Why did ABC move forward with the Roseanne tv show in the first place?

[oberliner]

It's not like she hadn't been tweeting insane, racist, bigoted conspiracy theories and worse constantly for many years.

It seems strange that no one at ABC was concerned by anything she tweeted until the Valerie Jarrett tweet. Every single day for about a decade she has been tweeting the most vile, awful, bigoted, hateful garbage.

Why were the people associated with her show (Sara Gilbert, Wanda Sykes, Michael Fishman, Channing Dungey, Emma Kenney, et al) not bothered by her offensive tweets before this?

[Dave Starsky]

1. Money. And that's also why they got rid of her.

Roseanne invites controversy, which delivers eyeballs to advertisers, which delivers cash to Disney/ABC.

Once somebody put together a Tableau interactive dashboard for management that showed the effects of the inevitable boycotts, they got rid of her. It doesn't get any more complicated than that.

Next time, they'll just run an extra season of Dancing With the Stars with Sean Spicer as a guest.

[oberliner]

3. ABC should donate the money they made from the show to charity

[rurallib]

26. That would be a good gesture - some charity dealing with race relations

or similar concept.

[Hortensis]

20. Too small a viewpoint. There's an audience wanting

shows about struggling, malcontent yet nevertheless brave and industrious, "slice-of-true-America" families like they imagine they are.

Of course successfully filling that need means making money, but going only for money is a route to oblivion for entertainment. I haven't seen it, but I heard they produced a good show.

[Dave Starsky]

25. They could have made a show like that with anyone.

They didn't need to rehire a deranged racist for that.

[Hortensis]

28. Maybe they thought she would keep her mouth shut

like almost all adults with something to protect do. She's not deranged, just sadly normal, and there are and always have been many competent people like her in high positions. In fact, our nation would collapse and hundreds of millions die within a few months if they were all to just, poof!, disappear. Those who open their mouths publicly sometimes do just that, but by far most are not half so stupid.

You know, neither of us has anything at all at stake here, thus we're both free to speak however we want about this show, with great conviction and righteousness if we choose.

I wonder if there would have been any difference in your tune, though, if you were creating a hit series by bringing the Roseanne show back, and if casting Roseanne as the lead (instead of "anyone&quot would have promised gold and glory for you. Would you have called Roseanne a depraved racist for something she did before and told the network to hire someone else, you won't have any part in it? Gone righteously back to your job as an assistant producer on Kevin Can Wait? (Horrible thought.)

I know I'd cast Roseanne hopefully and be sick with rage at her and myself, and fate, about now. A lot of decent people just lost their jobs, and some their new plans for secure, glowing futures. Opportunities like this don't come along just any time.

[BlueTsunami2018]

2. Because they saw the money potential.

As you well know, money is the most important thing in this country. They saw an opportunity to cash in on the dumbasses and the nostalgic and threw the dice hoping she wouldn’t do what she just did. It paid off for a couple of months, they were able to rake in a substantial amount of ad revenue with the gamble.

What’s truly disgusting is the point you make. Everyone knew what she was and they went ahead anyway. Greed being more important than principle is the defining trait of America.

ABC aren’t heroes for letting her go, they’re scum for going ahead in the first place.

[oberliner]

4. Agreed

No heroes in this story.

[dlk]

5. In Our Corporate Profit-Dominated World, It's Always All About the Money

This is why Channing Dungey, a black woman, made the decision to hire Roseanne in the first place, in spite of Roseanne's long and very public and bigoted history. No doubt, it was the phone calls Dungey received (from Shonda Rimes, perhaps and others) and the possible threats of consumer boycotts that made the cost of keeping Roseanne higher than the cost of cutting her loose. Make no mistake, this was an entirely financial decision.

[oberliner]

7. She was literally tweeting that Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring

She did this before ABC gave her the show - and while the show was running.

[RKP5637]

6. $$$$$'s n/t

[LexVegas]

8. Why were the people associated with her show not bothered by her offensive tweets before this?

$$$$$

[oberliner]

9. They should donate all the money they made from the show to charity

[magicarpet]

10. To capitalize upon and normalize aberrant trDump behavior has its price.

Much money to be made if you can capture the disposable income of the trDump Nazi crowd. Rather than bear hug the deplorable a with open arms - these commercial capitalists like to empty the wallets of the trDump hyper-Nazi deplorables but maintain an arms length distance so the Fascist filth does not rub off and tarnish them in their quest for profit.

The racist behavior some find entertaining. As long as those issues stay on the margins and periphery all is fine. But when racism becomes the central focus of the deplorables megaphone style - the quiet dog whistle - stealth racism is lost and becomes too much and crosses the line into in your face - putting your cards on the table - loud racism.

Loud racism is counter productive to increased profits - so punitive actions become necessary for profit damage control.

Normalization of white trash shit bags such as trDump and Roseanne Barr is a dangerous game for capitalists to play because the tables can turn in the blink of the eye and profits can go south in an instant because shit for brains should not be held in high acclaim, revered, or ever normalized.

As we dumb down America - people of this ilk will be more and more worshiped as the kind of persons who should lead our great nation because of their supposed great insights and wisdom.

God forgive us for the world we hand off to our children and grandchildren. The mess we leave behind will take generations to clean up and sort out if it can ever be done.

[Blue_Adept]

11. They were looking to get in on what 60 million people voted for

Yeah, there's normalization issues but at the same time it's a version of what alot of papers were doing with their "here are trump voter articles."

I never watched this new incarnation.

That said, how many families are made up like this these days? My father passed back in 2015 but if he was alive today he'd be a full on Trumpist. My family would have looked a great deal like what you saw on the show.

That's not represented anywhere. It's one reason that it did work in terms of drawing people in (20 million or so per week!).

Back in the 80's we had a ton of shows that didn't reflect how families looked. That changed with shows like the original Roseanne and the early seasons of Married with Children. It wasn't the puffy happy life that things like Silver Spoons or Family Ties presented.

We're in the same boat today and few shows engage with things like Black-ish does unfortunately, especially on the Big Four networks. So there was an opportunity here but its star (and owner/creator) blew it.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

14. Yeah, I think you are right. It is the realness that people find appealing n/t

[Blue_Adept]

15. We've had so many discussions on here about Trumpists in our own families

But there's zero representation of that out there. So I can see the pros and cons of it but, obviously, the show wasn't my decision. My only one was to not watch it because I lived with that already.

My hope for it was that it could spawn some good discussions considering the writers room that they had and the production team along with the actors involved. That sort of ability to try and meet somewhere in the middle and talk it out.

But the utter polarization and the demonizing of centrism these days (see the other thread here about the problem of centrists) makes it impossible. That has the "peacemaker" types kind of turning into wallflowers because the sides are too heated to deal with.

[spicysista]

19. Hey peacemaker!

To be a "peacemaker" is to be a person that's about the making of peace. It can and will get "hairy" from time to time. Stay encouraged. Don't let extremists dictate your actions. Peacemaking is busy, often thankless, work. There's nothing sexy in finding common cause between folks. It's much more fun to point out the differences. Stay focused on your goal of building bridges. The extremes are not going to do that work.

On the topic of moderates, Dr. King was not talking about moderates in the sense of those seeking consensus. He was talking about those that, under the guise of being a moderate, remained neutral to the pain and suffering of their black brothers and sisters. Those that would look the other way when their family members would say and do things that were wrong.....in the name of being a moderate. He was talking about inaction in the face of injustice. I mean, where is the middle ground on Jim Crow?

We need the "bomb throwers" pushing progress, but we really need consensus building communicators that can speak to a variety of people. We need peacemakers.

[Nitram]

12. Profit. Profit Profit. Profit. Profit Profit. Profit. Profit Profit. Profit. Profit Profit.

[Zing Zing Zingbah]

13. Wouldn't have been a bad idea if she could behave herself

Her old show was good in the 90's. They must have thought she was past all of that bad behavior. Guess not. I think the other people on her show were just putting up with her because it is part of their job.

[catsudon]

16. ask

the president who fired her, since she hired her in the first place.

[NCTraveler]

17. Rosanne is comfort food for a certain group.

ABC gets no pass from me. The paid and elevated a known racist just to act surprised when she acts like a racist. Really poor form on their part. Even the cowardly firing. If you are going to promote a racist then have the backbone to fight for them.

[oberliner]

22. Good points

I concur.

[Kingofalldems]

18. Diversion.

Not gonna work.

[oberliner]

21. You think they gave her a show as a diversion?

A diversion from what?

[RhodeIslandOne]

23. You sense it too?

The "no heroes in this story" is clever, isn't it?

[oberliner]

24. What do you mean?

Can you elaborate?

[Kingofalldems]

29. You can fool some of the people some of the time....

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

27. They saw an opportunity because of Trump's popularity in some quarters.

They probably assumed Roseanne would have enough sense to keep her nasty opinions to herself once she had a major tv show, but that her Trump-supporting character would attract an audience of Trump supporters while the other characters would provide enough balance that other people wouldn't be completely turned off. They probably figured there was enough money in the resurrection of the show (and there could have been if Roseanne hadn't jumped the rails again) to offset the risk that she'd do something disgusting again. They gambled and lost on that bet, but by canceling the show as quickly as they did, they were probably able to save themselves.

As to why the other cast members agreed to work with her, the answer is probably similar to ABC's: (a) they were being paid very well, and (b) they thought she'd behave herself now that she had a major gig once again.

[shanny]

30. Money. Next question.

[DarthDem]

31. Did Anyone Say "Money" Yet?

n/t