The lady doth protest too much:
A look at the poison in Roseanne’s jest
One of the things I really love about teaching high school is that I get to see the kids start to look beyond themselves and begin thinking — in earnest — about their role in the world around them. Social media has made it almost too easy to find out about what’s happening around the globe, and as students understand more about the world and see how what happens impacts them (school shootings, police brutality, etc), I get to watch them form opinions, come up with solutions, and think about how they’ll handle similar problems when they’re adults.
Part of this, of course, is the beginning of contemplating a real answer to the age old question:
It seems crazy to ask teens to make such big decisions when there’s still so much they have yet to experience. As for myself, I hardly could decide which cereal I was going to have for breakfast, let alone what to do with the rest of my life. I switched majors at least a dozen times because I had no idea what any field of study would actually look like beyond the classroom (Thus my first degree is Sociology… that prepares me to ???). I’m really happy when I learn of programs that help my kiddos think about their future in a real world context. Junior Achievement is an organization that seeks to “inspire and prepare young people to succeed in a global economy.” As part of the enrichment programming at my school, volunteers from a variety of professions visit classrooms and share a bit about their job and the opportunities education has made available to them.
I wasn’t too stoked about losing instruction time — our students already lose so much to standardized testing that I wasn’t sure it would be worth sacrificing yet another day. Overall, however, the students learned a lot and seemed to enjoy speaking to the visitors… with the exception of one.
An older man came into the classroom, and in his short time of about 15 minutes managed to insult and offend at least a dozen times. He told my students (many Black and Latino) that he understood what it was like to experience racism (it may be worth mentioning here that he is a White man) because he witnessed an incident of discrimination against his teammates when he was in college. He then went on to say that anyone who is unemployed or poor is making that choice, because capitalism offers ample opportunity to anyone who isn’t afraid to work. He continued by saying he could tell who “those people” are. Anyone who eats his dinner out of a brown paper bag from McDonald’s has decided he’s a loser, and everyone who sees them will know it. It has nothing to do, he argued, with where one goes to school, or where they grow up. Less, still, to do with skin color, he claimed (It’s too bad the NYT article “Extensive Data Shows Punishing
Reach of Racism for Black Boys” had not yet been released).
“I’m not racist,” he insisted. “Remember, I told you about my teammates. It’s not about color. It’s about how hard you work.”
When the event was over, I spoke to my students about what they thought.
One of my more outspoken students said, “The first way you know someone racist, is if they say they ain’t racist.”
We talked a little bit about why someone would do that, and the answers were interesting. Some said shame would be the reason; others said it was to be sneaky and get away with something. Some of the students are reading, or have read Hamlet. We talked a little bit about this great scene — the play within the play. The young Hamlet stages a show to mirror his dad’s murder and watches his mom and uncle carefully for their reaction. Unable to let it rest at observing them, Hamlet asks his mom, “Madam, how to you like this play?” Gertrude responds with her famous, often misquoted, line “The lady doth protest too much.”
“Ya. It’s like that,” one student said. “If you ain’t guilty, you don’t need to prove it.”
I thought about this conversation when watching the Roseanne reboot. It’s no secret the title character, like the actress, is a Trump supporter. For many, the curiosity of how the politics would play out was part of the draw. How in the world would writers reconcile the racist, sexist, and xenophobic Trump with an otherwise likable cast of characters?
It was going to take a lot of doing to justify much of what comes with the Trump administration.
In an Entertainment Tonight interview, executive producer, Whitney Cummings said, “We sat down and really tried to pick apart what [we] haven’t seen on television, what [we] have not seen addressed honestly or what this family uniquely could address in an authentic way. We wanted to dig right into prejudice; we wanted to dig into not having a retirement plan.”
I was intrigued. I was not the only one.
What a let down! None of the hard topics were tackled in any real way. The only justification Roseanne has to offer for supporting Trump is that he “talked about jobs.”
To be fair, some thought this was a brilliant stroke to unite viewers around a common concern. Glenn Beck, a well known conservative raved, “I think she actually spoke to the American people, both left and right. She is speaking the words that the media doesn’t understand.”
Really?
I didn’t expect to be convinced of anything, but I would have enjoyed a real discussion about race, class and gender. Maybe cast the sharper Darlene as the naysayer, instead of Jackie, whose objections to Trump ran to comedy rather than substance.
It was a cop out. You can’t be a Trump supporter and not expect to be asked to address the very problematic statements he’s made. Instead, Roseanne uses the cast as props standing in for placards that scream:
“I’m not racist. I have a Black grandchild.”
“I’m not trans-phobic. My grandson is experimenting with cross dressing” (because that’s the same thing).
“I’m not sexist. I support my middle aged daughter being a surrogate.”
Which brings me back to the story with my students…
Roseanne, you doth protest too much… and I’m not buying it.
Where does Roseanne stand on modern issues? How does she rationalize her identity? She only reaches the surface level. She says she cast a Black granddaughter because it’s important to her and she has a Black godson.
Roseanne, what happens when your godson gets harassed by the cops? Beaten or killed? Black men are 21 times more likely to be killed by cops than their white counterparts.
Is the character Roseanne worried when her granddaughter walks to school? If she cares to look beneath the surface, maybe she should be.
While she pretends to be open-minded and tolerant of Becky’s choice to be a surrogate, what does Roseanne have to say about the attacks on health care for women that might make it hard for Becky to get quality care?
Without really addressing any of the issues, it feels like a sneaky Trump commercial along with the borrowed “Oh no I’m not” strategy. We’ve seen this charade before. Let’s recap some of those priceless Trump moments…
Despite talk of “shit hole” countries, mocking disability, and assaulting women, if you ask Trump, he is the “least racist person,” “nobody’s better to people with disabilities than [him]”and no one respects women more than he does (For a full list of all he isn’t, please check out “How Trump is transforming himself into the greatest president ever”).
Roseanne seems to do more of the same. I’ve long expected lying from politicians, and Trump has done a wonderful job of maintaining that expectation. Lately though, I’m becoming equally disillusioned with entertainment. I want to believe that not all the people who voted for Trump are gutter racists. I want to have a conversation that wrestles with the contradiction of saying you’re not racist while supporting someone who obviously is.
I’m still waiting for that conversation. Roseanne’s generic stance on Trump is, “He talked about jobs,” and this bothers me more than I can explain. I’ve been struggling with how to articulate why.
I always tell my students when they read the news, identify the argument because nothing is just a straight recounting.
Then ask: who does it benefit? Who does it hurt?
Within this framework, Roseanne is problematic in the same ways Wonder Woman and Black Panther are problematic (see articles by myself and the brilliant Sam Dobberstein). As much as the show pretends to deal with important issues of social justice, it’s a smoke and mirrors trick of appearance and essence.
How can Roseanne support Trump without being forced to reckon with the fact that he’s undeniably racist and sexist?
How can the White working class enjoy any Trump-era prosperity in good conscience when his campaign and presidency has legitimized sexism and racism and encouraged gutter racists and sexists to be more vocal and violent than ever?
Roseanne has to take a side. She works really hard to give the appearance of an average working class woman, the matriarch of a multiracial family who are just trying to figure things out in a complicated world. It’s her best effort in supporting a racist, sexist, xenophobic. This is not acceptable. She has to be forced to admit that in essence, regardless of her token cast, she’s saying Whites first.
As viewers, we must take a stand. Racism is so deeply woven into our society that if we’re not actively fighting against it, we’re upholding it. When we support a vocal racist on a nationally syndicated show, we’re doing more than that: We’re spreading and normalizing it (Roxane Gay agrees).
Why it matters
After the Junior Achievement day at our school, I spoke to several of my coworkers. All of us were appalled that this speaker would have the nerve to insult our students the way he did. One of the teachers even submitted a complaint to administration.
None of us asked him to leave.
None of us interrupted him or corrected him. We second guessed — is this racist? Is this okay? Is it better to be polite and ignore it?
We all love these students. I’d bet each of the teachers spoke with students afterwards about why what he said was problematic, but we weren’t bold enough in that moment. We’ve become used to giving people the benefit of the doubt. We’re hoping Roseanne can show us how someone that acts like a racist and talks like a racist can be something else… And maybe that’s because it lets us off the hook.
It’s time for us to catch it, and call it out…
It’s interesting to note the timing of that famous line. Remember, this is when Hamlet has arranged for his mother and uncle to watch a play, so he can gauge their reaction, to see if they’re guilty.
Claudius, maybe already a little uncomfortable with the plot, asks Hamlet if he knows the story line: “Is there no offense in’t?”
Hamlet answers, “No, they do but jest. Poison in jest. No offense i’ th’ world.”
Poison in jest… How much of a joke is it?
And while we laugh and think it harmless, we ignore the real implications.
Is there really no offense in it, or do we convince ourselves as much so we can sit back and enjoy the show? And while we watch, who benefits? Who gets hurt? “Let the galled jade wince, our withers are unwrung.”
