Guilt by Association

There was a moment in the summer of 2013 when I became obsessed with Orange is the New Black, and since then, I’ve never been the same. Probably, the change happened overnight, made apparent one morning when I awoke from a series of Litchfield-set dreams, confronted with the sight of my laptop balanced on top of my chest, paused somewhere between episodes seven and eight. Back then, I’d rant about the show to just about anyone who would listen — the compelling storylines, the hilarious point of view, the subtleties of its narrative — it was the only thing worth talking about, quickly becoming the cornerstone of many conversations.

For better or worse, I had transitioned from being a casual observer of the show to a passionate champion of it, and it wasn’t long before those thirteen episodes became my life. Still, despite my mix of infatuation and enthusiasm, most of my discussions about the series went something like this:

Again and again, friends, family members and coworkers alike would react with the same brand of reluctance, skeptical of my claims that it was the best show of the year. In fact, many of them had already declared a different Netflix original to be their top pick of 2013, as House of Cards was released only a few months prior. Hailed as fine programming by the critics, the drama was admired for its cinematic style, complex political themes, and ruthless antihero, raised to the altar of this thing our culture calls “quality TV.”

Meanwhile, it took Orange several seasons to qualify as a member of that same category, and even still, many critics are reluctant to let this prison dramedy join the ranks of prestigious series like The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, and Mad Men. In an interview with the The Atlantic, Brett Martin, author of Difficult Men, a book about our current age of antihero-driven TV dramas, notes that:

These characters are male wish fulfillments. There’s no doubt that a large part of men watching Tony wanted to be Tony. What that made us think about ourselves was part of the tension of watching that show. That is how powerful that fantasy of seizing the masculine power is.

The unspoken assumption about quality TV is that it deals with masculine characters and serious subject matter, and our culture’s recent foray into this new Golden Age of TV has been, for the most part, the enterprise of men. Not only is the industry dominated by male writers, directors and producers, but the content it generates upholds the tenets of the patriarchy, situating man at the center of a fictional universe that he is there to master.

When it comes to Orange is the New Black, my acquaintances always confront me with the same list of reasons for why the show just isn’t worth watching: the nudity, the characters, the tone, the stereotypes, etc. For many, Orange is just too black, too crazy, too queer, or too female—and as viewers express their reluctance towards the show, often, they articulate repressed feelings of misogyny, racism and homophobia. Complaints about the series are never just disinterested judgements of taste, but discursive claims, ones that naturalize the power structures of the patriarchy, even when they might not intend to do so. These sentiments echo the words of Tom Meltzer, a TV critic for The Guardian who admitted in his 2013 review that:

The first time I tried to get into Orange is the New Black I failed. I turned it off within a minute. In that first minute, I saw: breasts, breasts, more breasts, and a stereotypical crazy-black-lady character talking about breasts. As opening sequences go, it didn’t promise moving, original drama.

But, “moving” and “original” is exactly what Orange is the New Black is — and while it may deal with content that diverges from House of Cards’ white collar norm, it sheds light upon the injustices of America’s prison-industrial complex, recounting the experiences of the women who are pushed into the margins of society. The series has an important message to deliver, one that is wrapped-up within sharp dialogue, stellar performances, and inventive plot lines. If that doesn’t fit your definition of quality TV, then Orange is the New Black might convince you to redefine the term.

True, the series has little in common with the critically-acclaimed dramas that came before it — there are no power-hungry drug lords, womanizing ad men, nor are there any corrupt politicians (that is, unless you count Natalie Figueroa, the conniving Executive Assistant to the Warden). Instead, it contains defiant lesbians, struggling single mothers, drug addicts, old ladies, and inmates who are mentally ill — with each woman clinging to her own private story, wrapped-up like a yarn and held close to her heart, waiting to be unwound. Much of Orange’s brilliance comes from its flashback structure, with each episode recounting the unlikely past experiences of a single inmate, unravelling the sequence of events that brought her to Litchfield. In the process, those caricatured supporting figures are exposed as profound human beings, mobilizing affects that pierce to the very core of the series.

When it comes to our popular discourses of TV, we reserve the language of “good taste” for masculine-oriented shows, ones that contain serious thought, progress, action, and drama — leaving female-centered series like Orange is the New Black within the gutters of “low culture” and “guilty pleasures.” This gendered conception of culture has a much older history, one that is recounted by Andreas Huyssen, a theorist who identifies the ways that:

Mass culture is associated with woman, while authentic culture remains the prerogative of men.

For too long, we’ve accepted that House of Cards is positioned higher on Netflix’s pedestal of quality programming than Orange is the New Black, without once taking a moment to recognize the range of sexist and classist beliefs that lie beneath such a judgement. Sure, I’ll admit, the show might not be for everyone, but it’s critical for us to acknowledge that patriarchal ways of thinking form the basis of our culture’s hierarchy of genres.

The problem is that all our talk of “good taste” and “high culture” is driven by out-of-date assumptions about gender and diversity. If a show about black, Latina, and poor female prison inmates is low-culture, then I suggest that we all take a very deep dive within it — embracing this subversive subject matter head on, with the goal of uncovering the truths that float beneath its surface. It’s not just a show about poverty, but about the inner workings of privilege; not just about sex, but about the politics of gender; not just about race, but about the dynamics of difference. In Orange is the New Black, nothing is just quite as it seems, and if this prison-set drama is a guilty pleasure, then it’s one that needs to be set free.