Comedy Brings An Element Of Entertainment

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Basel Zedan

MCS 010

Professor Shigematsu

Comedy & Racism

In a world where society is too sensitive to everything going, comedy brings an element of entertainment that only it can bring. Racism has always been, and will always be, a very sensitive subject. Unfortunately, it is not something that will go away any time soon or, for that matter, ever, which is the exact reason we cannot take it so seriously all the time. At some point, you have to be able to laugh at yourself because if you do not have a sense of humor when it comes to your own race, you will not live a very happy life. I was born in Homs, Syria and came to the United States of America when I was almost two years old. Growing up as an Arab until high school, I was never made fun of because of my race. Then the terrorist attack on September 11, 2001 happened and it was a whole new ball game. All of my friends made fun of the fact that I was an Arab, but they would do it in good fun, and thus, I would not get offended. By contrast, after the 9/11 attacks, one of my cousins had his car vandalized by other students at his school. They painted words like "terrorist" and "USA" on his car, not realizing that he is a U.S. citizen and was born in this country. There is nothing funny about that. There is a difference between being funny and being racist – the line between the two should never be crossed and most comedians do not cross it.

After the ill-fated events of 9/11, I began to see "failed recruitment slogans" like the following: "Be Allah you can be!", "Martyrs have more fun!", "Free camouflage turbans! Sign up today!", and "Uncle oSAMa wants you!" Personally, I find these to be very funny. I am thick-skinned enough to not be bothered by slogans like that, but a thin-skinned person might taken offense to them, and I am not sure why. If you believe everyone is out to target you specifically, you have a complete misunderstanding of what is going on. Russell Peters, an Indo-Canadian comedian, makes fun of Arabs, as well as other races, throughout his acts. "Just for the record, my Arab friends, I don’t do any Arab jokes in my act. It’s not that I don’t think you are funny. It's just, I don’t know… I don’t want to die." said Peters on his live tour Red, White and Brown. As an Arab, if I was to take what he said seriously, it would show how little a sense of humor I actually have. Comedy can be controversial without being an actual personal attack on a race. This can be seen in comedian Dave Chappelle’s sketch "Frontline: Clayton Bigsby," which I will get to later.

According to Stuart Hall, a cultural theorist and sociologist, "the media constructs for us a definition of what race is, what meaning the imagery carries, and what the ‘problem race’ is understood to be. They help to classify out the world in terms of categories of race" (Hall 273). Our understanding of race is through the depictions we receive through the media. The media creates the identity of a race by its representation through the media, therefore integrating an ideology and a set of meanings about a race into society. If a person has limited exposure or awareness of a particular race, their ideology or outlook about that race comes from their exposure to that race through the media. Whether you are a comedian or an audience member laughing along, you have to make sure you have knowledge of the cultures and races surrounding you because if you do not, you will come off as being ignorant.

In the aforementioned sketch, Chappelle plays the character of Clayton Bigsby, a blind white supremacist who is not aware that he is actually a black man. It is interesting that Chappelle’s most important prop in this performance is his speech: as Bigsby, Chappelle speaks in a very shrill, nasal dialect that includes repeated use of the "n-word" and other racist, homophobic, or sexist labels. The use of this particular voice coupled with his speech are key in this sketch because you cannot tell just by looking at him that Bigsby possesses a strong hatred of black people. Instead, the audience must rely on his speech, which displays all of the commonly associated signs of racism in America: southern, un-educated, etc. In doing all of this, however, Chappelle is able to laugh about his own race. He realizes that while controversial to some, the sketch is not meant to be taken so seriously. It is satire at its best.

Hall says that "racism has a long and distinguished history… grounded in the relations of slavery, colonial conquest, economic exploitation and imperialism in which the European races have stood in relation to the ‘native peoples’ of the colonised and exploited periphery" (Hall 274). He describes three variants of the concept of adventure, which he describes as "one of the principal categories of modern entertainment" (Hall 276): slave-figure, native and entertainer (or clown). For the purpose of this study, I will focus on the aspect of the entertainer. He says that this variant of the entertainer, which in this case is the stand-up comedian, captures the ‘innate’ humor as well as the physical grace, of the licensed entertainer, putting on a show for "The Others" (Hall 276). Stereotyping is part of the continuation of social and symbolic order. It is used to set up a representative boundary between the normal and the unusual, the ordinary and the pathological, the acceptable and the unacceptable: the former being what belongs and what does not is "The Others." As said by Hall, though, it is not clear whether we are laughing with the comedian or at the comedian. The majority of the time, though, it is very clear: we are laughing with the comedian. There are a few instances, however, where we laugh at the comedian and things go wrong.

Michael Richards is best known for his role as Cosmo Kramer on the American television sitcom Seinfeld, one of the most popular television shows in history. Richards began his career as a stand-up comedian and ultimately got back to doing what he started after his run in television was over. In 2006, during a performance at the Laugh Factory in West Hollywood, California, Richards was being heckled by some black audience members. In turn, Richards went on a tirade against the members of the group sitting together, shouting "He’s a nigger!" several times before screaming, "Fifty years ago they'd have you hanging upside down with a fucking fork up your ass! Throw his ass out!" Richards was obviously referring to lynching, an extrajudicial execution carried out by a mob, often by hanging, but also by burning at the stake or shooting, in order to punish an alleged transgressor, or to intimidate, control, or otherwise manipulate a population of people. Richards perfectly showed that the idea of white supremacy still exists among some in this country. White supremacy can be defined as the life chances and quality of life among colored and "Third World" populations as being structurally subordinated to those of white and "First World" populations. The scene only got worse as a member of the audience that Richards was targeting shouted back at Richards that he is "a cracker" and a "fucking white boy." Richards apologized over what happened, but his career never got back on track and he retired in 2007. Unfortunately, the idea of racism may never have a chance to retire in this country.

Comedy is the only way it is acceptable to use overt racism, in my opinion. What Richards was doing was unacceptable. Overt racism is defined by Hall as "those many occasions when open and favourable coverage is given to arguments, positions, and spokespersons who are in the business of elaborating and openly racist argument or advancing a racist policy or view" (Hall 273). In layman’s terms, it is easy to detect, often considered unacceptable and is ignorant. An example of this is generalizing that all Arabs are terrorists or that if you are Latino, you are an illegal immigrant. It is very wrong, but when done in a comedic way, it takes away from the seriousness of it, which some may argue is a bad thing; however, for many, it is not a problem seeing as comedians get hundreds, if not thousands, of audience members to show up to their events knowing full well what it is they will be hearing.

Hall, believes that the repertoire for stand-up comics "has come to be dominated, in about equal parts, by sexist and racist jokes" as he says in his article "Racist Ideologies and the Media" (Hall 278). This is not true about all stand-up comedians, but it is true about many of them. A perfect example of this is Louis Szekely (a.k.a. Louis C.K.), a Mexican-American Emmy Award-winning stand-up comedian, television and film writer, producer, director, and actor, who tells his fair share of sexist and racist jokes. But again, he does it in good fun because he not only makes fun of other races, but he makes fun of himself all the time. In a recent interview on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Leno asks C.K. how his daughters are doing, in which he replies, they’re "two little white girls in America," igniting a set of jokes about race that had both the audience and Leno laughing.

C.K. decided to use the remainder of the interview to explain remarks about his daughters complaining too much about things like bubblegum-flavored medicine. "I'm not trying to say that if you're white you can't complain," C.K. said. "I'm just saying that if you're black you get to complain more." He was making a statement about white privilege by showing that it is real and that it does exist in a comedic way, so as to bring awareness to the issue but not be offensive in any way. C.K. continued, "Every year, white people add 100 years to how long ago slavery was.  I’ve heard educated white people say, ‘slavery was 400 years ago.’  No it very wasn’t.  It was 140 years ago. That’s two 70-year-old ladies living and dying back to back.  That’s how recently you could buy a guy." In saying this, he is actually showing reverse racism by making fun of his own race and them not knowing what he refers to as the "historical context" of white supremacy.

As it has been demonstrated by my own personal experience, as well as stand-up comedians, comedy can be perfectly acceptable to take away from the serious issue of racism. You just have to have an understanding what racism is, all that it entails and the real effects it does have on people on an everyday basis. Henry Ward Beecher once said, "A person without a sense of humor is like a wagon without springs. It's jolted by every pebble on the road." Be a wagon with springs and enjoy the little things in life because laughter, after all, is the best medicine to a healthy life.