The July 25 episode of The Bold Type, “If You Can’t Do It with Feeling,” ran with the idea of the Trump era creating a culture of fear and hate, and used that false fear to excuse violence by the left.
The Bold Type airs on Freeform, previously ABC Family, and is geared towards teens, yet primarily features sex and promiscuity-driven storylines. The show centers around three young women who work at Scarlet magazine, based on the real-life happenings at Cosmopolitan magazine.
Tuesday’s episode was no exception to the sex-driven storylines as main character Kat (Aisha Dee), who used to be straight, explores gender fluidity by falling for a lesbian, Muslim artist Adena (Nikohl Boosheri). In this episode, they finally admit their feelings for each other and share a passionate kiss.
But Tuesday’s show delved into politics as well, as Scarlet magazine added a political vertical to the magazine to give a voice to today’s youth. Scarlet’s editor Jacqueline (Melora Hardin) says, “Young women want to be politically engaged, so let’s engage them.” She claims she wants to include “both sides of the aisle,” but as usual, there’s no sign of any sort of conservative opinion in the episode.
Jane is sent to represent Scarlet magazine at a political panel that Jacqueline says is “about politics in the woke generation.” When Jane is asked at the panel why she is there, she responds, “Young people want to be engaged, and right now, there's a lot to be afraid of, and when you're scared, you need voices that you can trust, and so it's up to us to be those voices.”
To emphasize this culture of fear, the show then features a racist verbal assault by an angry, white man (because, of course) on Adena while she is walking in the city at night with Kat.
Kat: What? So you get to have your phone, but I don't get to have mine?
Adena: It's my mom. She's calling from overseas. Allo. Allo, Mama. [Speaking Persian]
Man: Why don't you speak English, bitch?
Kat: What did you just say?
Man: I said I think your towel head friend here should speak English or go back where she came from.
Adena: Okay, come on, Kat. He's not worth it, come on.
Kat: No, no, apologize to my friend right now.
Adena: Okay.
Man: Don't touch me, you dirty little towel head.
Adena: Hey.
Man: Aah! What the hell? You crazy?
Officer: Do we have a problem here, sir?
Man: Yeah, yeah, we have a problem. She just assaulted me.
Kat: Oh, come on. That is total B.S., no. He just pushed my friend. Adena, tell them what happened.
Man: She punched me. That's what happened.
Kat: Adena?
Officer: Ma'am, I need you to step into the car.
Kat: Look, I can get my friend, and she can tell you what happened, okay? Just--
Officer: Ma'am.
Kat: Hey.
Officer: Ma'am.
Kat: Excuse me, don't touch me. Get your hands off me. Adena!
Adena says she ran from the scene because she was afraid she’d be deported and didn’t have much of a choice: “I'm a Muslim lesbian living in today's America. My choices are very limited.”
Later, when Jacqueline gets Kat out of jail for assaulting the man, we get the impression that it’s understandable that Kat would respond to hateful words with violence. Perhaps the writers are trying to create an excuse for the rash of attacks on conservatives by violent liberals, even though those attacks were unprovoked?
And, of course, let’s just ignore the rash of fake reports of attacks on Muslim women wearing hijabs, fabricated to create a false spirit of fear that was wrongly attributed to Trump. Were the writers desperate to create such a story for the show since none of the stories in the news turned out to be true?
Of course, Kat is given the first story to write for the new political vertical about her experience. But if the show had wanted to create a mirror of actual happenings in the world, they would have featured conservatives who are afraid to express their beliefs in public now and shown that the only culture of fear in the Trump era is amongst Trump supporters who are attacked and beaten simply for their political beliefs.
But that is apparently okay, as the writers demonstrated with Kat and Adena’s storyline. Despite the attacks on conservatives in real life being unprovoked by anything other than the victim’s political beliefs and in some cases for being white as well.
Try as they might to literally rewrite history, though, the truth remains. And it looks nothing like The Bold Type’s twisted version.
