Thursday, June 7, 2018

The Vulgarians

Rosanne Barr has lost her television show due to having made a Twitter comment about Valerie Jarrett.  Jarrett is black and the comment was:
Muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj
It's shocking and disgusting.  Barr deserved to be pulled from television and if that killed the show for her co-stars, oh well.

Some right wing folks are noting that Samantha Bee hasn't been pulled and are claiming a double standard.

Bee's comment, which came in the context of commenting on a photograph of Ivanka Trump and her child, is immediately below, and I'm not going to edit it.  Proceed with caution
You know, Ivanka, that's a beautiful photo of you and your child, but let me say, one mother to another, 'Do something about your dad's immigration practices, you feckless cunt.
Put on something tight and low-cut and tell your father to fucking stop it.
So is there a double standard?  I'd have to say yes.  Bee's comments are even worse than Barr's in a way, if comparisons can be made in this area, as they're so vulgar.

But let's be honest about it.  Neither Barr nor Bee should have jobs in anything more significant than a Mini Mart.

Barr is a disgusting low class American "comedian".   Bee is a disgusting Canadian vulgarian. 

Neither are the slightest bit amusing in any fashion nor are they funny.  They were both hired as they are disgusting and vulgar.  Barr was hired as some clever entertainment executive likely figures that she appeals to a certain element in the disaffected Trump right.  Bee was hired as so similar executive likewise likely figured that she appealed to the Rachael Maddow left.

Both have apologized. But it shouldn't matter. They should bear the burden of their comments or be made to make a public demonstration of satisfactory repentance.  Just a comment, for stuff like this, doesn't suffice.  Barr's comments endorse a heavily racist view that comes from people who have heavily racist views.  An apology won't erase that.  Bee's comments endorse a violent view of female sexuality that come really close to the bizarre objectification of women that some women on the left  have and fully support.

Indeed, in a way, both of these individual's camouflaged past make their comments all the more reprehensible.  Barr grew up in a Jewish family in Salt Lake City, something that should have familiarized her at least to some degree with what it is like to be a minority and characterized with racist stereotypes.  And as a person with a less than appealing visage, her going after the appearance of another woman is bizarre.  And while she's associated with Trump now, she's been all over the map politically which would suggest that she's at least familiar with people who hold a wide range of views (she was once in the Green Party).

Bee is a Canadian and in that sense a living example of the complete fraud of American immigration which makes her comments in that suspect.  American immigration policy is supposed to favor the desperate or fill a role in our economy which can't be filled by those already living here. We have plenty of vulgar "comedians" already and really didn't need to import one from Canada, although given the Canadian absolute emphasis on being polite in all circumstances, it's easy to imagine there being no role in her native land for her.  I can't imagine, for example, a "Full Frontal" going after Justin Trudeau, or even Stephen Harper.  Bee, the product of a broken home and raised by a grandmother, is also another embarrassing example of a Catholic education, having attended the Catholic school her grandmother worked at.  As we Catholics (I didn't attend a Catholic school) already have to contend with such examples as Madonna on that, we really ought to wonder about what is taught there.  Having said that, this does mean that she would be familiar with certain basic standards of decent conduct even if she's not Catholic (and a large number of students who attend such schools are not).

Well, a pox on both of their houses.  May we never hear from them again.

And may we stop and think. Why did we tolerate such people in the first place on our television sets?



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