The Praise for ABC's Cancellation of Roseanne Could Not Be Less Deserved

Wowow, what a day! In a matter of hours, Roseanne Barr said something extremely racist on Twitter; a lot of people tried to not use the word “racist” to describe what Barr said; Wanda Sykes quit Roseanne; someone clearly didn’t know who Wanda Sykes was; and finally, ABC cancelled Roseanne because everything I just mentioned. In a statement, ABC Entertainment President Channing Dungey, who greenlit the reboot in pursuit of the elusive post-election Rust Belt demographic, said:

Roseanne’s Twitter statement is abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values, and we have decided to cancel her show.

But this isn’t over. Nay, I regret to say, it has only just begun.

Barr’s tweet was vile, and the cancellation of her show is a both an apt punishment and a big deal considering it was “the highest-rated and most-watched series of the broadcast season.” But people are getting a little carried away with what largely seems to be symbolism. Social media has been flooded with jubilation over the cancellation of Roseanne, as if it was a spiritual proxy for the impeachment of President Donald Trump himself.

Debra…thanks.

Yes, some things are more important than money…like losing money.

This is not like an election…

She brought the show back in the first place!

Ditto him!

OK, Cillizza being an idiot isn’t too surprising.

ABC executives have been chosen as the new faces of the Resistance despite the fact that they gave Barr the Roseanne reboot in the first place, as if she hadn’t been firing off racist, homophobic, Islamophobic, conspiracy-ridden tweets for years. ABC knew about Barr’s very public and hateful social media presence and gave her a primetime slot anyway. They made a deal with a ticking time bomb— most likely with the hope that it would be a few seasons before she did anything so egregious that they’d have to deal with it. ABC, the same network that pulled a black-ish episode that allegedly addressed athletes kneeling, is not heroic for canceling Roseanne. It’s just cleaning up a mess it probably knew was coming. Now can we please just be done with this whole thing?