The RIP thread...

For white Brits/NI people, this will be (in descending order) partly an age thing, partly a measure of what your parents chose to watch or let you watch (I don't think even TS was old enough to be deciding what the family watched when Roots was shown), partly a measure of the breadth of their own interests (although Roots and any discussion of it pretty much disappeared from mainstream media only a few years after it broadcast). There were plagiarism accusations and the accuracy of Haley's genealogical research was challenged, which gave white society here and over there an excuse to say "None of that was real and we don't have to think about it any more, let alone talk about it".

My parents did watch it and let me watch. As a kid in very white, rural Aberdeenshire, I'd never seen anything like it before. But even a lot of white Brits my age are more likely to have seen (and remember) "lost cause" bullshit like North and South (a real fucking low point for some of its actors).