On Comedians that Punch Down (Srinivasan/Cowen, and yes Chappelle)

One of the great jokes of the political circumstances of our age is that comedians are the great political commentators of the age. And while it would be silly to claim that David Letterman is solely responsible for the political ascendancy of Donald Trump, it's also true that he helped turn Trump from a New York city character into a national celebrity by repeatedly giving him space for -- I say this with the benefit of hindsight -- test-running his campaign massages. Belatedly, around 2010 Letterman himself grew uneasy about this, calling Trump a racist and sharply demarcating the "circus" (in which Letterman and Trump were both starring (ahh) freaks) from the political arena. The point of the contrast in Letterman's shtick then is to proclaim Trump unfit for office. (The interview with Dr. Phil is still worth re-watching; Jason Zinoman's 2017 New York Times article gives useful background, although does not mention Trump's role in the Central Park five.)

Letterman's underlying instinct that there is a contrast between comedy and politics is an important one. It's no less important than the difference between work-place harassment and comedy. What's  funny and worth having in one context, is oppressive in another.

I am thinking of these matters not just because Plato implies that Aristophanes is responsible for the accusation (and so eventual execution) of Socrates, or the predictable controversy about Dave Chappelle's latest special, and (recall) my struggle with the implications of my admiration for Norm Macdonald, but also because the topic frames the relatively recent, fascinating discussion (or interview) between Tyler Cowen and Amia Srinivasan. 

So, let's first look at how that exchange commences:

COWEN: You’ve described yourself as a utopian feminist. In your vision of utopian feminism, how much room is there for what I would call compartmentalization? Just to give a simple example, if you look at, say, stand-up comedy, a lot of it is sexist or racist, or even if it’s not, it’s perceived as such. What happens to that in the utopia? Do we just compartmentalize and let it continue? Or how do you treat it?

SRINIVASAN: I’m not sure about room for compartmentalization. I do think there’s a lot of room for context. For example, when you’re thinking about the violence in rap lyrics, an obsession that began in the conservative pearl-clutching in the ’80s, you’ve got to think about what those invocations of violence are doing performatively in a piece of art, that is, rap music. It’s not the same thing as someone standing up in the middle of the town square, trying to deliberately incite violence against people.

Not even speaking about the utopia, just speaking about how we should think about performative utterances right now, I think we need to address them with a great deal of contextual sensitivity and think about, in general, what is happening in these particular cases. What seems to be problematic might not be. But then, let’s be honest, if you’ve spent any time in a comedy club — and I recently did that when I was last in LA — there is just a lot of quite naked sexism there.

It’s pretty shocking — despite the fact of this feminist revolution in comedy — just how much stand-up comedy is really quite comedically boring and sexist. Now, there’s this question about — I take it that one of the thoughts you have is something like humor —

COWEN: Right, which has a brutal element to it. How humor fits into utopia is a long-standing puzzle because humor is often brutal, right?

SRINIVASAN: Yes. Look, I don’t think the utopia or the post-revolutionary world is a place without any form of brutality, and it’s certainly not a place without humor. It’s going to have disappointment and heartache and tragedy and tragicomedy. Human foibles will still exist. Heartbreak will exist. With all of those things, you have humor.

What is very limited is the thought — and I’m not suggesting that you’re advocating for this thought — but the thought that you basically need structures of organized political oppression like racism to have humor. The Greeks had humor without having racism. They had other systems of domination, but they had a great and advanced sense of humor, often directed at intellectuals and philosophers, who, I think, are often very much a worthy target.

I think there can be this view on which ending forms of domination and oppression somehow drains life of all that is special and textured about it: humor, love, intimacy, friendship. I just don’t think that’s true. I think, in fact, what the end of domination would do is release us more fully into the specific things that make human life worth living, including humor.

Now, it's quite possible that Cowen surprised Srinivasan with this line of questioning. I recently read (and discussed) Srinivasan's The Right to Sex, and, while she does self-describe as a 'utopian feminist,' and mentions Louis C.K's misdeeds, I don't recall comedy being especially important to her arguments. Having said that Cowen did his homework and seems to have been aware of the fact (as I was not) that Srinivasan has a serious background in theater (as she affirms later in the interview). I hope to return to the meat of the interview some other time.

I was, however, taken aback by Srinivasan's comments that I have just quoted. For, if a post-revolutionary world, feminist or not, cannot do without "brutality," then it is not obviously worth having. Of course, she leaves unclear what 'form of brutality' she foresees, and without further specification there is not much more to say here.*

Second, she thinks that "intellectuals and philosophers" are worthy targets of comedy. Since she is talking about ancient Greece, and is one of our leading philosophers, one might say she forfeits Plato's/Socrates' "ancient quarrel" (Republic, 607b) against Aristophanes on behalf of the rest of us. She does not explain why, but given her comments in context, I assume this is so because the "intellectuals and philosophers" are not at the bottom of the dominance hierarchy and, one might argue, can wield the pen (or feather/keyboard) as sharply as the comedian. I suspect, then, she thinks it's kind of a fair fight that old quarrel between philosophy and the comic poets.

Fair enough. Although it's worth noting -- as the fate of Socrates suggests --, it's not wholly a fair fight because the comedian can attract a much wider audience than the philosopher, and may well be much better at political and social rhetoric (this is one of the sub-themes of the Symposium, after all.) And the consequential afterlife of such public rhetoric can be quite unpredictable. Aristophanes' Clouds may well have been thought harmless to Socrates when it first was performed, but after a plague, disastrous imperial overreach, a civil war and murderous dictatorship, context shifted dramatically. I mention these historical facts because what Letterman himself clearly thought initially was harmless entertainment, became politically potent after a great financial meltdown and a bailout of the rich and connected.

So, lurking in Srinivasan's comments, which, as I suggested, may well be entirely improvised, is the idea that humor, even brutal humor, is fine as long as it does not reinforce a structural hierarchy of some sorts. In addition (I take this from what she says about rap), comedy should not incite violence. 

Now, one natural way to read Srinivasan is that while comedy may not be art (like some rap is), comedy is, in fact, self-justifying. It's just one of those things that make a good life good. And because I agree with her about this (that comedy is self-justifying), and her suggestion that even in a very well ordered (albeit brutal) society there would be comedy, I do not want to exaggerate our differences.

But it does not follow from this that in addition to being good in its own right, comedy serves no social purpose in a disordered, hierarchical society like ours. For, comedy also offers society a mirror, even if it is a crooked or distorted mirror. And, not unlike great utopian fiction, it reflects back to us -- in exaggerated fashion, perhaps, -- the way laws, norms, and mores operate and the effect of them on all of us or some of us. In fact, Aristophanes Lysistrata has an important role to play in combining comedy with the birth pangs of feminist utopianism (if I don't have enough street cred for you to say this, this is the place in which I invoke the authority of De Beauvoir). Much of the old Chappelle's Show on Comedy Central (now available on Netflix) was about offering society a mirror on racial relations that with the benefit of hindsight looks prescient in light of black lives matter. 

Of course, Chappelle's recent special on Netflix, taped in Detroit, has gotten a lot of attention for its explicitly pro-TERF stance and its many transphobic jokes (also a theme in his earlier 2019 special). But if you watch his shows, there is a broader more complicated position. I want to introduce my defense of that claim by first mentioning another theme unrelated to transgender issues. A set of Chappelle's jokes (this is in his earlier 2019 show) is about Michael Jackson's child victims. And some of the jokes clearly minimize the harm done to the children (and others suggest Chappelle does not believe all the allegations). But the set is itself explicitly framed by Chappelle mentioning the fact that 50% of the audience members have probably experienced sexual harassment or worse. And while each of his punchlines can be construed as a belittling of the problem, the overall point is that there is a horrid epidemic of sexual harassment (and it should not just focus on celebrities). 

I think something analogous happens with Chappelle's orientation toward transgender issues. This is an issue he has gotten flack for in the past, and some of that criticism is part of the narrative. (I don't mean to suggest he is fair to his critics or actually responds well to them.) So, for example, there is a series of jokes about how on a road-trip a car, which includes a transgender person (a 'T'), can't make bathroom stops in four states. What's interesting about these jokes is that Chappelle is clearly not at all oblivious to the fact that many states make it inordinately difficult to be transgender; and his sympathies are clearly with the transgender against the states that wish to police bathroom behavior. 

After watching Chappelle's special and his (2019) Sticks & Stones, it seems pretty obvious to me that his underlying political outlook is live and let live (as long as Chappelle can make fun of you). I don't know whether Srinivasan thinks Chappelle is one of the "boring" comedians, but plenty of his jokes are not just transphobic, but also sexist.** (He recycles and repackages Norm Macdonald's sexist jokes about the WNBA. He also repurchases MacDonald's Jacques de Gatineau joke which is not sexist at all.) It would be disingenuous to say that he is merely representing or providing a window on sexism in society. He is also reenacting it.

But I don't think Chappelle is reenacting his transphobia merely for the purpose of putting his finger in the eyes of his critics. For the recent special culminates in a narrative about his relationship to Daphne Dorman a transgender (part-time) comedian, who ended up committing suicide. What's interesting about the narrative is not that Dorman (and later her family) defended Chappelle or that Chappelle set up a trust fund for Dorman's daughter, or that he has had a transgender friend and offered her professional opportunities, or even that Chappelle thinks white transgenders use their racial privilege in ways he rejects. But rather that Chappelle hoped to speak with Dorfman's daughter someday and that he wants to say to her (and now I quote from memory) that he "knew her father. And he was a hell of a woman.” (See here for slightly different rendition.) And whatever else Chappelle is implying with this joke, he is telling his audience that if even a transphobe -- and if you listen to his set he does not present himself as a moral exemplar at all -- like him can recognize and see Daphne Dorman's gender, anyone can. The implicature of the special is, thus, that the transphobes who act on their transphobia politically and economically are the real problem, and that if one recognizes one's own imperfections one can rise above them.

For Chappelle, we are all flawed none of us is really without sin. And his best jokes (and impersonations) have or exhibit, and now I echo Norm Macdonald's considered views about all good comedy, compassion for their targets.

The underlying point is that by being the object of a joke one can also, simultaneously, be humanized. Of course, this is not always true. But even jokes that are experienced as offensive and entrenching subordination also bring the outcasts into the community and into a larger conversation. (This is Chappelle's own defense in the special.) Not all purported jokes or the sets they are part of do this, of course. And my judgment here is fallible. And I also don't think Chappelle's humor is always that funny. (I never found Chappelle's Show on Comedy Central especially funny, but I also recognize that this may be colored by the realization that people like me were its target! Yet, some of the sketches are etched in my memory.)

But let's say I am wrong about all of this. Maybe his transphobic stance (funny or not to some) is simply beyond the pale, and maybe there are no positive consequences from punching down at all in comedy.  I would still argue that when performing, comedians should have an artistic license to mock and insult on par with the academic freedom of academics in academic life. 

For, it's healthy for society to have a place where none of us is above the joke. I don't just think this because it creates a privileged space for politicized or social commentary and for presenting the effects of our follies and foibles. Because of workplace rules and polarization, there are, in fact, few places where controversial and potentially obnoxious views can be aired at all in relatively heterogeneous company (outside echo chambers). And it is not like comedians can say anything. They, too, are regulated by public opinion and the views of their audience. So, the social utility of comedy is not just that it offers us a window into (the effects of) a lot of our social norms and practices, but also that they do so -- despite audience fragmentation and filtering -- in a way that is accessible to a relatively heterogeneous (and potentially large) public. This is, after all, one of the reasons why despite their lack of authority, they are important politically. 

I have gone on longer than is typical in such a Digression. And this reflects my awareness that perhaps I am all wrong here. So, I should stop here. But I wanted to add two more thoughts.

First, at one point, in an interview I think with Larry King, Norman Macdonald says in self-effacing manner, that stand-up comedy is no art. And this may suggest that Srinivasan is right in her implied contrast between rap (an art) and comedy (not an art) in her response to Cowen quoted above. For, Macdonald says, art is capable of multiple interpretations, whereas the job of a stand-up comedian is to make a room or a TV audience have the same reaction at the same time. What's funny about the comment, of course, is that Macdonald was quite capable of generating multiple reactions to his jokes over time (in the same audience). So, comedy is art, after all, but can only show (not say) it. Many of Chappelle's stories and jokes, too, also have multiple layers to them. He is not just creating laughs, but he is also inviting multiple interpretations. (This also suggests I should not be too confident in my own!)

Second, my partial defense of the fruitfulness of even potentially offensive comedy presupposes that comedy knows its proper place and stays in its lane. But as Letterman discovered that assumption is naïve. When a clown is seen as a trickster or noble truth-teller, they can become quite powerful politically in times of instability even potential civil war. (For the contrast between a clown and trickers see this fine essay on Boris Johnson by Alan Finlayson.)  

My idea that comedy is an important social safety valve and sometimes an epistemically useful window in a democracy also entails that it may be socially dangerous (as dictators everywhere recognize). My cop-out response here is that thankfully Chappelle's critics have access to influential outlets so that their concerns are also heard. Unlike the popular representation of Mill (which, inspired by Jill Gordon, I don't think captures Mill's views), I doubt the truth prevails over time in the 'marketplace of ideas.' Rather, liberal democracy is also a project in forbearance in which we ought to try to minimize mutual inconvenience and harms. Comedy can produce genuine harms, but it also plays an indispensable social role in helping see a way beyond them.

 

 

 

*To be sure, I do think that if one advocates revolution (recall Srinivasan on Stanley here; Srinivasan on Nussbaum here; but see here for second thoughts) one has some responsibility for what follows

**I have seen on-line chatter that his 'space Jews' joke is anti-Semitic, but the underlying point is the tragedy that a people that have suffered so badly are now oppressing another. 

Comments

[Tad Brennan]

I do not dispute your larger points here, but I do think you have misrepresented what Srinivasan said:
Srinivasan:
"I don't think the utopia or post-revolutionary world is a place without any form of brutality..."

Your summary of her position:
"For, if a post-revolutionary world, feminist or not, cannot do without "brutality,""

"Cannot do without" ≠ "is not without".

Srinivasan is making a prediction, as well as setting a threshold for what could count as a utopia: it may well have some brutality, and it need not be entirely brutality-free in order to count as a utopia. Perhaps, despite our best efforts, there are vestigial elements of brutality in it. They are hard to eradicate, but (luckily) their complete eradication is not necessary for utopia.

That is different from saying that a utopia "cannot do without," i.e. needs, as an essential constituent, some forms of brutality.

(it's the difference btw "necessary: contains some" and "not necessary: contains none.")

If some utopia needs, as an essential constituent, certain kinds of brutality, then "it is not obviously worth having," -- yes, that sounds right to me too, depending on the kind and severity of the brutality (c.f. naturally LeGuin's "Omelas").

However, if we are not imagining that the brutality is an essential constituent, but merely a predictable accidental feature of any utopia that will still include humans, and so will not completely eradicate every form of brutality, then that utopia may still be worth having, and indeed *obviously* worth having.

[Eric Schliesser]

Hi Tad,
I agree yours is the more charitable interpretation of Srinivasan on this point! Thank you for articulating it.
Eric

[Tad Brennan]

Thank you, Eric.