Tim and I were rambling on the phone about various things the other day. It turns out we’d both watched two comedy specials; Dane Cook’s “Vicious Circle” and Katt Williams “The Pimp Chronicles PT. 1” Talk about feeling old, grey and out of touch. I had a tough time “getting it” with either of them. Since a friend had seen them, and had many of the same reactions as I had, I wasn’t left feeling “is it just me”. My wife is not the person to go to for views like that, as she doesn’t have the patience to sit through such tripe — she’d just change the channel. Me, it was liking seeing a gruesome accident; you want to look away, but have this fascination and curiosity to see the whole mess.
Dane Cook isn’t so much funny as he is expressive, and isn’t a comedian as much as a story teller. He tells stories about sex, life, cheating, crying, and crime, that are amusing anecdotes with occasionally amusing observations, but no real point or payoff. His two hour special would have been far more entertaining as a 45 minute one. He takes something that some of us do; especially when we are young and stupid, and then mimics it, mocks it, tells stories about it, and then beats it mercilessly into the ground. I think back “was I like that in my adolescence?”… and of course, there was some truth to some of those things, back when I was a post-teenager (with a lot of emotions, and not much of a clue) — but as a forty-something person, with a little life experience under my belt, I have a hard time relating well. Kids or many ages seem to love him, and he sells out large stadiums, and I’m left feeling “out-of-touch”.
Katt Williams was worse. KKK members can’t slip the term “nigga” as many times into a single sentence as this guy seems to milk out of every single turn-of-phrase. And while I could look past that, as I have for many black comedians, I was at best, mildly amused at points. I did enjoy his mocking of Hollywood briefly, as having been from there, and even his cliche’d attacking of Michael Jackson was somewhat funny. But many of the entertainers he referenced, weren’t people I knew. And while I got most of the points, it wasn’t terribly funny to me. It was about taking a black perspective on things, but not in an amusing Chris Rock kinda way — it was sort of a “Redneck tour” meets the black-panthers kinda way. Again, huge focus on cheating, “black” things, sports and entertainment and so on. Some gangsta-rapper with a grill (fake ‘bling’ in the teeth, etc) came on, and it was like glorifying the ghetto, drugs, promiscuity — and in doing so, mocking ethics, work, opportunity and so on. It was like the opposite of a guy in a white sheet tell black jokes — instead being a black guy in a pimp outfit trying to glorifying all the things that hold them down, thus being far more effective at eliminating opportunities than the guys in sheets ever were. Stereotypes glorified in the return of huggy-bear.
I feel like an old-fogey when I start saying things like, “what is this world coming to”. Or, “it was never this bad, when I was young”…. but it wasn’t. If our idols and entertainers define us (or represent us)… then whites are about self-absorbed emotional ADHD-inspired hedonism… and black youth is about counter-culture glorification of anything that is anti-system. And while I had a rebellious streak and respect a little counter-culture views, there’s a point where the line becomes a little clearer. Glorifying crime results in more criminals. Glorifying ignorance, racism, drugs, promiscuity, bad-speech, slang, vulgarities, and so on, does the same. Yes, I get that it is entertainment — so was Gerry Lewis with Buck-Teeth and Thick-Glasses, and so were white actors in black face, and even some of Goebbels stuff was funny, if you didn’t think too hard. But with a little maturity and experience in this world, they aren’t quite so funny. Our youth is telling itself that it is OK to be immature, self-centered, unfocused, horn-dogs. And our black ghetto-culture (I certainly wouldn’t associate that comedian with most of the black people I’ve worked or hung out with), wants to glorify rap, sports, drugs, promiscuity, and every negative stereotype you’ve heard, and then some.
I was left pondering what happened to intellectual comedians. People like George Carlin or Bill Cosby, who used to make observations of the world, family or people that actually had a point and tried to make you think? Instead we have comedians that glorify mistakes and wallow in stupidity and ignorance in a way that I’m not left feeling they were mocking it, but more excusing it (when they weren’t outright glorifying it). So I recommend both shows to people. Not because they are particularly funny or interesting (they weren’t THAT bad), but because they are interesting sociological/anthropological observations on people, by what they find funny, what they glorify, and the message of their lives/careers, and what message they want to pass on to their kids.
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