The issue
In an interview with Los Angeles Times reporter, Tre’Vell Anderson (7/20/2017), she said Bill Cosby was one of the comedians who inspired her, and added that she wouldn’t mind collaborating with him on a project:
I still want to work with Bill Cosby; I don’t care, I’ll drink the juice. I’ll drink the juice. I’ll take a nap. I don’t give a damn. [Laughs.] But seriously, I would love for him to play my grandfather in something.
Michael Harriot of theroot.com (7/28/2017) tracks the outrage,
As soon as the article was published, headlines sprang up all over the internet condemning Haddish’s remarks as insensitive to Cosby’s accusers and all survivors of sexual abuse and rape.
Just kidding
In an AP interview (7/27/2017), she clarified that her comments were an attempt at a joke. She explained that she had done over 20 interviews that day and probably reached a little too far trying to conjure up something funny for the interviewer.
In every interview you have to be humorous because you’re a comedian. So I was trying to be humorous, and maybe it was not the best joke, but it was a joke. I’ll work with whomever. I’m not afraid of nobody. Nobody can do anything to me that I don’t allow.
This is a matter we’ve discussed before, the “just kidding” response. Don’t get me wrong: I think Haddish’s statement was a joke, made in the moment. And I think further that she expresses a sentiment that is right: at this stage of her career, she should work with anyone who can give her a leg up, even if it’s Cosby – though she should watch out for herself.
However, Haddish’s point is that she has to be funny in interviews because she’s a comic. Several comics would dispute this, arguing that when they’re not onstage, they shouldn’t have this obligation – this expectation. Haddish’s situation is different, I would argue, than comics who make politically incorrect or ill advised jokes onstage.
Doing it onstage
Harriot makes some important points here:
In 2011, Morgan was castigated for going on an “anti-gay tirade” during a Nashville, Tenn., comedy show. That’s right. He wasn’t trying to make a joke to a newspaper. He was onstage talking to people who paid to hear him go onstage to make jokes. Earlier this year, Dave Chappelle faced the same backlash when he released a pair of specials that had parts many felt were transphobic and blind to rape culture.
I am not one of those people who rail against the culture of political correctness; nor am I one of those people who believe that “art” is sacrosanct and cannot be criticized. However, I do think it is at least disingenuous and at most stupid to criticize comedians for making jokes when we know it’s a joke.
It may seem like a fine line to parse, but I separate them from city officials who email Barack Obama memes to each other or cops caught making racist jokes because we pay them to calculate our water bill and patrol the streets. They can make their friends laugh on their own time.
Cosby’s alleged crimes are horrendous. Haddish is a product of abuse and dysfunction, and perhaps her ability to make fun of it and situations like the one she escaped is one of the pillars on which her I-don’t-give-a-fuck attitude stands. She explained that it was a joke. That’s enough.
Harriot is right that comics should get some leeway onstage. However, he would seem to extend the same “joking” excuse to all of a comic’s activities; an understanding he does not bestow on your average Joe.
This begs the questions, “When she’s not onstage, do we know it was a joke? How? Should we just take her at her word?” While Haddish is not one of those “social” or “political” comics, who have an overt message and will bring it up onstage and moreso in interviews, neither does she get to escape the idea that when offstage, she might be a real person. While we can agree that while “on the job,” our public officials and servants don’t get to make racist jokes, do comics get the same leeway in interviews as they do onstage?
Harriot’s concessions
Harriot makes some concessions to the culture of sensitivity:
I can understand when people say they don’t like that brand of comedy (I still don’t understand how Andrew Dice Clay was ever a thing). I can even understand why some people get offended when someone they don’t know says something that has no effect on their lives whatsoever. Even though I wasn’t outraged when Emilia Clarke equated Hollywood sexism with racism, I thought it was a stupid thing to say with a straight face.
Yes, as will become apparent (if it isn’t already), there are forms of humor and comics I downright detest – some of these comics will for that reason never appear on this blog – Dice isn’t one of them. And yes, we should help people by becoming outraged on their behalf – particularly when some of them are outraged – that’s called “being an ally.”
False dichotomies
Harriot is also right to point out some of the points of comedy, but he takes it too far:
Much of comedy is using absurdity and hyperbole to make fun of reality. There are some who prefer to chuckle, but I don’t want to live in a world where sidesplitting jokes are replaced by innocuous puns and clever witticisms. I like the “I might get you pregnant” Morgan. I prefer the Chappelle who dissects white people, crackheads and racism. You can’t get that by making someone dance on the knife’s edge of public sentiment.
You can’t fall in love with her for blithely beginning a story with “What had happened was … ” on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and turn around and get upset with her when she doesn’t carefully choose her words for a newspaper interview. You can’t ask her to tread gently around sensitive toes and give banana-grapefruit blowjobs in a movie. Milquetoast doesn’t coexist with bold fearlessness.
They don’t go dagetha.
This is a false dichotomy: either we allow everything, or we are reduced to puns and witticisms. I agree that, as with all free speech, comedians should be free to say whatever they want. They are not, however, free from the consequences of their speech. These consequences will usually be mixed – some will understand their intent, even if they miss their mark, but some will be outraged, and perhaps they should be. That’s what affects a comic’s career. In the internet age, comics will find their crowds, their niches, however, if they want to become huge, they have to appeal to the mainstream, and that means not saying things that hugely offend.
Questions? Comments? Thoughts? Additions?
