By now you have probably heard about the Roseanne Barr racist tweet and cancelling of her show incident.
i have maybe watched Roseanne the show once in my whole life and it didn’t do enough to get me back. So i don’t really know Roseanne Barr much besides glimpses of her on interview shows and random celebrity news from time to time. But this post isn’t really about her.
In a nutshell, Roseanne posted a hectically offensive tweet which in essence called yet another black person a monkey and the next day her newly revived rebooted show was cancelled by ABC. Yay ABC. And that’s what this post is about: a swift response to racism.
This is #NotOnOurWatch in 3D and this is what the world needs more of. It wasn’t aggressive or violent or mean in any way. It was just a case of responding to an act of racism by saying, “That is not okay and here is the consequence!”
Hopefully, it gives every day people like you and me more courage to step up and speak out when we see another racist message on our Neighbourhood Whatsapp group or to the cashier by the person in front of us in the line at the store or in the restaurant where it is taking place at the next table. Or at our parents’ dinner table.
We don’t have to get aggressive or violent or mean, but we completely have the right, and i believe the responsibility to interject, to interrupt, to shut that stuff down and politely let the person or people know that, “No, you can’t do/say that!”
Lastly, i think it is important to add that naming the thing is so important – this wasn’t just “a tweet in bad taste” as Roseanne suggested in her apology. It was out and out racist. And she might think that she is not a racist, but then she HAS to absolutely own the fact that she did a completely racist thing and that there is work to be done in here. Anything less than that attempts to put a band-aid on a full-blown gushing wound!
Let’s increase our collective vigilance and let’s be quick to speak up and out and be a part of creating a better society for all.
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