The Scandal Roundtable 2.11: A Criminal, A Whore, An Idiot, And A Liar
Hosted by Joe Lamour and Kendra James
Well, what a difference a day (or a few hours) makes. I really want to jump right into this weeks discussion with my fabulous Scandal roundtablers, but here’s the short of it: as we saw last week, Edison in one day implied that Olivia was, as the title of the episode indicated, a criminal, a whore, an idiot, and a liar, and then backpedaled so far into “I love you!” within an hour that he should really contact The Guinness Book of World Records.
Kendra James, Jordan St. John, T.F Charlton, Johnathan Fields, Zach Stafford and Loree Lamour join me to dissect what in the world is going on.
T.F.: Can we talk about the recent discussions about Olivia Pope as a fictionalized reality TV star? A lot of people in my Twitter feed have been discussing this–sparked by this article claiming Olivia’s “no different” than the women on Love and Hip Hop or Real Housewives of Atlanta (whom the author calls “reality show chick[s]”. Setting aside for the moment the implicit respectability politics being imposed on reality TV stars who are women of color, and the serious slut-shaming of these women and of sex workers…I think this is a very, very odd comparison. It seems to not take into account at all any of Shonda’s other work, or perhaps more importantly soap operas as a genre. Olivia isn’t “just” a black “chick” behaving badly–secret affairs are a trope in soap operas, regardless of race, and in Shonda Rimes’ work specifically, she has lots of female and male characters who are cheaters. It seems to me that the only reason Olivia Pope sparks this comparison is because she’s a black woman–Meredith Grey and Addison Montgomery don’t spark the same comparisons to “reality show chicks” for similar behavior because they’re white. Male characters like Derek or George don’t get shamed at all for cheating on their partners. The whole discussion seems to me to speak to anxieties about being seen as respectable under a white gaze: no one is calling it “hypocrisy” to enjoy a character like Meredith Grey but, because of respectability politics, it becomes hypocrisy to root for Olivia Pope. (For the record, I hate Fitz and do not in any way, shape, or form root for his toxic relationship with Olivia, but again, their relationship isn’t particularly unusual for the genre).
Joe: To Mo Ivory (the writer of that article): First of all, lady, Olivia has a job. I know some of the housewives do, but implying that she is one of those ladies implies that she is like most of them and not the (very) few in those franchises who run a successful firm, or didn’t marry into money, or aren’t arrogant or entitled. I should know: I have watched every single Housewives franchise. Even the horrible DC one. I’m a terrible person–I know. At least I don’t watch any of the Kardashian shows. We’ll have to agree to disagree on the Olivia and Fitz thing, T.F., as I slowly hide away my Olitz t-shirt and red, white, and blue sparklers.
Loree: OMG Joe, Olitz. I love it! I will use it henceforth. Now back to what T.F. was saying–categorizing Olivia in the same department as the stereotypical portrayal of the Real Housewives. I have one thing to say to Mo Ivory: Haters gonna hate. To categorize a whole race of women according to what reality television deems them to be is ridiculous. Any of us are proof of an anomaly in that respect.
Joe: Maybe I’ll design some t-shirts for real, Loree! Craft weekend!
Page 1 of 5 | Next page