Orange is the new Black is a brand new show that features many queer woman of color. As a Netflix series the show is riding a new wave of media. Netflix began as an internet option for viewing movies and has successfully put many movie chains like Blockbuster out of business alongside Red Box. The company has expanded now to include instant viewing of movies and television shows that have opened it up to every possible television audience. With the creation of Orange is the new Black (OITNB), the company has become almost like a television network. Whereas you can only view Glee on Fox, you can only view OITNB on Netflix. Though for only about $7.00 a month, it's not a bad deal.
The show follows a character named Piper Chapman who is about to begin a year long prison sentence for her role in a drug smuggling operation alongside her ex-girlfrind. The prison stay could not come at a worse time, as she has just become engaged to her boyfriend Larry. Now Piper must readjust what can only be described as a hiccup in her all around privileged life to prepare for life on the inside. Because the show is based in a female prison, most of the leading roles are played by women. This is in many ways outside the mainstream and has given the show a captive female audience who find it to be in many ways empowering. I feel that this show was created however for a very specific demographic and at the expense of others.
Lets talk first about access. We are talking about one of the only shows available that features, comparatively the most realistic portrayal of a trans* woman of color offered no where else except Netflix. We spoke extensively in class about access to the media and how it extends beyond whether or not you own or can find a computer at your local library. It matters whether or not you can afford the right type of internet cable and how long you can use a public computer. OITNB is a great example of this.
If you cannot afford a Netflix subscription, you do not have access to this show. Queer andTrans* women of color are disproportionately poor and oppressed compared to queer white women and queer black men. Netflix is cultural capital. It is a symbol of the middle class. And in this sense, OITNB is a show about many low-income, incarcerated, queer women of color created for middle-upper class white (queer) women. These images and representations do not serve as empowering because the people that need to see them do not have access to them.
In addition, how empowering can it be to see the only legitimate representation of yourself set in a prison? From its inception, this show was racist. It featured advertisements that relied on racist stereotypes to draw in its audience like the one below.
The characters of color are subjected to these tropes in the show as well. The Latina women are presented as fiery, promiscuous, bitches with too many kids. The black women are presented as loud, ghetto, stupid, dangerous and cold. The one Asian woman on the show is presented as submissive and voiceless. All of them are presented as in need of saving. While the white women in the show also have stereotypes attached to them, they are spared racial character commitments. They are subjected to class stereotypes.
The only character in the show with full legitimacy is Piper Chapman, because of her race and class. While the show asks us to believe that Piper is just like anyone else, it is only successful because it plays on the fact that she isn't.
Piper is not just like anyone else in prison. She has access to wealth and family. She is a business owner and she holds values that Americans trust like marriage. The show creators use Piper's whiteness in order to offer legitimacy to the other characters in the show. The audience is told who to like and who not to like based on Piper's perception of them. No one cares about 'Crazy Eyes' (a name that could only be assigned to a black character) until Piper has a relationship with her. In this way, white audiences learn to have relationships with people of color from a distance and only through the lens of the white savior. Piper has no black friends on the outside and suddenly she is puting her freedom at risk to reopen the track for a black character who used to run track in high school and needs it to stop being so angry all the time.
The only thing that makes Piper's character significant is the fact that she is queer. She dates both men and women, though the show and audience at times tries to push her into one of the two camps- (biphobia at its best). It is this fact that draws in a large white lesbian audience. There is a lot of white lesbian sex in this show, which makes it the best thing to happen to queer television since the L-word. However, it once again erases black female sexuality. Black women do not have sex in this show, especially with one another. It is extremely ironic that even on a show where lesbian sex is the norm, it is still deviant as long as it is black and brown. Piper's rejection of 'Crazy Eyes' serves to reinforce this commitment to the right kind of gay sex.
Orange is the new Black allows white women the opportunity to engage in revolutionary television without actually having to examine what is going on. They are privileged enough to see themselves represented in multiple media outlets and therefor do not have to fret over inaccurate representations of themselves based on class. They can come just close enough to black and brown culture without actually having to go to black communities or make black friends. They are afforded access to and consumption of black bodies and lives without permission. They even earn street cred by watching a show about prison but do not have to worry about prison reform.
Many of my above points are highlighted in Julianne Hough's recent decision to dress up as crazy eyes for Halloween by doing black face. It is clear that this show was never made for me.
