I don't want to hear an apology from Michael Richards. I want to see somebody get their ass beat.
But the person who should get their ass beat shouldn't be Michael Richards. I'm not sure who should though. But I tell you what. When Russell Simmons makes a rule to ban the word 'nigger' from all comedy routines that go on Def Comedy Jam, then maybe I won't want to see anybody get their ass beat.. nah yes I will. You see what has gone wrong today is that a lot of people believe there is a lot of racist hate in America, but when the wrong word is spoken they cannot bear it, and they can't bear the consequences of finding out that maybe they're right. And it begs the question about what the discussion about racism is supposed to be about, and when whomever it is says that it's supposed to be about what comedians say on stage, that somebody needs to get their ass beat. And whomever is being kept awake at night by this awful, horrifying display of poor breeding, well they should probably be on the boot end of an ass-whipping too.
See I just can't get that offended about it. I'm a college-educated sophisticated man. I read the Invisible Man a long long time ago, and I remember the part when it was said that if you thought you could insult a sophisticated man by calling him 'nigger' you really weren't important enough to mind. But it appears that we have a generation around here that can't bear it. When De La Soul said "I got too much family to heed your threat", evidently half the audience did not, and we have a society which is getting brittle, people who need so much respect that it proves they're not worthy of much. If it kills your dignity to be called a 'nigger' maybe you never had enough, proving once and for all that deep down you believe you are one. Too bad for you. They deserve all the opprobrium they bring upon themselves. There's only one reason for a black man to be perceived as a nigger, and that is to be indistinguishable from the stereotype. Maybe if everyone had license to call a spade a spade, then such spade would show their true colors. Problem is, they're protected.
But on the other side of the coin, there are insults and there are fighting words. And I know the currency of the American fat-faced bourgeoisie. The People of the Passive Voice. They like dueling lawyers. For them, justice is found in the absolute drubbing of the OJ Simpson book, a right and proper snubbing. Oh, they wouldn't dare lay a hand on the man because that would be...heaven forbid, action. We have too many of those empty suits in our society too. People who think they have an intellectual point to prove by saying that they can call a nigger a nigger if niggers call niggers niggers. Well, they're right, but they forget that by doing so they themselves become niggers. And niggers kill niggers every day. And when they see that retribution coming that's when they step out of the ring and dive behind whatever it is they think they have that makes them something other than a nigger. But they're transparently devolved, and really deserve all the drama and trauma. Problem is, they're protected.
So in my proper world the match-up is nicely square. The arrogant prick who takes license gets popped in the nose by the insecure man-child. It's like a new-jack fraternity hazing. Please, my nigga may I have another. Blood calls for blood.
This is what failed to happen at the comedy club. Maybe Michael Richards was asking for it. Maybe the anonymous black man was itching to dish it out. But we'll never know because we've had an intervention. And now every freaking pundit, wag and fool with two Kbs of bandwidth to rub together will begin filling the internet with bloviation about what this signifies. They need to get their ass beat too.
We've seen this before. Between Lebanon and Israel. And if the Democrats have their way, there will be another intervention between the Coalition of the Willing and the anarchists in Iraq. You can just hear them all nannying about 'now there'll be none of that.. go to your room'. Yeah, now it's becoming clearer who needs their ass beat. It's the unelected referrees. The Protectors. The third party legal interests. It's the somebody who says 'nobody wants to see a fight'. Actually, a fight is what's needed. Not an apology.
I'm tired of the apologies. I'm tired of the lawsuits. I'm tired of the speech restrictions. I'm tired of the mincing. I'm tired of the uneasy peace. Somebody needs to get out there and say what they mean, mean what they say and take the consequences straight on the chin. I don't expect it, but that's what should happen.
What's funny about all this is that it is inevitably where those elements of society want to be. Let's be frank. That wasn't Mort Sahl up on stage. It wasn't even Moms Mabley, whom I never heard use the word 'nigger'. And that comedy club, wherever it was, was nothing close to sophisticated. My guess is that what passes for humor in that joint goes by the same standard as what passes for writing in Hollywood. You know which Hollywood I'm talking about - the one that doesn't bother with sophistication. The one that entertains us with pimps and whores, lowlifes and gangsters. The one that writes 'fuck' into the scripts for spice. The one that commercializes the shameless. That's the kind of venue where comedians say 'motherfucker' and it's OK, because it's part of the dialog they have with the audience. What kind of offense is off limits? Well that's very difficult to tell isn't it? Because you know it's all marketing. But everybody who paid to hear knew that they were going to hear the kind of obscenity you can't ordinarily hear. And the shame of it all is that once upon a time, if it came to that, people could step outside into the alley and have a manly resolution.
Ahh, but there's no manly resolution here. Just a bunch of whiny babies mad because they think they've got unfinished business. Yeah well perhaps they do, but it's not important business. I want to be an Unleasher. And so I say piss off to the Protectors and let these pit dogs go at each other. I'd be plenty happy if they kill each other off and take the pretenses of the comedy club business down with them. Take this to WWF where it belongs.
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