TV verdicts can rebrand surveillance as courtroom drama

Evidence

But the reality is that we make exceptions to our constitutional rights all the time. Be it freedom of speech, religion—none of them is absolute. The legal test for doing something so patently unconstitutional is basically: you better have a damn good reason. There has been one other long-standing reality in this country: If not safe, one can never be free. With great personal disgust, I am denying the plaintiff’s motion. Though this episode seeks to demonstrate sympathy for Arab and Muslim Americans after 9/11 and repeatedly states that discrimination is unjust, the ultimate message veers to the other end of the ideological spectrum. The dramatic shift of the judge’s decision makes for good TV. It offers viewers a surprising twist. At the same time, the episode’s conclusion is actually in keeping with the popular trope of respectable racism. — Evelyn Alsultany, Arabs and Muslims in the Media, 381

Categorization

• XREF: Pairs with the concept of respectable racism elsewhere in media criticism, and with the 2001: A Space Odyssey-era trope of mediated authority figures legitimizing state power.
• ADDENDUM: This ‘respectable racism’ verdict directly parallels how the small sacrificial acts in the sacrifice piece are dressed in respectable, loving garb—the mechanism of legitimizing violence through its framing.