ABC Cancel’s Roseanne Reboot after Racist Tweet! So What?
I am sure by now that you have heard that Roseanne Barr took to Twitter and expressed her bigotted views — insulting and assaulting both, Muslims Men and Black Women in one swoop. Any social awareness on our part would have alerted us to the racist views of Roseanne decades ago.
The entire show is built upon a red-neck backdrop. But Roseanne, the individual has always been one to say whatever came to her mind and then hide it behind the veil of comedy.
While I am shocked that ABC responded so fast by canceling the reboot of Roseanne’s show, I do not see any true victory in it for the Black collective. We have been claiming moral victories for decades, but these moral victories do not come with any progressive changes in our socioeconomic reality. They do not change the level of education our youth receive in public schools. The number of Black men being shot and killed by police officers has not changed.
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We must abandon our proclivity to major in minor things and learn to remain focused on the things that matter. We must also leave our emotions on the sideline when confronting institutional racism.
There will always be people who will hate us simply because we are us. In fact, they know better than most of us do.
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We must keep our attention focused on making progressive moves, building businesses, restoring the Black family nucleus, holistically educating and socializing our youth, and more to ensure their success in this world.
“Ok, so ummm, now what? It’s not like ABC didn’t know Rosanne was a racist when they picked up her show for a reboot… that was the whole big deal, remember? Normalizing racism. Its not like this was the first time Rosanne compared a black woman to an ape. I see a lot of black folks applauding her show cancellation like it means something in the grand scheme of things. It doesn’t. ABC created Rosanne. It can create another Rosanne. And another. And another. We don’t control ABC’s programming. The sista at the top of ABC doesn’t control ABC’s programming if she did, the show would have never got a reboot. We still don’t control images of black people in media. Still have no say.
I think what irks me most about this is how many of us are declaring some type of victory… as if Rosanne Barr’s show was somehow tied to our struggle. A coupla month’s ago same folks were applauding Disney’s Black Panther. Disney owns ABC.” ~ Nyota Uhura