Michelle Wolf: ABC Shouldn't Have Revived Roseanne
Roseanne is gone, but definitely not forgotten. (It may not even be gone.) She stayed on Twitter for a while, Trump chimed in, John Goodman keeps on keepin' on. Meanwhile, Michelle Wolf tackled the controversy on her Netflix show, The Break, pointing out that ABC's heroism in cancelling Roseanne is slightly mitigated by the fact that they hired a known racist in the first place.
Exhibit A for Wolf's argument is a 2009 photoshoot featuring Roseanne Barr dressed as Hitler and pulling gingerbread men cookies from an oven. "Everyone’s been saying it’s so brave of ABC to cancel their biggest hit show," says Wolf. "But the bold move was actually putting this lady Hitler chef back on the air in the first place. So kudos to ABC, it takes a lot of courage to fire someone after they’ve been openly racist for the thousandth time."
Wolf also responded to the conservative counterargument that left wing comedians-like Wolf herself–get to keep their jobs even when their jokes spark controversy. That the legacy of slavery, the history of scientific racism, and the difference between punching up and punching down would need to be explained in 2018 is truly pathetic, but Wolf offered a pretty good primer:
People keep saying Roseanne is being held to a double standard because she got fired for her tweet when despicable people like Bill Maher, Sam Bee, and me get away with making 'offensive jokes' all the time. And you’re right. It is a double standard. So let’s even the playing field: How about we enslave all white people for a couple hundred years, and then even after they’re not slaves anymore still hold them down in society, devalue their existence by comparing them to animals, never apologize, never really make it right, and then after that there will be no more double standards and everyone will get fired for everything they say!
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