Society/Culture Has cancel culture gone too far?

[Gralin]

or again, if he's making jokes about the victims of the Christ Church Massacre (something else has done) because Islamophobia hur dur something something white supremacy, at what point do you think people impacted by that might not think he should be making money from that without push back?

 

[ShanDog]

or again, if he's making jokes about the victims of the Christ Church Massacre (something else has done) because Islamophobia hur dur something something white supremacy, at what point do you think people impacted by that might not think he should be making money from that without push back?

You clearly don't understand the point of comedy or what the role of a comedian is.

One of their core functions - and has been for hundreds of years - is to hold a mirror up to society and address the fringes of what is normally considered acceptable dialogue.

The point is to broach difficult topics with comedy in order to soften the blow and/or bring people together. That could be anything from jokes about 9/11 to AIDS. Everything is fair play.

The things that are said aren't supposed to be taken literally, as the object, subject, and vehicle of a joke are all different things.

It's all fiction. They are there to poke sacred cows in the eye, tell emperors they have no clothes, and to point out the folly of kings.

If you are offended by a comedian, the most likely reasons are because you are fragile and don't get the joke or what comedy is for.

Maybe listen and research more than you talk. You can start with this:

"Comedy In An Age Of Cancel Culture" with Mark Normand

Jerry Seinfeld personally chose Mark Normand to be his opening act. He’s a favourite of Joe Rogan and has appeared on CONAN, the Tonight Show & Late Show. Josh caught up with him, live and in-the-flesh, during Mark’s Australian tour. Mark’s new special

open.substack.com

 

[Gralin]

Yes it's all fiction it's just holding a mirror up to society, if you find something offensive the problem is always you not the person being offensive if they say "it's just a joke"

 

[ShanDog]

Yes it's all fiction it's just holding a mirror up to society, if you find something offensive the problem is always you not the person being offensive if they say "it's just a joke"

I did say that if you find it offensive, it's USUALLY because of those things. To be absolutely clear - of course there are bad actors out there who genuinely are spouting hate.

Problem is that the vast majority of accusations of such are absolute garbage.

 

[happy_eagle]

I did say that if you find it offensive, it's USUALLY because of those things. To be absolutely clear - of course there are bad actors out there who genuinely are spouting hate.

Problem is that the vast majority of accusations of such are absolute garbage.

This is why I think intent is a better judge of whether something is offensive, rather than an arbitrary number of people that were or were not offended.

Take for example the below clip from Michael Richards


It is clear in this clip the dude is having a breakdown on stage, and his intention here is not to be funny.

 

[Gralin]

He blocked me from his twitter venue. No idea who he is. Will assume he is Avi Yemini adjacent.

View attachment 1775927

Is anyone not blocked by him lol

can't imagine why he would be limiting who can view his tweets though

 

[SaintsSeptember]

You clearly don't understand the point of comedy or what the role of a comedian is.

One of their core functions - and has been for hundreds of years - is to hold a mirror up to society and address the fringes of what is normally considered acceptable dialogue.

The point is to broach difficult topics with comedy in order to soften the blow and/or bring people together. That could be anything from jokes about 9/11 to AIDS. Everything is fair play.

The things that are said aren't supposed to be taken literally, as the object, subject, and vehicle of a joke are all different things.

It's all fiction. They are there to poke sacred cows in the eye, tell emperors they have no clothes, and to point out the folly of kings.

If you are offended by a comedian, the most likely reasons are because you are fragile and don't get the joke or what comedy is for.

Maybe listen and research more than you talk. You can start with this:

"Comedy In An Age Of Cancel Culture" with Mark Normand

Jerry Seinfeld personally chose Mark Normand to be his opening act. He’s a favourite of Joe Rogan and has appeared on CONAN, the Tonight Show & Late Show. Josh caught up with him, live and in-the-flesh, during Mark’s Australian tour. Mark’s new special

open.substack.com

I actually thought that Will Smith's punching bag was pretty poor.
His joke pretty much amounted to "haha you have no hair ".
It was focused on one particular person and an issue she had.

He could just as well as done....."There's Brendon Fraser , he can play the part of Humpty Dumpty.... cos he's fat."
"There's Michael J Fox, maybe he can play Stephen Hawking in future if he can no longer walk..." ( different disease i know ).

Whereas Jimmy Carr's Hitler joke was "you know there were others killed by the Nazi's too" .... His punch line was the distasteful part , but that was also the part that was very obviously the joke for anyone familiar with his work.

Back when Graham Kennedy , was doing the news, someone wrote in asking after his dog Rover ( who had probably been on TV in the early 70s ).
Kennedy said something along the lines of "unfortunately my dear old faithful companion Rover is no longer with us ......But he was delicious .
Don't call the animal activists , it was a JOKE!!!.

 

[ShanDog]

I actually thought that Will Smith's punching bag was pretty poor.
His joke pretty much amounted to "haha you have no hair ".
It was focused on one particular person and an issue she had.

Yeah, I agree. Chris Rock's bit was more of a roast than a stand up comedy act, and it's a bit iffy to do that when the other people aren't consenting to it.

But hey, Will and Jada are filthy rich, and are therefore immune to criticism, right?

 

[SaintsSeptember]

Yeah, I agree. Chris Rock's bit was more of a roast than a stand up comedy act, and it's a bit iffy to do that when the other people aren't consenting to it.

But hey, Will and Jada are filthy rich, and are therefore immune to criticism, right?

No they aren't white. If they were white it would be ok.

 

[Chief]

Is anyone not blocked by him lol

can't imagine why he would be limiting who can view his tweets though

View attachment 1776634

Honestly I would go and see it just for the car-crash value. If tickets were cheap. Free.

 

[Geelong_Sicko]

You clearly don't understand the point of comedy or what the role of a comedian is.

One of their core functions - and has been for hundreds of years - is to hold a mirror up to society and address the fringes of what is normally considered acceptable dialogue.

The point is to broach difficult topics with comedy in order to soften the blow and/or bring people together. That could be anything from jokes about 9/11 to AIDS. Everything is fair play.

The things that are said aren't supposed to be taken literally, as the object, subject, and vehicle of a joke are all different things.

It's all fiction. They are there to poke sacred cows in the eye, tell emperors they have no clothes, and to point out the folly of kings.

If you are offended by a comedian, the most likely reasons are because you are fragile and don't get the joke or what comedy is for.

Maybe listen and research more than you talk. You can start with this:

"Comedy In An Age Of Cancel Culture" with Mark Normand

Jerry Seinfeld personally chose Mark Normand to be his opening act. He’s a favourite of Joe Rogan and has appeared on CONAN, the Tonight Show & Late Show. Josh caught up with him, live and in-the-flesh, during Mark’s Australian tour. Mark’s new special

open.substack.com

I often wonder about the boundaries of comedy. There seems to be a 'fair use' system about things, even bad things, that are big enough to make the news but what about jokes about newsworthy events that specifically pierce an individual's pain?

Someone close to me has had three failed IVF implantations and they're getting quite despondent about it. Just yesterday there was an IVF lab incident where several eggs got infected with a contaminant and were destroyed.

Sydney hospital forced to destroy IVF patients' embryos and shut down fertility laboratory

Now here's the hypothetical. Say we both know a third person, someone who does stand-up at pubs, one whose gimmick is 'no empathy, angry at the world'. They crack jokes about the lab accident knowing my other friend is in the audience.

Would foreknowledge make it wrong? Is empathy a character flaw that should never be catered to? Is there a middle ground between empathy and pushing the envelope for reactions?

I'd like to think even comedians have some kind of duty of care.

 

[Gralin]

It is interesting that there are a bunch of middle aged male comedians who seem to have based their current career phase on being cancelled.

They go out of their way to tell jokes that will get them cancelled, so that they can complain about cancel culture which gets the a certain audience watching their shows and buying their merch

They don't even have to actually have any shows cancelled or be dropped from a streaming platform, they just have to wait for the rest of the grift machine to start insinuating that is what is happening

And this is what people want to focus on and call those that got angry about the racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, whatever the "jokes" were fascists and the real problem.

Not the fact that purposefully wrapping hate speech up as a joke is currently profitable

Not the fact that we've got actual neo nazis and other fringe right wing groups threatening physical violence to get LGBTQI+ events shut down, books banned, minorities targeted for harassment.

No the problem is people criticizing the public figures that pander to those fringe groups.

Back to this again especially after we just had CPAC here on the weekend and they'd all love tbis to come here as well.

California shop owner shot dead over LGBTQ+ Pride flag displayed at store

Man made comments about flag at Laura Ann Carlton’s store in Cedar Glen and killed her before being shot and killed by police

www.theguardian.com

 

[ShanDog]

Seems like one of those psychos who is keen to commit suicide by cop and take out someone he hates along the way. Scum.

 

[Gralin]

Doesn't happen in a vacuum though does it

 

[ShanDog]

Doesn't happen in a vacuum though does it

No, of course. There's a whole lot of shitty right-wing rhetoric that makes out as though gay or gender diverse people are coming to try and trans your kids or some s**t. Anyone who hates themselves and the world has a ready-made group to project that hatred on.

 

[Gralin]

No, of course. There's a whole lot of shitty right-wing rhetoric that makes out as though gay or gender diverse people are coming to try and trans your kids or some s**t. Anyone who hates themselves and the world has a ready-made group to project that hatred on.

yeah and there are comedians making jokes to that crowd and copping criticism and the discussion is some how about how the people criticisng the jokes are soft and easily offended and ruining the lives of comedians doing their jobs

and when the inevitable violence does happen its excused as just some person with an issue and you go back to bemoaning how comedians can't say racist and homophobic s**t without pushback

 

[Gough]

Doesn't happen in a vacuum though does it

Mental health and video games, probably had no dad either. That's how the narrative usually ends up around these things.

 

[Gralin]

Mental health and video games, probably had no dad either. That's how the narrative usually ends up around these things.

yes and all the people ranting about how gay people are a disease that should be eliminated will publicly say

that's not what we meant

and privately mark another notch on their belt and keep going

 

[ShanDog]

yeah and there are comedians making jokes to that crowd and copping criticism and the discussion is some how about how the people criticisng the jokes are soft and easily offended and ruining the lives of comedians doing their jobs

and when the inevitable violence does happen its excused as just some person with an issue and you go back to bemoaning how comedians can't say racist and homophobic s**t without pushback

See, it's at this point you divorce yourself from reality. If you are genuinely trying to link a nutter with - well, I have no idea who, as aside from racism and Butterfield, I've not seen you be any more specific than 'comedians'... well then, I have a website for you: Spurious correlations.

As if racism or other forms of irrational hatred weren't around or acted upon prior to stand-up comedy. Reminds me of the fainting-in-shock trope.

 

[Gralin]

See, it's at this point you divorce yourself from reality. If you are genuinely trying to link a nutter with - well, I have no idea who, as aside from racism and Butterfield, I've not seen you be any more specific than 'comedians'... well then, I have a website for you: Spurious correlations.

As if racism or other forms of irrational hatred weren't around or acted upon prior to stand-up comedy. Reminds me of the fainting-in-shock trope.

you refuse to allow for a link between the murder and the behaviour you defend because that would make you part of the problem

you have to dismiss my position outright as fantasy, because the alternative would be that you are defending behavour that leads to hate crimes

I've got a term for you to stochastic terrorism

heard of it?

fox presenters, politicians, all sort of commentators use it regularly to incite hate and violence towards people they don't like

and in that environment, comedians certainly can play a part

they could choose, as you say to hold a mirror up to society, they could point out that the drag queens aren't out there grooming kids in record numbers, that gays aren't trying to convert your children to their team like its a religion

huh interesting word that, religion

now who would be trying to convert your kids, who does keep being found to groom them in record numbers?

yeah maybe if they were making some jokes about that instead of normalising attacking the gay and trans people you'd have a point about comedians

some do, its not all comedians obviously

but the second, anyone tries to link any violence against a community the right is attacking, you call that person delusional

apparently it doesn't matter how many hate crimes are committed, each and every one of those people is just a nutter, and therefore the people promoting the hate's hands are clean

the fact that you think the public derision of a minority both by politicians and in popular media has no relation to an increase in the targeting of that community by the general public is mind boggling

but you do you, I'm going to go back to not engaging because you really don't like it when the conversation goes beyond the surface outrage where you feel safe in your convictions

 

[ShanDog]

you refuse to allow for a link between the murder and the behaviour you defend because that would make you part of the problem

You're more a part of the problem than I, by a long, long way.

you have to dismiss my position outright as fantasy, because the alternative would be that you are defending behavour that leads to hate crimes

You haven't provided a position - you've provided blanket statements and shifted the goalposts on the discussion to suit your narrative. E.g. I have said several times I was talking about comedians, academics and artists regarding cancel culture. However, you keep bringing the topic back to the most extreme example you could think of that supports your censorious perspective. Know who else does that? The same right wing nutters you decry. Welcome to their club.

they could choose, as you say to hold a mirror up to society, they could point out that the drag queens aren't out there grooming kids in record numbers, that gays aren't trying to convert your children to their team like its a religion

Once again, feel free to give me an example of who you are actually talking about, instead of the crazy shake-the-fist-at-the-sky type ranting. "Them".

but the second, anyone tries to link any violence against a community the right is attacking, you call that person delusional

I call your overly simplistic, single-answer link delusional because it is. That's not how complicated things work.

the fact that you think the public derision of a minority both by politicians and in popular media has no relation to an increase in the targeting of that community by the general public is mind boggling

Never said that. Never even talked about that. You make up arguments in your own head, even when you are actually arguing with somone.

but you do you, I'm going to go back to not engaging because you really don't like it when the conversation goes beyond the surface outrage where you feel safe in your convictions

Ok king of ad-homs, go for it.

 

[Mofra]

Conservatives and book-banning. An iconic duo.

Steve Martin Offers Hilariously Iconic Response After His Book Is Banned In Florida

Always a silver lining.

www.comicsands.com

 

[cartwright]

Conservatives and book-banning. An iconic duo.

Steve Martin Offers Hilariously Iconic Response After His Book Is Banned In Florida

Always a silver lining.

www.comicsands.com

“Regimes ban books, not democracies”.