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First Amendment rights ideological culture individual achievement

Can’t Cancel J. K. Rowling

The UK Telegraph says that “Scores of actresses turn down roles in play critical of J. K. Rowling’s gender views.”

Since we’re a family-​oriented publication, I can’t divulge the name of the play, which “has already caused outrage over its explicit working title.” The title calls Rowling a word that rhymes with “bunt.”

Rowling “has become a figure of hate online among some activists, and received death threats after publicly sharing concerns about the encroachment of transgender campaigning on women’s rights.”

The play’s purpose is apparently to smear Ms. Rowling, whose beloved Harry Potter novels have so far sold zillions. One hopes that an aversion to cooperating with the smear is the main reason why scores of actresses, many of whom probably have trouble getting steady work in a very competitive industry, won’t go anywhere near the play.

Unfortunately, by June 13, the date of the Telegraph story, actors had been found for the male leads.

One of the producers, Barry Church-​Woods, admits that the play has “met some kind of resistance every step of the way.” He’s been “surprised by how difficult it has been for us to recruit the female cast in particular,” even though this is a “well-​paid gig … and the script is terrific.”

What if the producers do find enough conscienceless thespians to play all the parts, the play gets produced, and it enjoys a duly brief run and sparse attendance?

J. K. Rowling will still survive. Somehow.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.


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ideological culture media and media people national politics & policies

The Sitcom Society

If we are entering a new Golden Age of television, it is for the most part passing the legacy TV networks by. 

So, Roseanne Barr to the rescue! 

The reboot of ABC’s Roseanne — a hit situation comedy of the late 1980s and much of the 1990s — should put the network and the art form back in the spotlight.

But though it is very popular, the show is not without … its political controversy. You see, funny-​woman Roseanne plays Roseanne Conner, and she … (drum roll) … voted for Trump.* 

Horrors!

Predictably, our modal mainstream media cultural mavens are not on board. Roxanne Gay, in the New York Times, complains that Roseanne’s views are “muddled and incoherent.”

Roseanne to Roxanne, hello-​o‑o: the character is fictional. Who said characters in a comedy should have coherent views? One would think the point of comedy would require the opposite.

Jezebel provides another fine example of this. In “What’s Up, Deplorable; Roseanne Is Back,” Rich Juzwiak opines that “[n]ever discussed was the laundry list of hateful, stupid, and wrong things Trump said, nor their even more nefarious implications.” On Twitter, Professor Jared Yates Sexton calls the character’s perspective “a cleaned-​up lie,” and amounts to a turning a “blind eye to Trump’s many, many bigoted statements.” 

Neither Juzwiak nor Sexton mentions any problem with the main alternative to the president in the last election — something Roseanne does in the show itself. 

It’s almost as if what these (and many similar) critics want is a tidy propaganda piece for their opinions; it’s almost as if their objection is to the show’s realism.

Now that’s comedy.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* In the season opener, Roseanne defends the president from her dippy Democrat sister, whom she had not been speaking with since the election. Her sister, Jackie (played hilariously by Laurie Metcalf), enters the tenth season wearing a red pro-​Hillary t‑shirt and one of those grab-​em-​by-​the-x pink hats. Their reconciliation is a hoot.


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folly media and media people responsibility too much government

The Missing Links?

Is giving presidents a hard time for playing too much golf itself a pastime?

In Fahrenheit 911, filmmaker Michael Moore portrayed then-​President George W. Bush, as more golfer than president — as if W. had secured the nation’s top job as a ruse to convince his wife to let him golf more.

Likewise, Republicans attacked President Barack Obama for incessantly hitting the links. In 2014, when ISIS came frighteningly close to Baghdad, Obama went golfing, causing Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank to bemoan the fact that “Obama’s golf habit needlessly hands his critics a gimme.”

An amusing website documented all of Obama’s golf outings … and plays audio of him pledging not to rest “until the dream of healthcare reform is finally achieved” and “until every American who is able and ready and willing to work can find a job,” etc.

Note: Obama never promised not to tee off.*

“Between 2011 and 2016,” SB-​Nation reports, Donald Trump “tweeted at least 26 complaints, jokes, or scoldings about Barack Obama playing golf while president.”

Now, President Trump is getting the backswing scrutiny. While Obama didn’t golf during his first four months in office, Politico informs that Trump went golfing after two weeks and, in nine weeks, has already played a dozen rounds of golf. 

Good. I wish all the politicians in Washington spent more time on the course and less “governing.”

Even more so as Republicans consider taking a mulligan on healthcare …  and Mr. Trump invited Sen. Rand Paul to join him on the fairway. 

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

 

* In the closing days of the Obama administration, Golf Digest published a story lauding Obama’s “deep commitment to supporting the golf industry.” However, the publication informed readers that, while Obama golfed more than his immediate predecessors, Presidents Clinton and Bush 43, he didn’t hit the links nearly as much as Presidents Dwight D. Eisenhower and Woodrow Wilson.


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