So many "I" statements. I'll have to read it on a bigger screen than my phone because their #ableist font is #problematic. It's safe to assume the LA Review of Books consist completely of transcribed discussions of television?
"Some people spend much of their lives cleaning up after others. Many of them are working poor, working class, immigrants, and people of color. So the show’s joke relies on the idea that people who clean are not, should not be, people like Abbi."
Sigh. Really? (To elaborate, they think the show doesn't say that people should have the job they want and not have to clean toilets, but rather that these middle class, white people should have the job they want and not clean toilets.) That whole article--it seems to be complaining because the show isn't what they want it to be--but the show never claimed it was the kind of show they wanted. (If that makes any sense, but it's no less convulated than their argument.)
"“Precariat chick TV” seems to turn more than a bit on how incongruent it is for white girls to live demeaning lives. So when people like me are accused of being oversensitive when we don’t like some forms of comedy, we are often being criticized for not being drawn in by comedy that makes fun of people like us, or people we love, or people we think should get more respect."
Ummm. Right.
"The most intense moment for me was when they return all of these office products, hoping to get money, but instead they get a gift card they can only use in the store. It stressed me out! But for them, and for the audience, it’s comic. And the thing is: it’s only if you experience poverty or abjection as a state that you are going to move through, or that doesn’t adhere to your own body or your value in the world, that you can find comedy in that."
OK, and then the American Horror comparison with their fans. And then ending the piece by saying there's a lot that's good in Broad City just not enough (or something.)
I just read that whole thing wondering how I was going to explain my reaction to it, but the authors did me a solid when I got to this - I am just annoyed when they don’t or won’t see that they are loving something that might be racist or sexist or classist - because I think about that shít all the time. I thought about it a lot when I was a little removed from my Kimmy Schmidt binge. But I have never thought about it when it comes to Broad City.
I just think it's problematic to suddenly think that BC is commenting on race by having Abbi do a job that she sees as beneath her--I obviously overthink tv too much myself, but I have no idea where such a leap is coming from--as someone said in the comments, if anything the joke seems to be more about the fact that the women are smart enough to pursue "better" jobs, but much of the time can't really be bothered to.
Was this a TV-related springboard from that great article a while back that explained how the maxim "Do what you love!" was insensitive to actual working people and completely tone deaf to class privilege because MOST people in the world don't have that luxury (take THAT Oprah!)? Because that article made sense.
That article reads like a word salad to me. It goes off on tangents and then cycles back to "I don't like this because it's not what I think it should be." It's very hard to actually discern the roots of their opinions.
"...everyone finally shut up, and the audience could enjoy the beginning of the Anatevka Pogram in peace."
Ugh also the show is so not good around queer stuff. I feel like a central joke is that Ilana is in love with Abbi. Like so many gay jokes. Because a woman loving another woman is ridiculous, hilarious, whatever
I really feel like these people are watching a different show than I.
Any show is fair game to examine from different points of view--and I suppose Broad City is fair game to examine as a piece of white privilege. But I just don't buy any of their criticism. The just feels like "Well so many of my friends love this show! Why can't they see why *I* don't love it." At first I thought they had only watched the first episode, but later comments make it sound like they have seen most of them--
Author Rebbeca Wonzor is a self confessed chick lit genre whore. She loves and wants more fiction written by women about women. I can get behind that. But her basic statement about the issue with Broad City is: "Poverty, struggle, and comedy have long gone together. But I think I enjoy such comedy more when it turns on the idea that nobody should live like this, vs. the idea that specific types of people shouldn’t live like this."
Are we watching different shows? I don't think this really is what Broad City is about anyway (that poverty and struggle create wacky comedy,) but I certainly don't see it being about the fact that only *specific types* of people shouldn't live amongst poverty and struggle.
"Some people spend much of their lives cleaning up after others. Many of them are working poor, working class, immigrants, and people of color. So the show’s joke relies on the idea that people who clean are not, should not be, people like Abbi."
No it's not. We don't see Abbi surrounded by people who lack intelligence and are poor and/or people of colour also cleaning toilets with her and see them derided for what they do.
The show also makes it pretty clear that Abbi is not very qualified for the trainer position she wants so much, which is part of the joke. The show doesn't do much to show that Abbi is qualified or deserving of better career positions in her life.
The article's half-hearted attempts at criticizing the depicition of race in the show are annoying, too- considering that Lincoln is a pretty great recurring character.
As for the finale: Patricia Clarkson slayed me.
"...everyone finally shut up, and the audience could enjoy the beginning of the Anatevka Pogram in peace."
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