As the target of the racist tweet that got Roseanne Barr's namesake show quickly canceled by ABC, former Obama administration senior advisor Valerie Jarrett has shared her thoughts, Jezebel reports. During an appearance on MSNBC in a town hall discussion on everyday racism, she shared that she was "fine" after the incident and said it should be looked as a "teaching moment."
"I’m worried about all the people out there who don’t have a circle of friends and followers who come right to their defense. The person who’s walking down the street minding their own business and they see someone cling to their purse, or walk across the street," she said. "Or every black parent I know who has a boy, who has to sit down and have a conversation, ‘the talk,’ as we call it. Those ordinary examples of racism that happen every single day."
According to the caption, Jarrett added she spoke to the chairman of ABC's parent company, Disney, before the announcement of the Roseanne's cancellation was made public.
Barr initially took to Twitter to say Jarrett, a black woman born in Iran, was the result of "muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes" having a baby. The backlash was strong and swift, and led to ABC blasting the tweet as "abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with [their] values." Reruns of the show are also being pulled from cable networks, and Barr was dropped by her talent agency ICM.
