Orange is the New Black, a TV series in which we can see stereotyping, racism, materialism, and different social class levels in conflict. The first episode titled "I wasn't ready" is full of Marxist content, an entire paper can be written only about the first 5 minutes alone. This is the first time I watched this TV show and I got interested or hooked up not because of the content, but rather because after the Marxist Perspective reading I can better understand what this TV show does to the viewer. Piper's perspective is the only view we can perceived the most, we identify with her as a new inmate inside of this jail environment. As the show develops we start to see that not just Piper's perspective changes drastically, but ours as well. We can clearly appreciate a class relationship issue as well as a societal conflict in the first half of the show. Law enforcement, guards in this case are portrayed as jerks, stupid and pigs with empowerment. Men in general are also portrayed as pigs especially when Piper's fiancé farts in the bed when she walks away into the restroom and then when Piper makes that phone call and the guard starts to masturbate. The idea of making love is lost in this episode it is referred as f***me instead. Yes, it seems like Piper is in love, however she was also in love 10 year before that and see what happened to her. Society is loosing the true meaning of what is truth. Money is portrayed as happiness and satisfaction at the beginning of the show accompany with sexual seduction and satisfaction, and at the end it is portrayed as perversion and the reason why we end up making the most stupid mistakes possible.
I liked the scene where one of the inmates slaps one of the new inmates, the Latina; which to our delightment the one who slaps her was her own mother. Here we see a vicious circle of social relationship issues in which it portrays an idea that if you are in jail most likely your kid's will end up in jail, just like the wrongful mentality that if you smoke, drink or do drugs your kid's will also end up using these. The media portrays stereotypes that drive our way of thinking and slowly, but surely these ideas stay in our mind and it is when people make stupid decisions and react improperly to certain events in life.
It is clearly communicated through S. Healy the guard who is doing Piper's documentation that there is a broken system in place, he stated to Piper during their conversation as to how she ended up in that place and I quote "and here you are, costing the tax payers money and sweating in my arm chair. You know I have been here for 22 years and I still can figure out how this system works. I have a crack dealer who is doing nine months and then I have a lady who accidentally backed up into a mailman who is doing four years. The guy broke his column bone, but come on I just don't get it." (Wasn't). The system of our country is portrayed as a broken system, is the system broken? After seeing TV shows like these and watching the news like the ones we typically watch on the daily basis it is possible that we are being brain washed little by little to believe these ideas to the point that we no longer trust the laws of our country.
Unfortunately, everything is about money and sex and drugs in today's world for many people. It sounds like the 70's, right? or is it that this movement never went away, but is is simply being emphasized via the the media today? This is why Piper makes her biggest mistake by getting involved with her rich trafficking lesbian partner.
Finally, racism is very well shown throughout the entire episode, especially when the driver of the jail bus tells Piper that she takes care of her own people. Marxist views are all over this show, I can continue sharing my thoughts about the many social, political and societal issues portrayed in "Orange is the New Black" episode, but I think I have contributed to this blog up to this point with the above. Overall, great show, good actors, content is on the grey area in my opinion. This can be of negative impact for people who are not ready to watch and understand the true message.
"I Wasn't ready" Orange is the New Black. Netflix. 2013. Television
The part about her prison councillor stood out to me as well. The reason that this stood out to me was because if one of the people that works in the system does not understand how it works, then who does? Also interesting that you brought up the idea of the cycle because although I'm not sure if that fits any Marxist theories, it is a societal view.
ReplyDeleteI'm really glad you brought up in the first paragraph the stereotype of Piper's fiance being portrayed as a pig (He is also one of the main actors in American Pie, which doesn't help his character out a lot) and how Piper says "f**** me". Maybe that's her way of making light of a tough situation, but still. Not sure if you noticed, but when he proposed he told her to put the ring on her finger, which made his proposal seem so nonchalant and kind of depressing. I guess I've just always assumed when a man proposes, he puts the ring on the woman's finger?
ReplyDeleteTotally agree with you! There was plenty of Marxist views just in the first five minutes to complete this assignment alone.
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