A couple of weeks ago, someone asked on my Facebook page, I Don’t Get It, for my comments about a tv show on ABC’s fall line-up entitled, “Good Christian Bitches.” So, Rick, here are my thoughts.
The tv show is based on the novel by Kim Gatlin. The “dramedy project,” as it’s described, is about “a woman who moves back to her Dallas neighborhood after a divorce only to become the center of salacious gossip from the community’s churchgoing wives.” Not a book I’m at all interested in reading.
Clearly, by pitching “Christian” against “Bs”, the story revolves around religious hypocrites. No surprise there. Christians are humans. And humans are flawed. I get it. That’s why there’s Easter.
But, hey, the author of the book can call the book anything she likes if a publisher is willing to publish it. I have no idea how many copies of the book have been sold but the audience, I’ll bet, is a lot smaller than the television audience.
My lawyer-turned-screenwriter friend, John, introduced me to the term “high concept” which is used to refer to an artistic work that can be easily described by its succinctly stated title. The intent is to compel the broadest audience to watch after a pitch of only a few words. “GCB” is a classic example of a high concept title, so it’s easy to see why the network would want to use it. The problem is that the inherent insult is higher than the concept.
I’m not sure if ABC is planning to keep the title, but, if I had the opportunity, my first questions to ABC would be, “why is it ok to use “Christian” and the “B” word in the same title for a tv show?” Who’s your target audience? Don’t you think it’s insulting to the vast majority of Americans who consider themselves Christian?
My next question would be, “So, Mr. ABC executive, if you’re going ahead with this project, I think you should be fair and balanced and having some other shows on the fall line-up like, “Good Islamic Bs,” “Good Muslin Bs”, “Good Jewish Bs,” and how about “Good Buddhist Bs.”
I can tell you his answer. “It’ll never happen.” Of course, it won’t. Everyone knows you can’t say anything about Muslims or Islam. Look what happened to Juan Williams over at NPR and actor and former Congressman, Fred Grandy, who lost his radio gig.
The bottom line for me is why are Christians always such an easy target? I actually have to work for a living so I don’t have too much time or too much money, but if I did, I’d conduct a study why Christians are the objects of such religious animus and prejudice. (Perhaps I could get a government grant. Hmmm?)
Is it because we don’t have a centralized organization like the Anti-Defamation League or the Council on American-Islamic Relations to speak up against these affronts to our religious beliefs? Does it have anything to do with the “turn the other cheek” Christian mentality?
Just look what happened with the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy or the Everybody Draw Mohammed Day brouhaha?
Yet, every few months I read about another anti-Christian “art” display like in Loveland Museum, Colorado, the Harvard Art Exhibit in Cambridge, MA, the Sacramento County Public Law Library, and, of course, who can forget the Brooklyn Museum of Art’s “Yo Mama’s Last Supper” and “Holy Virgin Mary” smeared with elephant dung controversy. The list goes on and on.
I don’t care whether the actual show gets on the air or not. That’s why the remote control was invented. But I do care about the title.
“Entertainment expert,” Jenn Hoffman says, “ABC’s core viewership is Christian, so the goal of the show won’t be to attack Christianity. Just like the book, this is a show by Christians, for (mostly) Christians, to enjoy a little prime-time self-deprecation.” I wonder if Ms. Hoffman is a Christian.
Aside from the title being insulting to me as a Christian, I can’t imagine any parent wanting their child exposed to a commercial for “GCB” or to read about it in the TV Guide. Bottom line: Isn’t it time for all religions to become sacrosanct again?
I don’t get it, but if you do, God bless you.
