30 Rock Make America Great Again

Six Ways 30 Rock Predicted the Future

Tina Fey, creator of xxx Rock, with her co-stars Jane Krakowski, Tracy Morgan, and Alec Baldwin.

This summer, alongside medication, meditation, group and individual therapy, and cocky-help books, I attempted to treat major depressive disorder by re-watching the unabridged series of 30 Rock.

Mental health issues aside, Americans spend a lot of fourth dimension watching mindless Goggle box (or merely scrolling endlessly through Netflix and Hulu never deciding what to watch) and I figured I may too exist watching something I know I similar. Also Tracy Morgan got me through some crude teenage years, and I am so glad he survived that machine accident.

30 Rock Cult Jokes — Table by S. Besl

For anyone who isn't aware, thirty Stone is a sitcom that aired for vii seasons on NBC from October 2006 through January 2013. Merely v years have passed since I watched it, merely they were my determinative developed years. So, my favorite part of this feel was understanding jokes I didn't get before…primarily related to cults (another obsession I use to care for depression). (Run across Table)

In addition to these timeless—besides every bit many other dated—jokes, 30 Stone prided itself in timely political commentary. Withal, listening to these plotlines post-2016-ballot, I started to feel that they were more than just timely, but prescient. My list of those particular moments is below.

Despite how awesome this show is, I must note that the evidence is arguably quite racist, or "racially irresponsible." As an due east-coast, educated nonetheless ignorant, wealthy white lady (simply like Tina Fey/Liz Lemon), I guess I saw stuff in 2018 that I didn't then, but at that place is no alibi—not for viewers like me nor for Fey. Plotlines for blackness characters, even if they get equivalent screentime, are woefully underdeveloped and oversimplified. Fey relies on the idea that she is employing irony and subversion to justify the characters and jokes. However, frequently the stereotypes (or "extreme opposite of stereotypes," such as Tracy'due south bodyguards having a fiction book club), land then close to dwelling house that it is hard to distinguish them from perpetuations of racial stereotyping. (Run across also: Was Margaret Cho's North Korea act biting one-act or merely racist?)

1. Backlash / pendulum swing in American race relations

Many discussions of race on the show occur between Tracy Morgan's character, the hilarious and outlandish actor Tracy Jordan, and intellectual nerd writer James Spurlock, known as "Toofer, because with him you get a two-for-ane; he'due south a black guy and a Harvard guy" (see notation about social criticism five. racism in a higher place).

When James gets called a racial slur on his way to work, he tells his coworkers most it (S4E17):

Dotcom: Well, I'm sure it was simply an isolated incident.
Tracy: Nah, I'm telling you, Dotcom. Onetime schoolhouse racism is back!
Toofer: How tin racism exist back when nosotros elected a blackness president?
Tracy: Barry Obams is the one who brought it back.
Toofer: So you're saying that racism is dorsum because white people no longer feel distressing for united states of america?
Tracy: Hey, something's going on. You know what I seen last night? A [abode security] commercial with a blackness burglar.
[cutting to: prune of man breaking into a white woman'southward domicile, sitting on the burrow, she yells, "black man!"]
Dotcom: That's not skillful.
Grizz: Come to think of it, I saw a white judge on Law and Lodge concluding night!
Tracy: Oh, yes. It'southward back on. Get ready, son. All y'all've e'er known is your affirmative action job and Queen Latifah Cover Girl commercials.

I mean I could weblog about this all day, but didn't that episode pretty much foretell and summarize (seven years in advance) the horrific trends toward white supremacism we've witnessed and experienced since the Obama presidency ended?

ii. Harvey Weinstein'south accusations of sexual assail

There are several references to Harvey Weinstein's behaviors in various episodes. As @karenricks captured perfectly in her October 2017 tweet, "Harvey Weinstein'due south addiction of abusing vulnerable women was such an open secret that 30 Rock joked almost information technology."

• "Oh, please, I'thousand not agape of anyone in prove business. I turned down intercourse with Harvey Weinstein on no less than three occasions. Out of five." -Jenna Maroney (2012)
• "You lot ever know you're at the right political party when it feels like The Riddler is nigh to attack. Look at this invitee list: Harvey Weinstein…" -Avery Jessup (2010)
• "I know how one-time lovers tin have a hold over you long afterward they're gone. In some ways, I'm even so pinned under a passed-out Harvey Weinstein, and information technology's Thanksgiving." -Jenna Maroney (2013)

Now that I'yard working on this article, I see several other people noticed this too, if you'd like to read more near it in Glamour , The Independent, and other outlets.

My personal favorite was actually the Neb Cosby reference that gets personal when someone pretends to be Cosby on the phone to Tracy, "Y'all've got a lot of nervus getting on the phone with me after what you did to my Aunt Paulette!" This episode aired in 2009. While issues between Cosby and Andrea Constand (and more) were occurring between 2002 and 2005, the issue went viral with a Hannibal Buress joke in 2014. Buress used to write for, and was a recurring grapheme on, 30 Rock — just an ascertainment!

3. Gross incompetence = White House appointment

Dr. Leo Spaceman is the astonishingly incompetent doctor who cares for most of the staff of TGS as a recurring character on 30 Rock. Information technology'due south hard to imagine a worse md e'er existing, plus he is extremely misogynistic (call up torso image, repro rights, and lines like "Yous know what else is from the 70s? Women staying tranquillity.") His grapheme arc on the prove ends with federal agents arriving at his office. Viewers, Lemon, and Dr. Spaceman all assume he's being arrested, but they're notifying him of his appointment to U.South. Surgeon General. This seemed just silly and satirical at the time, only in 2018 information technology evokes a as well-familiar feeling from the past two years, of seeing like types of people being appointed to position after position in Washington.

Headline: "Western reporter married Kim Jong-un. He's okay with how much shorter she is than him."

4. An uncomfortable intimacy with Democratic people's republic of korea

Kim Jong-il was the 2d Supreme Leader of N Korea, and passed away on Dec 17, 2011, when his son, Kim Jong Un succeeded him. On April 28, 2011, an episode aired guest-starring Margaret Cho as Jong-il, who detains Jack'southward wife Avery in North Korea. The jokes (many of which are most claiming dead people are however live) last for a full twelvemonth, with Jong-il making his terminal appearance in a May 17, 2012 episode, with some implication that he faked his own death.

The plot goes so far as to say that Jong-il married Avery off to Kim Jong-united nations. North Korean dictatos never before played a function in one-act and network TV entertainment, only entered our homes that fashion. And now we get to hear about Jong-un in the news every day thanks to Donald Trump's obsession with him!

5. Traits of the next President

While expressing faint hope about Hillary at times, 30 Stone overall seemed resigned to a candidate — or president — that, as implied through jokes and characters, would have some of all of the post-obit traits

• Republican/very bourgeois
• Verrrrrrrry rich
• From the business organization sector
• Crazy or potentially certifiably insane

Again, these are the trends from the sense of combined offhand comments throughout the serial, but very notable was the Steve Austin campaign (S5E7). Jack tries to dorsum Whatsoever conservative who will run against an anti-business U.S. congresswoman he wants to defeat.

"This state has lost it'south manner. Nosotros need to start over and return to what made our nation great." -Steve Austin

Ughhhh I mean Fey basically wrote Trump's slogan for him! The characters speak explicity nearly what liberals accept joked "Brand America Bang-up Again" means (e.thousand., "Make America White Again"):

Jack: You're an individual. A maverick. People like y'all are succeeding because Americans are fed up with the status quo.
Steve Austin: Exactly. They're tired of the direction this country's headed in, they want a render to our past glory, they want an American renaissance. That'southward the theme of my campaign. Renaissance means rebirth.

Then while filming a promo, Steve elaborates on his…ideas:
"I'one thousand a ramble originalist. And I believe that our founding fathers had it correct. We need to become back to THEIR America. No paved roads. Rum used as an anesthetic. Legalize slavery. Jack, you want to see my hand gestures? I have: [points at camera] you mind to me. [fist into palm] Forceful determination. [rolls up sleeves] At that place's work to exist washed. Hand me that shovel so I tin dig a grave for her." [accent mine]

What do Trump and Austin have in common? No respect for or understanding of women, dearest of modest government, and a rhetoric of returning to previously held "values." For all the originalists, hither are some bully excerpts from the most original document, the Declaration of Independence:

1. [The present King of Great-United kingdom] has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction, of all ages, sexes and conditions.
2. …with a house Reliance on the Protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our fortunes, and our sacred Honour.

Certainly.

"I truly believe that i rich person tin brand a difference in this country." -Jack

And I'm not the only one who feels that the prove was in-tune with five-years-later on politics:

half dozen. A Harriet Tubman biopic

I hateful this should take happened a long time ago, so is it really a prediction? Needless to say, January ten, 2013, Toofer pitches a Harriet Tubman biopic to Tracy Jordan'due south new production visitor. In 2016, talks of the new picture show were announced. The movie currently but has working titles, either Harriet or Freedom Burn. If you demand a Harriet Tubman ready today, lookout S2E7 of Underground (no context needed) on Hulu.

I hope you institute this commodity interesting and that information technology makes yous want to go sentry or make social and political satire!

Criss: They're flight from Houston's George Bush airdrome.
Liz: Not my aerodrome!!
Criss: Let it go, Liz!

#NotMyPresident #LemonOut

thirty Rock is available to stream on Hulu:

This article was much easier to write thank you to: world wide web.30rockquotes.net

mclaughlinsplaccut.blogspot.com

Source: https://rockyc5.medium.com/six-ways-30-rock-predicted-the-future-b947c4487685

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