If you're stuck for time, here's the short answer inside one paragraph, nothing is sacred. I believe if you're doing comedy at a venue with adults that have willingly come to watch and listen, you have the freedom and right to use any subject matter you wish. With that freedom though, comes a responsibility and a bit of a waiver. If you want to say something in the name of getting a laugh, say it, but from the moment you took the stage and addressed the crowd, then you have accepted that just as you have the right to free speech, your crowd has the right to find you offensive, to think you're an idiot and to downright hate everything you come out with. That's the game, you can discuss genocide if you think that's going to get a laugh, but if you get booed off stage and roundly hated on, never to be booked again, you knew the risk going into it.
From my experience, the most common hot button issues in comedy are; Racism, Homophobia, Sexism and perhaps the one topic that has the most emotion surrounding it, Rape. There are comedians in the Wellington circuit that use some or even all of these topics on a regular basis in the name of comedy, so, the question is, should they? For me, they have every right to try, that's what they are trying to do, joke about these subjects, to elicit laughter from the audience. They have signed their waiver though and often these jokes do not go down well, I personally can not find the subject of rape funny, for me, the idea of rape is such an atrocity that I don't find it in the least bit amusing. I am not offended by it, I don't feel rage and hate swelling up inside me and want that person to get off the stage, I just don't find it funny. Some people though, will. Some people will be disgusted with what they hear, and they have every right to feel that way. Someone who has been personally affected by one of these issues is likely going to find it really difficult to deal with, whether that be rape, sexuality or using a racial slur. I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on what someone affected by any of these may feel, hey, I'm a white guy aged 20-50, we have a pretty easy time of it. What I can do though is empathise with anyone who feels offended or belittled by an intended joke.
I look at my role as a comedian as having one objective and one objective only, to make people laugh. It really is that simple. That in mind, I want to make jokes that have the best chance of making everyone laugh. I never consider whether my joke will offend someone, for me, that's an exercise in futility, you're always going to offend someone, so I don't bother thinking about who may or may not be offended, they have the right to feel offended so if they do, so be it. What I do want though is to create a joke that will appeal to as many people as possible, and using my functional brain, I know that if I try and make a joke out of someone being brutally attacked and sexually assaulted, a lot of people are going to sit there looking at me thinking "what the fuck was that..." and what I want is them to be laughing, preferably a lot! So that's out for me, its the same with any topic, Racism, you can get a cheap laugh by playing to some sort of Black\Asian\Hispanic stereotype, but that's all it will be, a cheap laugh, and the people that are offended aren't going to be laughing so why would I bother. I've seen this a couple of times when I have misjudged the divisiveness of a joke.
A couple of weeks ago I saw a current affairs show where they profiled a guy who had lost the use of his arms and legs in an accident, now, immediately there's absolutely nothing funny about this, it's a tragedy. There was one shot they used where he was laying in bed watching TV and there was a voice-over talking about his plight, on the TV though, you could see that he was watching the cricket, and my first thought was "poor guy, cant even change the channel". Its not the greatest gag in the world by any measure, but the point of the joke is who am I poking fun at, certainly not the guy who has to live with a disability that would without question destroy your life. I was making fun of the Blackcaps, a notoriously under performing sports team. When I wrote the joke I had written down -
"So he's laying there in his bed and my heart goes out to him, but I couldn't help noticing, someone had put the TV onto Sky Sports, and he was watching the Black Caps, has he not suffered enough"
In itself, I think that's not that offensive, I'm simply pointing out that watching the NZ cricket team is suffering in itself. There's almost certainly people who aren't going to find that funny for one reason or another but I had hoped when I delivered the joke, that most people would be able to laugh at the badly performing cricketers aspect. When I actually delivered the joke on stage though, I ad-libbed a bit, right at the start and it totally changed the joke. What I actually said was..
"So he's laying there in his bed and my heart goes out to him, but I couldn't help noticing, someone had put the TV onto Sky Sports, and they've put the remote control just out of reach.. well I suppose for him just out of reach is anywhere, ....and he was watching the Black Caps, has he not suffered enough"
I've underlined the bit I ad libbed and its pretty obvious what I've done, without thinking, I've re-structured the joke so that before we even get to laughing at the cricketers, I'm making a joke about his unquestionably tragic situation. The crowd let me know it was poor form and I moved on, having been reminded of the importance of "who are you laughing at".
That's an important thing to consider when making a joke, who are you actually laughing at. Most people agree, generally speaking, its wrong to laugh at someone who didn't choose something bad happening. You're on pretty safe ground if you follow that rule, people who are disabled, of another ethnicity (and the joke is squarely about the race), have had a horrible tragedy befall them etc. It's a scaled approach though, The rich guy who buys a new Jaguar and drives it round to his friends house to really rub it in, only to find that a tree falls on his car when he's inside trying to find the friend to brag to, is kind of funny. He didn't choose this thing happening, but its a judgement call, a bit of common sense. I think that situation is likely to get a giggle if worked into shape. The guy is fine, his car is totalled. That's where using your judgement comes in. I don't want to crucify anyone for having bad judgement, because they may make an error like we all do, learn from it, and be funnier because of it.
Someone in the local comedy scene I have heard talk about offensive topics is Brad Zimmerman. Brad has been doing comedy for years and normally goes down an absolute storm with audiences. Now like everyone, Brad makes the odd joke that is crap, he'll admit that (although I'm guessing now I've said that, he will do the classic comedy response of "no, all my jokes are amazing, fuck you" or something similar). One thing that has stuck with me that he said once was "If someone hates my comedy, then I'm fine with that, they're not my audience". I'm paraphrasing,but that was the jist of it. That's become my new mantra, if someone hates my stuff, they're not my audience. Now who do I want my audience to be, well, anyone really, but here's who I don't want. A bunch of brainless bigot's who laugh at other peoples tragedy. So when I make a joke about drinking my dehumidifier water, and someone thinks "that's shit, talk about women in the kitchen", I couldn't be happier that they hate me, because that is not the sort of audience I want.
The distinction for me is one between 'offensive' and 'is it funny'. They can exist together, something someone finds very offensive can be hilarious to someone else. As a comedian, all you're trying to do is make people laugh, if you have a good sense of what is funny to most people, you're probably going to do well, if you have constant bad judgement, and never adjust, you're probably going to either do badly and eventually give up because no one wants to see you, or you're going to develop a small but loyal group of similar thinking individuals who find the same stuff funny. That's not what I want, but if it works for you, go for it. There's a risk involved when you do comedy, and there's a risk you take when you watch comedy too, the risk you will find something offensive. Both parties have to take that into account.
The last thing I want to discuss briefly is, people are different. It's the most obvious thing but increasingly seems to be forgotten when people mention a difference, not just in comedy. I am talking about people who are offended\outraged as soon as they hear a minority group even mentioned. If you begin a sentence, "There was this gay guy...", or "I walked past this group of Asian students..", there are many people I'm sure who have immediately decided that you are going to say something hateful. They don't care how you finish the sentence unless its in glowing terms. Perhaps a better example of this would be saying "I saw a Chinese guy reverse his car into a lake". Now this situation has some comedy potential, lets assume the bloke is fine, and his car is slowly sinking into the lake as he looks at his NAVMAN GPS system (which for the purposes of a joke, he's rescued) quizzically". Now some people are going to immediately label you a racist because you've mentioned the guy was Chinese. Is it important to the joke? no, not at all, he could be Russian, English or African American and its still a joke about a guy who trusted his GPS and got into a sticky situation. But if the guy really was Chinese, and you've mentioned that fact, you are just telling a story. If someone is offended by the fact you felt the need to explain he was Chinese, fuck them. Again, that's not your audience.
To all the self styled 'offensive comics' out there that may stumble across this article, I have absolutely nothing against you. Some of these types make careers out of it and have their audiences, they've chosen that over years of working on gags and that's their choice, their lives and so long as they are only ever using words, I cant get angry about their material, I can only choose to avoid it if I don't find it funny. Most of the time I don't, So I wont go and watch someone do a set that I am aware is going to involve these sorts of things, again I stress, I'm not going to be offended, I'm just not going to laugh. The beauty of this situation is, neither of us really give a fuck, I don't care they're speaking to a room of people with what I consider to be crap material, and equally, they don't give a shit that I don't like it.
Its been a bit of a rambling post this one but to sum up my feelings, and that's all this is, my feelings, on comedy's hot button issues:
- You're always going to offend someone.
- Over time, you choose and refine your audience.
- Comedy is subjective, just because you don't like it, someone else might.
- You can say whatever you like, but be prepared to take the heat.
Thanks for reading.
No comments:
Post a Comment