Working on a hit TV series is a rarity. It provides steady employment for people of many gifts, including sound and lighting experts, hair and makeup artists, as well as all manner of craftsmen—not to mention the crew for craft service. When the star of a show goes from shooting episodes to being a shooting star, when a show’s namesake like Roseanne Barr pollutes her stardom and perverts her power, when she speaks her mind but is not mindful of what she says—and does not so much retract her words as she attacks her detractors—she ruins a special gift.
Put another way, Roseanne has a right to say whatever she wants, just as ABC has the right to have canceled her show.
Before I stand accused of taking sides, as if I am unaware of what the Left has said and done, I want it known that I stand for what I believe is right. Rightness is not copyrighted material; it transcends politics, as it should, because it is blind to partisanship but not unable to help us see the wrongs that pervade society.
It is, therefore, more than wrong to compare, as Roseanne did, a person of color with an ape. It is the perpetuation of a wrong, which further distorts some Americans’ views of African-Americans; because injustice cannot survive without justifications for unjust rhetoric; because dehumanizing words make deplorable actions possible.
The same is true of comparisons to President Trump and his supporters to vermin. Even worse, I suspect most know not what they say. That would require them to think before they speak, to listen before they respond, to be responsible for what they say and do.
To hold Roseanne accountable for what she wrote does not mean we must ignore other messengers of ill will, whose message is as clear as it is criminal: to remove Donald Trump from office—by any means necessary.
It is more important that we, as Americans, be right than keep or settle scores. In the end, rightness bends the moral arc of the universe toward justice.
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