Roseanne’s
“Lets Call it Quits” – A critique of Marxist Critiques
One of America’s most beloved and
important sitcoms, Roseanna, follows a middle class working family. Roseanne, a
working wife and mother, works at a factory that produces variety of plastic
products. Her supervisor abuses his power to increase the quota of production
to an unreasonable amount which I think is a dick move. The supervisor later
states that those that cannot meet the quota will be fired. It is later
revealed that the supervisor doesn’t have the power to enforce such a quota or
relief people of their job, he is just doing it to stress out the other workers
and make himself look better to the other higher ups that run the factory.
This abuse of power can be seen as how the upper class takes
advantage of the lower class in a capitalist society. As the workers are pushed
to their limit and can’t meet the new quota, they worry about losing their jobs
and stress about their futures. I think this is a good example of Marxist criticism
because how the working class is unable to go against the elitist in this
situation. Roseanne then tries to
bargain with the supervisor to have a more realistic quota mark but in return must
degrade herself by giving in to show total respect and be obedient to the
supervisor.
Later on, the supervisor announces that
the quota has been risen again back to the original amount despite Roseanne being
obedient. Roseanne then decides to quit her job and a few of the motherworts
follow suit. This moment of the episode does support Marxist Critique because in
a Marxist society worker would not have the option to leave their positions as
they are placed there as needed by society.
Though this episode has moments
where it does show shared moments that would happen in a Marxist world, I see
that it an example that because we do not live in a Marxist society we can
still stand up for our beliefs.
Very interesting post about the Roseanne episode! I especially liked your comment about how in a Marxist society worker would not have the option to leave their positions as they are placed there as needed by society. I hadn't thought about that. You provided a great analysis of Mr. Faber and his power over the factory. If you wanted to go further, you could have touched on the relationship between Roseanne and her family. As a working class mom, there are a lot of examples that can provide a great Marxist analysis. Great job!
ReplyDeleteI agree with you when you mention that it stopped being a Marxist critique as soon as they left the factory because if it truly was Marxism they would not be able to have the choice! I think you could have used a bit more examples from the episode but great job overall!
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