For those of you who find the same kind of juvenile bathroom humor from fifth grade hilarious in your mid-thirties, most contemporary white comedians will easily have you in stitches. The list of caucasian dumbfucks who get people to laugh via screaming, animal sounds, inane sight gags, toilet innuendo or frat-boy stunts is rather lengthy. And their popularity is still hard to explain. They're described as "edgy" or "loose" or "improvisational" or "no holds barred" or with some assemblage of adjectives that creates the illusion that we're in for something hilarious in a really huge way. Then when the moment of truth arrives, you're left sitting in a confused silence, wondering when the "funny" part is supposed to commence. You leave the joint with the impression that watching a holocaust movie or some Abu Gharib prison torture footage would have been more of a laughfest.The interesting common denominator with these irritating douchebags is that their audience is limited to a very select few: other white people with a flawed sense of humor, and the unwilling guests that they drag along with them to the comedy club or amphitheater. I watched a Dane Cook comedy special recently, and couldn't find any non-white people in the audience. And when you did spot one, they were clearly not laughing or having a good time. Here's an amateurish shithead who went from being an obnoxious substandard comedian in college student unions to a humor-killing film actor in some of the most vile straight-to-DVD offerings so far this century. Even the airlines won't offer Dane Cook movies out of fear that the passengers would either storm the cockpit or bolt for the nearest emergency exit without a chute.
And speaking of sickening, one of the most bewildering successes in white low-IQ pop culture belongs to MTV's "Jackass", a show that brought the laughs via stunts like skateboarding into brick walls and rubbing one's genitals with toxic solvents. Mind you, this was media giant Viacom who gave the green light to a troupe of stupid white fucks who chose to take the unfortunate shit they did in their backyards and put it on tape. Partners in idiotic white trash crime Johnny Knoxville, Steve-O and some brainless doof named Bam got the yuks from high school dropouts and anyone who considered self-mutilation a knee slapper. And the fact that the Jackass audience totaled millions made this form of American art a sad commentary on our culture.
Then you have this red-headed freak who does bad Gallagher imitations and is somehow allowed camera time regardless of how unfunny his schtick gets. Yes, I'm referring to Carrot Top, who decided that he had to eventually look even funnier than he actually is by morphing himself into a steroid-enhanced transvestite. Just watch (if you can) the clip below. When a comedian is shocked that people are actually laughing at them, that's a clear indicator of self-admitted suckdom. Some people have graphic nightmares that involve clowns. My darkest dreams involve being duct taped to a chair while watching Carrot Top. It seems like the only way that I'll ever find myself at a comedy gig featuring this subhuman freakazoid is if I've been kidnapped by the Jigsaw Killer and I decide to hack off my foot instead of watch another fucking dimwitted sight gag.
It seems that most white comedy centers around the ever-present "inside joke", where there's no way you'll get the punchline unless you understand the alleged humor that lies beneath. Like why Dane Cook ends his jokes with loud puking noises. Or why dry-white-toast monotones like Paula Poundstone and Louie Anderson do the kind of generic comedy that's a solid cure for insomnia. And how about that accordion-wielding lunatic with a grating voice who can't say anything close to funny if her life depended on it? Yes, that's Judy Tenuta, who looks like the crazy old bitch next door who owns three dozen cats and gets her prescriptions via mail order. The laughter that comes from white people via these overpaid con artists is still a logical oddity. Yet people are paying to be entertained by them, and somehow, they succeed at it.
The other inexplicable phenomena in the bizarro world of white comedy is how some of these freaks make a career out of one catchphrase or punchline. By now, even pygmys in the most rural villages of Africa know all of the reasons why you might be a redneck. And some of these shitheads are under the impression that using "fuck" or "fucking" when you need to form complete sentences make the punchline even funnier. And even the high-minded thinkers of our generation still can't understand how they made a whole goddamned movie out of "It's Pat" from SNL. With the possible exception of the late Bill Hicks, there have been very few white comedians who have taken the art form to the next level or who have brought any new creativity to the fore. Oh, I'm sorry...you think that's not true? OK, then I've give you five seconds to think of someone current who's an innovator and not an imitator.
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Time's up. See, I told you. These fucking hacks are taking you all for a ride and have a following who make them think they're hilarious at what they do. One of these days, they'll end up at a club where an audience with high-school level literacy will sit in silence and reveal the true crowd-killers. Or they'll just play it safe with the audiences of drunk college kids and keep cashing in. So guess what, people, you may be the one laughing, but from start to finish, the joke's on nobody but you.
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