're doing on a much larger scale.

The show stands for the mistaken belief that politics can be separated from the personal. We're left with the idea that it's nice she's come around to helping her neighbor, and it's never mentioned that she's still advancing government bigotry against millions of her neighbors.
posted by zachlipton at 2:39 PM on May 30, 2018 [31 favorites]

The problem is that it doesn't do that, it sort of teaches that other groups have humanity if they do stuff for you rather than simply for being human.

I don't think this reaches the rationale. Racists believe in race, in genetic differences between people of different skin colors, which don't exist. This means that other races are "human" (pace dehumanizing "animal" talk), they're just not as good as white people.

So, it's a value-of-life argument, not a state-of-humanity one.
posted by rhizome at 2:51 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'm very glad to follow two of the best 'Hollywood Bloggers', both of whom have careers going back over 40 years.

Mark Evanier, best known for comic books and cartoons but a writer of all kinds of stuff, added to my comments about Roseanne's standup and her longtime attitude with his own experience.

My precious comment also mentioned the Exec Producers, Carsey and Werner, as making the show work in spite of Roseanne. Well, Ken Levine, a sitcom writer/producer whose credits include M*A*S*H and Cheers, (you don't get more credible than that) pointed out that they are essentially TV's biggest enablers of bad-egg stars, going back to Cosby.
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:57 PM on May 30, 2018 [19 favorites]

Does she acknowledge her racism, or is this just another oh look, when it's one on one the bigot can learn to love sort of narrative?

It felt like an acknowledgement to me, but I guess that's subjective?

Like I said, I don't think the show was successful at this, I don't think Roseanne was the person to hang that kind of message on (she is terrifically unstable), but I really do think Gilbert was trying to do something that went beyond Roseanne here, and I think it's a shame Roseanne screwed it up for everybody.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 2:58 PM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

In each of these encounters, white people took it upon themselves to police black bodies in public spaces. They felt entitled to do so because of racism, which they used to delineate the borders of what they arbitrarily determined as acceptable behavior for black people.

The list could, unfortunately, go on and on. There's the recent Brennan Walker incident where Brennan, a 14 year old while black, knocked on a door to ask for directions to his high school and was almost killed for it.

And today we had the Global Village Idiot and his gang talking about double fucking standards. I'm not surprised by all of this but the injustice, stupidity, and absurdity of it all (again another list that could go on and on) is terrifying.
posted by juiceCake at 3:05 PM on May 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

Not to be outdone and feeling left out, the demented man-child currently occupying the White House chimed in with the following: "Where's my apology from ABC?" We have a president who likens media criticism and satire of him to accusing a holocaust survivor of being a former nazi. The kicker is it's far from certain that we'll be rid of the fucker anytime soon.
posted by DavidfromBA at 4:45 PM on May 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

octothorpe: This TV Guide cover hasn't aged well.

"Did you say 'racist'? Never mind; hold my beer…"
posted by Pinback at 4:56 PM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

I have some sympathy for the producers and cast members, or well, kinda, just because it's really, really, really, really hard to know what the message of a piece will be. Speaking as someone who's worked on small films. At best, you know what message you're aiming for - sometimes you don't - but you don't know what you've actually achieved until it comes out of the edit. And the cast, in particular, have no control over how their performance is used - I have a ton of sympathy for them. A lot of films depict bad things, like rape, slavery, torture, JFC so much torture. It's easy to think you're making something thoughtful like The Hurt Locker and then end up with something like American Sniper.

In this case in particular, it feels like it should have been an easy choice just because of how nuts Roseanne Barr has gotten But with any other project, a single crazy cast member or producer would be managed by the team of producers pulling the other way. A single person wouldn't normally be enough to make a show toxic. It was, in this case, only because it was Roseanne. It makes sense to me that the other returning cast members would think they could manage her. Idk.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 5:15 PM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

But with any other project, a single crazy cast member or producer would be managed by the team of producers pulling the other way. A single person wouldn't normally be enough to make a show toxic. It was, in this case, only because it was Roseanne. It makes sense to me that the other returning cast members would think they could manage her.

Yeah, but in this day and age we see how well that works with the White House.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:54 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

oneswellfoop, thanks for those links. That anecdote by Evanier is telling, and it's especially painful that the comic that she pre-empted was Dennis Wolfberg, someone who was way funnier than Roseanne and died way too soon and was negotiating for his own sitcom when he died.

And I'd been thinking of looking up what Levine had to say about this mess; I liked his response to a piece that she'd written for New York when Charlie Sheen was having his public meltdown; the ostensible reason for that was that Chuck Lorre used to work for her, but it quickly turned into a lengthy recitation of old grudges that, if it was intended to be a vindication of her, had the exact opposite effect. She deleted her response to Levine--as she does some of her more awful stuff, after it's had its impact--but Levine's counterresponse is still up.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:32 PM on May 30, 2018 [7 favorites]

and I think it's a shame Roseanne screwed it up for everybody.

her name, her show, her self, her train wreck.

This is another of those media moments where I find myself hoping that the zombie apocalypse doesn't happen too soon, that Ms. Barr weathers her current storms well enough to eventually look back on all of this with at least some humility and lucidity ... and come clean on what the actual f*** she was thinking.

I'd buy that tell-all.
posted by philip-random at 8:05 PM on May 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

According to one writer at Levine’s blog, back in the day Roseanne created a hostile work environment for writers by, among other things, “literally farting on table drafts.”
posted by Countess Elena at 8:08 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'd buy that tell-all.

Why in God's name would you do that to yourself?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:24 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

because I love disaster stories.
posted by philip-random at 8:31 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

So, despite not watching the reboot, and not really paying attention to Roseanne since her marriage to Loudy McLoudyson, I have totally fallen down the Roseanne rabbit hole of doom. Like, I'm pretty sure I decided to distract myself from the politics thread, because...because politics, and now I find myself so deep in this story and the connecting threads that I swear before Bob, I may need an intervention.

So many questions. So many. Like, there was some multipage article I read, linked here, where Roseanne just slags off on Casey Werner so hard, so hard. Pretty much calls the woman a high heeled bimbo who sucks up and punches down. And yet, they were willing to produce her again? I mean, everyone from the original show talked about what a nightmare she was, and yet...they all went back.

And I had no idea Wanda Sykes was connected to this disaster of pseudo-populist porn. I have so many questions about that. I cannot even imagine why someone who presents as Wanda presents would have anything to do with someone as toxic as Roseanne clearly is.

But mostly, I want to know what turned Roseanne from a lefty feminist who was anti corporal punishment, pro environment, pro Palestinian even while proudly being Jewish into a alt-right maga-phone promoting anti-vax nonsense and spouting racist tirades.

Because whatever that brain worm is, I want desperately to avoid it.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 8:36 PM on May 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

I have some sympathy for the producers and cast members, or well, kinda,

That's one thing I don't have really, having spent enough time in and around and on the fringes of the Hollywood Dream Machine to know that pretty much everyone* involved is there by choice, chasing fame and/or glory and/or vast amounts of power and cash. It's just not a very nice place and everybody involved is somewhat to blame because none of them really needs to be there.

I mean, everyone from the original show talked about what a nightmare she was, and yet...they all went back.

case in point.

*excepting the genuinely insane ones, and the folks who were born there, in greater LA.
posted by philip-random at 8:48 PM on May 30, 2018 [1 favorite]

I want to know what turned Roseanne from a lefty feminist who was anti corporal punishment, pro environment, pro Palestinian even while proudly being Jewish into a alt-right maga-phone […]

Probably her mental illness combined with her enormous wealth. She sounded a bit odd in interviews even during the original series, but once people reach a certain level of wealth they often become caricatures of their former selves. I think it's probably because the people who used to say no to them – their friends, their doctors, and their colleagues or employers – are driven out by better friends, better doctors, better whatevers, who are gloriously eager to be around them and supply all their physical and emotional needs and never, ever tell them what to do.
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:00 AM on May 31, 2018 [12 favorites]

We regret to inform you the walrus is racist.
posted by roystgnr at 5:38 AM on May 31, 2018 [8 favorites]

But mostly, I want to know what turned Roseanne from a lefty feminist who was anti corporal punishment, pro environment, pro Palestinian even while proudly being Jewish into a alt-right maga-phone promoting anti-vax nonsense and spouting racist tirades.

The thing was, Roseanne Barr was not "pro Palestinian" -- at least not in terms of being against Israel's existence. Descriptions of her as an anti-Zionist were wrong as well. She used to (and still does) talk about making aliyah.

This is the last interview I remember seeing with her about Israel and Gaza. It's from 2010. Much of what she said would resonate with many American Jews. She's clearly afraid that Israel's treatment of the Palestinians is going to end in tragedy for Israel. She hated necons and the Israeli government.

So with regard to Israel, Roseanne seemed more pro-peace than anything else. And she was, like many Jews in the diaspora, horrified by the way the Palestinians were being treated by Israel and called for them to stop. To end sanctions, Settlements, human rights violations and military attacks. She used to speak about creating a network of Jewish grandmothers worldwide that would step in and slap some sense into neocons.

But she's always been a supporter of Israel's existence as a refuge for Jews.

Then BDS happened. She spent time over the last few years making trips to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. Railing about how anti-semitic she feels BDS is. She obviously felt that Israel's existence is threatened.

Knowing this, even though I don't personally agree with her, her change in attitudes feels somewhat more organic and less attributable to neocon brain worms. She was never Phillip Weiss or on the other end of the spectrum, Netanyahu. She was, like many of the rest of us, somewhere in between and probably still is.
posted by zarq at 8:38 AM on May 31, 2018 [1 favorite]

Thanks to oneswellfoop's links, I'm now worried about exactly how much of a loose cannon Brett Butler was (I really liked Grace Under Fire!). And on Cybill...was it Cybill Shepherd? Oh noooo.
posted by PussKillian at 9:12 AM on May 31, 2018 [2 favorites]

I'm now worried about exactly how much of a loose cannon Brett Butler was (I really liked Grace Under Fire!).

Butler had difficulties with alcoholism and substance abuse. During the show's run she did a stint in rehab for an addiction to pain killers. Chuck Lorre tried to sue Carsey-Werner at one point, alleging "that an executive producer and at least two and possibly three supporting cast members received large cash settlements to resolve their claims of sexual harassment and emotional and verbal abuse" by Butler.

She also reportedly exposed herself at least once to her male co-stars, including the 12 year old actor who played her eldest son on the show, the late Jon Paul Steuer, prompting him to quit. And he didn't just quit the show but acting altogether. The studio replaced him with another actor.
posted by zarq at 9:25 AM on May 31, 2018 [11 favorites]

@Not a Wolf: LISTEN I KNOW THERE ARE A LOT OF COOL DRUGS OUT THERE BUT HAVE YOU TRIED WATCHING A RACIST GET HER TV SHOW CANCELLED?
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:27 AM on May 31, 2018 [18 favorites]

All Reba ever did was make people listen to her sing Fancy.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 9:28 AM on May 31, 2018 [2 favorites]

@saladinahmed:
every time y'all suddenly discover some celebrity is racist it's someone who's been saying deeply, explicitly, unapologetically racist stuff about Arabs for years

@saladinahmed:
DID YOU KNOW BILL MAHER- yes, we did

CAN YOU BELIEVE ROSEANNE- yes, we can

etc
posted by Artw at 9:55 AM on May 31, 2018 [24 favorites]

Was trying to see if Maher had announced Barr as a guest or not and spotted this: An Open Letter to Roseanne. A "New Rules" segment from April.

For once, he's not punching down.
posted by zarq at 11:23 AM on May 31, 2018 [2 favorites]

This article by Original Becky Lecy Goranson came out around the time the reboot premiered. It's in a feminist online magazine, so the tone is very much "this person is problematic, but the reboot of the show is about the ensemble and still empowering". There's a lot of hand-waving about how "difficult" Roseanne was and is (some of the original writers who were fired were invited back! she taught her TV kids how to stand up to The Man!) and an emphasis on the idea that powerful women are often criticized for being divas, bitches, etc. I certainly remember the latter as the feminist defense of Roseanne around the original show -- at least before more about the degree of her terrible behavior came out -- and especially before Tom Arnold, who was blamed for a lot of her shittiness.

I mean, Goranson sounds as if she had a huge case of willful ignorance about the degree of Roseanne's awfulness and was going into the thing with giant rose-colored glasses on. There's obviously a degree of "the feminists used to like the show and we want them to watch it again" happening as well, but Dame magazine isn't exactly Teen Vogue (90s-me is laughing hysterically at that comparison), so it's a glimpse into the way some of the people involved may have persuaded themselves that they were making a wise move (besides the money, of course).
posted by camyram at 11:44 AM on May 31, 2018

The TERFy Guardian column set is all over the shows supposed values as well.

(Maher and Roseanne are both transphobes of course, which Twitter will tell you is the other tell. )
posted by Artw at 11:47 AM on May 31, 2018 [6 favorites]

For a show that championed America’s forgotten working-class families, the irony is that the biggest casualties of the cancellation will be the blue-collar employees — the below-the-line workers who built the sets, drove the trucks and wired the lighting. [...] Hit shows such as “Roseanne” are especially valuable because they provide long-term, steady employment to crews in an industry where steady employment is a rarity. [...] “This has got to have severe impact on the people working on that show,” Brown said. “They knew they were working on the No. 1-rated show in America. They were already making plans, maybe upgrading their homes or purchasing that one luxury item they’ve been saving up for all these years. They had a sense of security…. Now they’re in complete in shock mode.”

posted by the return of the thin white sock at 12:49 PM on May 31, 2018

Man, I wish Samantha Bee hadn't tripped up just now. I think her remark is substantially different than Roseanne's, but now there's pure both-sides-ism about it.

Roseanne made a racist remark about a race she does not belong to, punching down, and suggested a connection to a violent Islamic group, irresponsible hyperbole. Bee used a sexist term about a gender she does belong to, together with an assertion of opinion about a public figure that is, shall we say, not unsupported by the evidence. It's not six of one and half a dozen of the other. Still, I wish Bee had read the room. I don't know if her segment was prerecorded or not.
posted by Countess Elena at 1:00 PM on May 31, 2018 [3 favorites]

Thanks, zarq. Sigh.
posted by PussKillian at 1:21 PM on May 31, 2018 [1 favorite]

I mean, Goranson sounds as if she had a huge case of willful ignorance about the degree of Roseanne's awfulness and was going into the thing with giant rose-colored glasses on.

Goranson is also one of the two among the core cast who seemingly most need the work. If you look up net worth estimates of the cast Rosanne is at the top and Goodman is close behind. Chalke is also well-off, unsurprisingly after her long stretch as a lead in SCRUBS. Goranson and Fishman are the only two whose IMDB pages show nothing but a stretch of pretty small one-off roles. I can imagine a return to one of the biggest financial successes of her acting career can lead her to some mental gymnastics to convince herself This Time Will Be Different.
posted by phearlez at 1:32 PM on May 31, 2018 [4 favorites]

Man, I wish Samantha Bee hadn't tripped up just now.
It's not the first time SamBee drops a C bomb on the show, and I'm guessing TBS twisted her arm over it because of the circumstances. But when dealing with the right, you can't apologize from crossing a line they arbitrarily drawn in the sand under pale gaslight, as they are brazen, habitual line steppers over lines carved in stone but don't give a shit about them.
The real mistake was apologizing, as now it's a full-on streisand effect.
posted by lmfsilva at 1:47 PM on May 31, 2018 [14 favorites]

It's a really tough one. Right-wingers absolutely never argue in good faith about this kind of thing, and yet the c-word is a hard limit for a lot of people, as it should be. I absolutely hate it myself; it's a slur, but when a member of an out-group uses a slur, it takes a different connotation. And if there's one thing the right wing refuses to understand, it's that.
posted by Countess Elena at 2:02 PM on May 31, 2018 [6 favorites]

oh well look at that. Huh.
posted by Artw at 2:11 PM on May 31, 2018 [14 favorites]

yet the c-word is a hard limit for a lot of people, as it should be.

I understand that. But if that was a line she was willing to cross, never apologize, deflect blame or make immediate concessions to the other side over fake outrage. NEVER. Internally acknowledge it was mistake, learn from it to never repeat it and move on.
posted by lmfsilva at 2:33 PM on May 31, 2018 [3 favorites]

The real difference with Samantha Bee is that it's the fucking President of the United States demanding for a TV show to be taken off air. It's amazing how swiftly our country has normalized Trump's repeated attacks against the first amendment.
posted by Nelson at 3:02 PM on May 31, 2018 [25 favorites]

She may be the perfect person to take that on.
posted by rhizome at 3:28 PM on May 31, 2018 [5 favorites]

I figure anyone who's ok with Trump being a Pussy Grabber, doesn't get to play performative outrage at Bee.
posted by mikelieman at 3:29 PM on May 31, 2018 [25 favorites]

@PublicGoat:
On this Greer/Rosanne/Posie Parker Thing. @zoeimogen pointed out last night that people are rarely bigoted against only one group, but transphobia is “safe” to express.

The other stuff comes out later, when they’re drunk, or on something, or start losing their faculties.
posted by Artw at 10:22 AM on June 1, 2018 [5 favorites]

zarq said: She also reportedly exposed herself at least once to her male co-stars, including the 12 year old actor who played her eldest son on the show, the late Jon Paul Steuer, prompting him to quit. And he didn't just quit the show but acting altogether. The studio replaced him with another actor.

I'mma need a cite on that. In multiple interviews, Mr. Steur and his representatives have said that he quit trying to get jobs as an actor because he was constantly being asked about Butler by the media. As in, he would go to an interview to promote a thing, and the second question was always something about Brett's behavior on set. He said he felt like he was being pressured, and for the love of god, he was 12-13 years old, and grown-ass adults are asking this kid on the record to say something nasty about a big star in the industry at the time. It was irresponsible of the media to put that sort of focus on a kid just so they can try to break a gossip story.

As to "exposing herself to a 12 year old", the story as I've heard it, is that she flipped the back of her skirt up, as a direct insult to someone else on the set, while launching one of her rather vivid and profoundly vulgar tirades which began "kiss my ass", at the same time Mr. Steur and his parents were coming on the set. For his parents, who were already disturbed by other things happening on the set, this was was the proof they needed to legally argue that the set wasn't a safe environment, allowing them to break the contract without penalties and retaining residuals. Which, rock on. I fully support this action. Being on the set with Brett Butler was no place for a kid during the difficult years.

But, that's a long, long, long way away from "exposing herself to a 12 year old." She exposed less than you would see on the cover of Sports Illustrated, and not "at" him. Phrasing it that way is inflammatory and unnecessary.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 1:09 PM on June 1, 2018 [7 favorites]

Hit shows such as “Roseanne” are especially valuable because they provide long-term, steady employment to crews in an industry where steady employment is a rarity. [...] “This has got to have severe impact on the people working on that show,” Brown said. “They knew they were working on the No. 1-rated show in America. They were already making plans, maybe upgrading their homes or purchasing that one luxury item they’ve been saving up for all these years."

He's partially correct. Having your show killed when this one was is bad. A lot of other shows have crewed up, to lose 9 months of work is a disaster for anybody, especially with bad prospects for getting on another show.

However, let's not overstate the "long-term steady employment" a show like this provides. Yeah, you hope you'll end up on Season 2 of something after Season 1, but a lot of shows spawn new sub-corporations for each season of a show, which makes it a lot easier to weed people out of your crew between seasons. Fired? Nooo, we're just not asking you to come back next season. So sorry!
posted by curiousgene at 2:57 PM on June 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

But, that's a long, long, long way away from "exposing herself to a 12 year old." She exposed less than you would see on the cover of Sports Illustrated, and not "at" him. Phrasing it that way is inflammatory and unnecessary.

The story you're telling isn't all that much different than what was originally reported by Entertainment Weekly: http://ew.com/article/1997/09/12/sad-fall-grace-under-fire/ Butler’s backstage antics also resulted in some on-air fallout. Before the season began, Jon Paul Steuer, the then-12-year-old actor who had played Grace‘s son Quentin on the show, abruptly quit. People familiar with the situation say his parents felt Butler’s behavior was detrimental to his well-being. According to printed reports (and confirmed by a number of people close to the show), Butler hiked up her skirt and flashed her bosom in front of Steuer. (His spokesperson declines to comment.)
That's the report I remember. And I am wholly uninterested in nitpicking this with you.
posted by zarq at 3:12 PM on June 1, 2018 [1 favorite]

'Roseanne' becomes 'Darlene'? ABC reportedly considering reboot around Sara Gilbert

Right to the On Da Capo sez I.
posted by y2karl at 8:18 AM on June 2, 2018

Re: the grunts on set, not that they're not affected but they'll be fine. Having a show disappear is the rule, not the exception - a significant part of the workforce in LA just doesn't get hired at all, and they pick up day work and wait tables for six months. The crew of Roseanne is just joining the mass of other people in their situation.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 10:25 AM on June 2, 2018 [4 favorites]

I figure anyone who's ok with Trump being a Pussy Grabber, doesn't get to play performative outrage at Bee.

Hell, you can use an even more exact word equivalence when pointing out their hypocrisy.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:34 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

A surprisingly thoughtful editorial in The Algemeiner by Jonathan S Tobin, editor of the Jewish News Syndicate:
A Lesson From Roseanne: Let’s Abolish Jewish Celebrities
posted by Joe in Australia at 1:25 AM on June 4, 2018

I think it's odd that editorial failed to mention the anti-Semetic tweets about Chelsea Clinton/George Soros that occurred in the same storm that brought the Valerie Jerrett comment. Not only is Roseanne not a good Jewish celebrity role model, she is an anti-Semetic Jewish celebrity.
posted by hydropsyche at 3:53 AM on June 4, 2018 [6 favorites]

It didn't mention the weird "dressing up as Hitler to put gingerbread Jews in the oven" photoshoot either. In Roseanne's case, there was already excellent evidence that she said weird, unsupportable things, but I presume Tobin didn't want to go down the path of "well, you should have known". His point is that in a free society where Jews need no heroes in the way we once did, we should stop obsessing over Jewish celebrities
Jewish organisations shouldn't try to boost their credibility by associating with Jewish celebrities who are famous for their work in unrelated fields; mentioning that Roseanne had a known prior history of acting up would just make people say "well, they should have known about Roseanne, but who could have known that Harvey Weinstein wasn't a good choice to present our award for family values."
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:02 AM on June 4, 2018

Tobin is also a pro-Trump right-wing nutjob who writes pieces for right-wing nutjob publications like The Federalist, with titles like "No, Illegal Immigrants Do Not Share The Plight Of Holocaust Victims". He's repeatedly ignored, downplayed, and whitewashed bigotry--including anti-Semitism--from Trump and his administration, his supporters (famous or not), and conservatives at large. In other words, he's not exactly the kind of person to approach the criticism of famous Trump supporters with any sort of real context or balance.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:32 AM on June 4, 2018 [6 favorites]

In other words, he's not exactly the kind of person to approach the criticism of famous Trump supporters with any sort of real context or balance.

And yet, he's not wrong about her. She was lauded by the pro-Israel community (especially the JPost) simply for being pro-Israel, even as they ignored or whitewashed everything else she said and did that was questionable. The conspiracy theories that were blatant hatred. The community turned a blind eye and placed her on a pedestal because she was a prominent voice of support. They do the same with evangelical Christians

With friends like these, etc., etc.
posted by zarq at 7:21 AM on June 4, 2018 [2 favorites]

Jewish organisations shouldn't try to boost their credibility by associating with Jewish celebrities who are famous for their work in unrelated fields;

I think it's more complicated than that.

Bill Cosby's foundation created over $800,000 in scholarships from '00 to '13. That money often went to people who wouldn't otherwise have had access to better, higher education. He spent years donating substantial (millions of dollars) funds to schools and helping them raise money in other ways. At the time, his donation of 20 million dollars to Spelman college was the largest single donation ever given to a Black college. The fact that Spelman was a women's college didn't go unnoticed, either.

All of that undoubtedly had a positive impact.

Cosby isn't a teacher. He's not a formal educator. He got a GED through a correspondence course and dropped out of college. But at one point he had over 60 honorary degrees and doctorates from various colleges. In Education, Humane Letters, Humanities, Law and other subjects. Dozens of those have since been rescinded in the last few years, after it became widely known that he was a sexual predator. But he supported education with his time and money. Particularly for African Americans.

He became known for his philantropic work.

So how do we weigh the positive impact of that charity? Knowing that on some level his philanthropy was a smokescreen that helped burnish the same image of him that discouraged his victims from speaking out? Should orgs that didn't know who he really was or what he had done have turned him away?

The calculus behind needing to keep an organization's doors open or giving a wider reach to its activities and associating itself with a potentially problematic celebrity isn't so simple, either. Jewish organizations -- as well as many other non-profits -- can and do reap large benefits from attracting known names as speakers, fundraisers, donors and representatives. They're usually not being lauded solely for their fame. The can promote an org's message to a wider audience and bring in much-needed, like-minded donors.

In Roseanne's case, her conspiracy fearmongering was visible to anyone who was paying attention. But in most cases, it isn't. Weinstein spent millions of dollars keeping his predations hidden or silenced.

It doesn't feel like there are easy solutions here.
posted by zarq at 8:10 AM on June 4, 2018 [5 favorites]

And yet, he's not wrong about her. She was lauded by the pro-Israel community (especially the JPost) simply for being pro-Israel, even as they ignored or whitewashed everything else she said and did that was questionable.

That seems the way of the current Israeli government and power structure. Was there a peep said publicly about having Pastor Robert Jeffress appear at the Jerusalem embassy opening? If you'll put the torch down long enough to shake hands then Bibi will smile with you for the photo op.
posted by phearlez at 8:42 AM on June 4, 2018 [3 favorites]

I feel like this line of discussion is about to go off the rails.
posted by rhizome at 9:07 AM on June 4, 2018 [5 favorites]

anem0ne: honestly, while i like pushing daisies and wonderfalls, i'd love a show with more than zero or one person of color in the main cast, preferably one with a poc lead, maybe with some very american undertones.

ABC's own Agents of SHIELD gets very little love from ABC itself or from Marvel, and it garners relatively little "TV diversity" attention despite the majority-POC main cast, WOC-led webseries, and Asian female lead actresses and co-showrunner. I'll be thrilled if ABC put some of that Roseanne salary money into the SHIELD budget so they don't have to keep shooting every scene in the same dusty warehouse hallway.

As mentioned above about Channing Dungey, it's increasingly clear how much Representation Matters in Hollywood behind the scenes as well as onscreen. From the linked interview with Agents of SHIELD's co-showrunner Maurissa Tancharoen:
Tancharoen, 41, is of Thai descent. When she set out to create the show along with husband Jed Whedon (brother of Avengers director Joss Whedon) she was insistent that at least one of the leads should be Asian.
“It was a goal that I put out there and it wasn’t a secret,” says Tancharoen.

The majority of Marvel's TV showrunners are white; without Tancharoen's connections to Whedon white nerd royalty, I doubt she'd have been given a shot as showrunner despite her own merits. But she's used her power explicitly to increase diversity onscreen. If more POC had the power and privilege to call out and shut down racism without fear behind the TV scenes--as producers, showrunners, writers, advertisers, etc--the Roseanne racist reboot would've never gotten onscreen.
posted by nicebookrack at 6:24 PM on June 4, 2018 [8 favorites]

>But, why not just ditch Barr, rename it The Conners and give the fans what they really want? It's not like that's never happened before in the history of television.

I so called it.
posted by Ruki at 8:12 PM on June 21, 2018 [6 favorites]

They're actually killing her off her own show! Rare TV history, something I haven't seen since Valerie 30 years ago.
posted by rhizome at 8:26 PM on June 21, 2018 [1 favorite]

ABC Thursday picked up "The Conners," the tentatively titled spinoff of the hit comedy "Roseanne" with no financial or creative connection to that show's star and executive producer, Roseanne Barr.

Deadline:
"Barr will have no financial or creative involvement in the new series after reaching a settlement with series producer Tom Werner."

I'd be curious to know how much Roseanne is personally profiting from this deal.
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:07 AM on June 22, 2018 [1 favorite]

Paying a bad client to go away is a time-tested compromise. Now she can simply be ignored.
posted by rhizome at 12:03 PM on June 22, 2018

The apology tour has begun.

“I’m a lot of things, a loudmouth and all that stuff,” Barr said, sobbing. “But I’m not stupid, for God’s sake. I never would have wittingly called any black person . . . a monkey. I just wouldn’t do that. I didn’t do that. And people think that I did that, and it just kills me.”
posted by box at 5:27 AM on June 25, 2018

That's not an apology. That's a Trumpian lie.
posted by rdr at 5:39 AM on June 25, 2018 [3 favorites]

She never said those words? Yeah, probably.
Did she make comments where that was implied with the subtlety of sledgehammer to the face? Totally.

The only difference betweem both are semantics and how long before they can start doing the rounds on the "let's hear it from both sides" media outlets.
posted by lmfsilva at 6:19 AM on June 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

First it was the Ambien.

Then it was an insightful allegory that we just couldn't see.

Now she simply did not say it at all.

She's really hitting all the boxes.
posted by Etrigan at 7:23 AM on June 25, 2018 [1 favorite]

She never said those words? Yeah, probably.
Did she make comments where that was implied with the subtlety of sledgehammer to the face? Totally.

Just in case anyone else reading the thread is as hopeless as me: the difference is that she says she thought her target was "white", and not black. That seems to be the argument Barr is referring to there.

Disclaimers:

I understand that is clear in the linked articles. Unfortunately I jumped straight to the latest interview transcript, which I then mis-read. This made my head hurt, as you say, trying to see what exact difference Barr was trying to make in her denials.

I am an ignorant British white who had never seen Valerie Jarrent and didn't know about her heritage. I looked for a picture of Jarrent and that did not disprove Barr's story. To me. On its own.

It sounds like most people here have rather more context. Including but not limited to the general messages Barr broadcasts and the sources she chooses to read and re-broadcast. As well as taking a critical look at Barr's ideas about how to apologize for her actions. Please continue; I don't want to defend Barr at all.
posted by sourcejedi at 8:30 AM on June 25, 2018

she says she thought her target was "white"

She's lying.
posted by Nelson at 8:39 AM on June 25, 2018 [5 favorites]

From Roseanne in 2013:
.
"Susan Rice is a man with big swinging ape balls"

Please let's not repeat Roseanne's bullshit
posted by rdr at 8:40 AM on June 25, 2018 [2 favorites]

Her tweet makes absolutely zero sense if she honestly believed Jarrett to be white. The only point was the racist point.
posted by I'm Not Even Supposed To Be Here Today! at 8:42 AM on June 25, 2018 [3 favorites]

I am an ignorant British white who had never seen Valerie Jarrent and didn't know about her heritage. I looked for a picture of Jarrent and that did not disprove Barr's story. To me. On its own.

If Roseanne Barr had run into Valerie Jarrett in the airport, and they'd had some sort of confrontation, and she'd said, "That person is a rude fucking ape", and someone had said, "Hey, that was Valerie Jarrett", and Barr had said "I don't know who that is, but I guess Valerie Jarrett is a rude fucking ape", then sure, I could believe that maybe she didn't know.

But Barr said about Jarrett "Muslim Brotherhood and Planet of the Apes had a baby". Okay, fine, let's assume that she was purely talking about what the intelligent simians of the various "Planet of the Apes" franchises looked like. Then we are forced to ask, What does the Muslim Brotherhood look like? What pop culture reference, instantly recognizable to millions, was she trying to make there?

And of course, the answer is that she wasn't. She was referring to the old saw that Jarrett -- who has European and African heritage, and was born in Iran -- is part of the vast secret network of Muslims, led by Barack Hussein (Soetoro) Obama, that seeks to make America part of the Islamic Caliphate. Which means that she knows damn well who Valerie Jarrett is, and she knows damn well that she would be considered "black" by virtually any racial identification program, not to mention that Jarrett herself identifies as African-American.

It's fine to be ignorant of Jarrett's racial identification. I'm sure there are a lot of British politicos whose racial identification I would be surprised by. But Barr wasn't ignorant. She knew what she was saying, and she thought she would get away with it, because she always had before.
posted by Etrigan at 9:08 AM on June 25, 2018 [10 favorites]

Planet of the Apes premiered in 1968, just a few days before Martin Luther King Jr., was assassinated. In other words, right in the very heart of the Civil Rights movement. The story and its sequels were formed in a specific political and cultural environment for audiences who no longer accepted on blind faith that cowboys (Hollywood's heroes) were the good guys and that African Americans and Native Americans (Hollywood's villains,) were always the bad guys. And this is important context, because Planet was preceded by a decades of depictions on film of African Americans and apes like King Kong symbolizing that group being not only the villain of many pictures but also an Other to be feared. Up until that point, Hollywood typically depicted Black people and those that symbolized them as either dangerous or subservient. Films played into White Peoples' fear of African Americans in every way possible.

Planet was a movie that was primarily about racism, with secondary themes around the Cold War, animal rights and nuclear war/annihilation. It reversed the stereotype to comment on current society, and it did so with full knowledge of the unique audience it would be reaching. There are direct parallels in the movie to the African American experience, from slavery (held in chains and cages, forced to work as slave labor, viewed as lowly animals or worse by whites -- not human beings deserving of dignity and rights. The movie shows characters being firehosed by the Apes in charge, which was something that was done to African Americans during that era.

Roseanne Barr is 65 years old. She spent her teen years in the heart of the Civil Rights era and she knows damned well what the movie represented at the time, what it was depicting and just how racist the slur is that she used more than once. She must know the symbolism involved. She knows that it was not, as she has claimed, about anti-semitism.
posted by zarq at 12:46 PM on June 25, 2018 [8 favorites]

I was disappointed that some news source I was watching had another story on Barr recently—really she should just disappear from public view at this point—in which she repeated the Ambien claim. Then I was watching the Deutsche Welle world news broadcast tonight which had a story about the conviction on hate crime charges of a man in Berlin who attacked a guy wearing a kippah while shouting "Jew!" in Arabic, who has also evidently claimed that drugs made him do it, while maintaining that he wasn't being racist.
posted by XMLicious at 5:30 PM on June 25, 2018

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