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Mindy Kaling Never Said She Wouldn’t Ever Write About Abortion

By Jon Mark
Published on: 11:23 PST, Apr 17, 2016

Mindy Kaling attended this year’s Women In The World Summit (WIWS) which was held in New York on April 6 – 7.

In an interview on WIWS which Huffington Post covered, Mindy revealed she’s working on a project that touches on feminist issues which is separate from her show as she’s known for doing a lot of writing during her off time.

That was the answer to the (paraphrased) question asked which was, “you write a lot of screenplays, why don’t we see any of them?”

Since the news that Mindy Kaling’s series The Mindy Project was getting picked up by Hulu after it was cancelled by FOX last year, the comedian has been very direct about how she intends to try new things for the show, likely touching on very real, challenging topics.

Mindy Kaling signed DVD.
Mindy Kaling’s signature on DVD. [Image by LWYang via Flickr | CC BY 2.0]
The Inquisitr provides the details on the cancellation, but in the show when her character gets pregnant, the topic of abortion came up and forced Mindy to address the issue in some interviews.

Last Friday, the National Review published an article about the topic in relation to an episode of the Big Bang Theory and also took a sentence to point out that a left-wing show like Kaling’s has even embraced conservative views by not doing a show about abortion.

“Even the very liberal Mindy Kaling, star and producer of The Mindy Project, says the show won’t touch the issue of abortion — and Kaling plays a gynecologist.”

The article has been republished throughout conservative sites with various titles to spin the idea that the conservative voice has won in programs with liberal messages and where they have no choice but to admit in some way that abortion is wrong.

In an article published by Flare in September of 2014, Mindy Kaling is quoted as saying that she’s making sure The Mindy Project feels like her show whether it gets cancelled or not.

This was about the time that FOX had ordered less episodes for the third season, perhaps a foreshadowing of the inevitable cancellation?

But Flare also reveals her views on talking about the controversial topic on her show.

“Despite Lahiri’s profession, Kaling has no plans to address the American right’s current war on abortion: ‘It would be demeaning to the topic to talk about it in a half-hour sitcom.'”

Eight days after that interview, Huffington Post published her follow-up response on the controversy regarding what she initially said.

Mindy Kaling speaking with someone at Revlon event.
Mindy Kaling at Entertainment Weekly/Revlon Party, Beverly Hills Post Office, Sept. 20, 2008. [Image by Watch With Kristin via Flickr/Kristin.eonline.com | CC BY-SA 2.0]
The article links to an archived video of her interview during Huffington Live from which the article is based and refers to the other sites which tried to clear up the idea that comedy shows haven’t handled the issue in the past.

“My show is not about gynecological issues that much. It’s about a workplace, the way ‘The Office’ wasn’t really about paper. It’s hard to say those things and not sound like I’m not skirting the issue, but at the same time, our show from the get-go hasn’t made its centerpiece to focus on political issues. Instead, the fact of the way that I look and the decisions I make — the character — that has sort of been our more subtle mouthpiece for those things.”

In league with the National Review‘s article, Mindy does say that it’s hard to do comedy about abortion but also acknowledges the pressure around the fact that she’s become the go-to source around women’s issues.

Slate also wrote on the growing controversy, suggesting that the events which had recently taken place during the previous season — which triggered the question on whether she would use abortion as a plot device in the show — would change The Mindy Project entirely, as the character was not the type to follow through with a pregnancy.

The article was published early last year before FOX cancelled the show, apparently due to low ratings.

This, however, brings up a few questions as to whether The Mindy Project was cancelled due to perhaps potentially touchy subject matter rather than the low ratings and also whether the new Hulu network is her chance to write it into the comedy of the show.

Clearly, Season 4 has solved the abortion problem from the beginning, proving Slate’s view of the show’s direction wrong by letting her character have the baby.

But since Mindy Kaling has been writing other projects, there’s always a good chance she will give the abortion narrative another pass.

[Image by Richard Shotwell | Invision/AP]

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