Yeah, as long as its funny, if its just lazy cheap gags (so like 99% of internet edgelord humour) then I'm probably not gonna find them that funny.
Can you laugh at “offensive” comedy?
- Thread starter Zipzo
- Start date
Sure, but the joke has to have substance to it.
I went to a local comedy show a few weeks ago and two of the comedians were all about offensive humor and how everyone gets so offended these days. One guy’s entire set was pretty much a rant about PC culture, with him often making offensive jokes and saying things like “if you’re aren’t laughing you’re an asshole.” But, like, the jokes were lazy as hell and the entire punchline was that the joke itself wasn’t politically correct. You can’t make lazy played out holocaust jokes or do a bad Chinese accent and act like the only people aren’t laughing is because they’re suppressing in order to act offended.
I went to a local comedy show a few weeks ago and two of the comedians were all about offensive humor and how everyone gets so offended these days. One guy’s entire set was pretty much a rant about PC culture, with him often making offensive jokes and saying things like “if you’re aren’t laughing you’re an asshole.” But, like, the jokes were lazy as hell and the entire punchline was that the joke itself wasn’t politically correct. You can’t make lazy played out holocaust jokes or do a bad Chinese accent and act like the only people aren’t laughing is because they’re suppressing in order to act offended.
I prefer offensive jokes. Like that new ricky gervais special on netflix. I was in tears. So good
That seems kind of arbitrary, though, coming from a guy who did a musical number about the systemic torture, abuse, and execution of innocent Jews in the Spanish Inquisition. Including goofy gags about guys getting their knees smashes and shoved into iron maiden.
It's all delivery. Or, maybe, in this context, the source - he's comfortable making jokes about oppression but not about others'. But either way, it's not the subject that's taboo.
I've seen Jimmy Carr live multiple times so yes. Personally I can detach offensive comedy done by a professional because that's literally their trade. It's honestly pretty easy as well to tell when a stand up actually means something awful they've said IMO.
This gets extended to professionals only. I've got no tolerance for these kinds of jokes by random because it's an entirely different context. Stand up is a controlled environment where everyone has agreed to it.
This gets extended to professionals only. I've got no tolerance for these kinds of jokes by random because it's an entirely different context. Stand up is a controlled environment where everyone has agreed to it.
Whew, this thread made me feel better about this forum. I was expecting a bunch of self righteous commenters to take over this thread. :)
Depends on how it's presented. Of all the comedians I've seen, the only one I can think of who came off as offensive was Andrew Dice Clay, and that's because he never seemed to be joking, rather he always seemed to believe the misogynistic views he peddled.
Well for starters, Mel Brooks is a Jew. Racial jokes is in an entirely different ballpark if the person making those jokes is part of that race. Mel Brooks never would have the presumption to joke about the victims of the oppression of black people though.
And second, the Spanish inquisition was centuries ago. It's not in recent memory, nor is it making light of issues that are relevant today such as racism.
Blazing Saddles is mostly targeting the stupid stereotyping and the ridiculous notion of racism as a concept. It doesn't target black people, it targets the racists. As I mentioned in my initial post here, if offensive humour is targeting the perpetrators, it's funny, but if it targets the victims, it mostly rides on shock value. The whole "haha, I can't believe you said that!!" kind of thing. And that is insanely difficult to pull off to be funny and not just taking a dump.
This is poisoning the well, attributing a blanket position to some nebulous "side" you disagree with and attaching a derogatory label to it to discredit it from the outset.
I would say that it depends on the skill level and the people being targeted. I'm pansexual and I still find the whole dance segment from Blazing Saddles to be hilarious simply due to the skill level involved in how it's being done and what is being mocked, as it feels like it's making of gay stereotypes and not actual gay people.
Conservative humor is all shit though.
Conservative humor is all shit though.
I mean I got banned before because I was saying that shitty jokes that can be seen as racist are still free speech. Comedy is subjective and I like free speech. I was kind of shocked that it was controversial thought on this forum.
Only if it's clever and not obnoxiously mean spirited. You can tell some comedians relish any chance to say taboo words that exist to demean people.
I do get annoyed by lazy stereotypes that are just thrown out there to get chuckles of recognition, like Dave Chappelle's idiotic gay superhero joke in one of his recent specials. The idea is nobody remembers this superhero because he keeps changing his outfit. Get it? Because he's GAY. All gay people are obsessed with fashion, as we know.
Comedic genius in action!
I do get annoyed by lazy stereotypes that are just thrown out there to get chuckles of recognition, like Dave Chappelle's idiotic gay superhero joke in one of his recent specials. The idea is nobody remembers this superhero because he keeps changing his outfit. Get it? Because he's GAY. All gay people are obsessed with fashion, as we know.
Comedic genius in action!
Last edited:
Offensive humour is fantastic when executed by professionals adept in their craft, though my bar has risen as I've aged. Things that would have made me laugh in my teens aren't always as funny and really that's because I feel more empathetic than I used to back then.
The likes of Ricky Gervais and Frankie Boyle aren't nearly as funny as they seemed to be. However, absolute masters of the craft like Stewart Lee remain a step above. Always Sunny is offensive, but it's also brilliant
Stuff like Drawn Together and other offensive cartoons are easier to stomach given the absurdity of them. Ren and Stimpy as unfortunately forever tainted now, as is Louis CK
On a basic level offensive comedy has to be better/more intelligent/better constructed to hit with me.
The likes of Ricky Gervais and Frankie Boyle aren't nearly as funny as they seemed to be. However, absolute masters of the craft like Stewart Lee remain a step above. Always Sunny is offensive, but it's also brilliant
Stuff like Drawn Together and other offensive cartoons are easier to stomach given the absurdity of them. Ren and Stimpy as unfortunately forever tainted now, as is Louis CK
On a basic level offensive comedy has to be better/more intelligent/better constructed to hit with me.
Yeah, if its funny and doesn't cross certain lines. I can appreciate gallows humor because life is often dark and humorous. I appreciate humor that can acknowledge that and balance both.
Though a recent Chappelle quote stuck with me about everything being funny until it happens to you.
I watched the host recently and I was really surprised at the balance of humor and darkness. they made a memorial service sad and hilarious at the same time.
Though a recent Chappelle quote stuck with me about everything being funny until it happens to you.
I watched the host recently and I was really surprised at the balance of humor and darkness. they made a memorial service sad and hilarious at the same time.
If you were banned for downplaying or handwaving racism, even if it's in defense of jokes, it was the right call.
Depends on the joke.You can make plenty of clever jokes about offensive things but if its just mean spirited then no.
Absolutely, and there's next to nothing that comedians/shows can say to offend me. They're made for entertainment, not for me to be outraged over.
Yeah, in fact it is one of my favorite types of humor. Life is too short to take everything so seriously (many people here would benefit from that).
If it’s funny, I’ll laugh at it. I was at a comedy club last night actually. Some funny jokes, even the racial stuff.
Absolutely not! There was nothing specific I was downplaying. All I was (and am) saying that offensive jokes are OK. Because comedy is subjective and freedom of speech is important to me. Are you disagreeing with that. I’m not sure what point you are trying to make except to lecture me.
Context is key, and not everyone views free speech as carte blanche to spout hate speech. Regardless, not worth getting into specifics, but framing an entire board in any way is not entirely helpful to any conversation
I’m happy to see responses in this thread because it looks like I was wrong making broad assumptions about this forum. I was talking specifically about my generalizations that were wrong. (I feel like there’s a bit of irony in this statement:))
i think Anthony Jeslenik does shock offensive comedy better then anyone working today. The british guy with the immaculate hair and the weird laugh whos name i cant think of right now also does great shock comedy.
I think dave chapelle handled his current problems with trans people terribly and ricky gervais new special also came off as more mean sprited and bad.
I think dave chapelle handled his current problems with trans people terribly and ricky gervais new special also came off as more mean sprited and bad.
I really enjoy the bite in a lot of the humor I like. Though offensive doesn’t automatically mean funny.
knock knock
who is there?
a woman
woman who?
woman who plays videogames
Comedy is highly subjective either way but I can sometimes find offensive remarks to be more or less funny, though I might often feel bad about it afterwards. The best comedy has no such effect so I don't actively go looking for offensive jokes. That said, a lot of Internet humor barely makes me smile in the first place. I don't tend to laugh too much.
90% of the time , yeah but also Depends on the topic and the execution .
Bill Burr is great on his execution of his subject matter and oddly enough facts checks for real his subject matter.
Meanwhile Gervais lazily throws out cancer jokes left and right and makes boring jokes based on generalities that are not fact checked
Bill Burr is great on his execution of his subject matter and oddly enough facts checks for real his subject matter.
Meanwhile Gervais lazily throws out cancer jokes left and right and makes boring jokes based on generalities that are not fact checked
if comedy starts playing it "safe" I want off this planet. Sometimes humans need to laugh to realize how ridiculous we all are. Comedy is the conduit to realizing just how narrow our perspective of the world can be, and if we can't laugh at ourselves and move on, then what is the point?
He wasn't too concerned with covering his bases with the transphobic stuff he said about Caitlyn Jenner, or punching women
It depends entirely on context and delivery. Yes usually, I'm a fan of gallows humor for example, but also no in some ways, such as making fun of another race for the sake of making fun of another race.
What did he say about Caitlyn? Was it the joke about how he misses "Bruce"?
It's a hard question, it depends of the delivery of the punchline, i can pee my pants in laughter with a "why did the chicken cross the road" if your set up and execution is perfect.
If your joke is shock value offensive bullshit with no actual comedic timing, i will not laugh.
However there is the weird middle road, im going to use Dave Chappelle's comedy for example, because he is an expert of comedic theory and the joke im going to summarize in bullet points is incredibly funny on execution, but uses very problematic elements (rape mentions), i bring it up every time because the funny part is execution and delivery of the punchline, not the offensive bits.
-Set up starts early in the show, Chappelle is doing this skit where he's talking about pitching ideas for super heroes to different people, the joke here is that he's trying to pitch heroes tailored to what the person will like, in this case a rich old southerner white guy
-Chappelle describe a hero who is a white guy with all the powers of superman and who hates latinos, the catch is, in order to have super powers he needs to molest women, stating that he does it only because it's what allows him to save people, Chappelle introduces the phrase "he rapes, but he saves", the joke here is that the idea is horrible, but the rich old southern white dude loves it.
-Chappelle continues his routine and he gets to the point where he starts making jokes about Bill Cosby and takes a tiny tangent about how sometimes women come to him and say he's being insensitive to the plight of women and how he doesn't understand oppresion, he cracks a few jokes about "oppression olympics" and how white women try to pull this on black men who obvipously know oppression (and then jokes how you can't beat a Jew at Oppression Olympics), he ties this into talking about cosby again
-Chappelle gets a bit serious here and talks about how, as a black man who grew up looking up to cosby, the revelation of what Cosby did broke his heart, specially because Cosby had done so much for the african american community, in essence, he "saved many people"
-Chappelle ends the joke and the show by doing a call back, saying "He rapes, but saves".
This is what is usually known as a callback joke, and basically Chappelle could have been talking about about ANYTHING, and it would still be funny because "Rape" is not the joke, the joke is the introduction of an absurd concept and then bringing it up again in an unexpected but organic manner, Chappelle just choose this callback joke to be themed around rape, which is the offensive bit, but not the source of the comedy.
Another joke that comes to mind is Louis CK's N-word routine ("[N-word] fell asleep on the forklift!"), which is a joke about him relaying a story of him being weirded out by people using the N-word around him (which of course involves him saying it himself as he tells the story) and the punchline is incredibly funny because it's about something else entirely, CK gets the audience so immersed on the whole discourse about people using the N-word to the point where when the punch line, "Wait, how does anybody even falls asleep on a forklift?", comes it's the most hilarious thing ever and it's completely unoffensive.
So, what im trying to get here is, a great comedian can make anything funny, from the most pure, innocent word, to a joke themed with insanely problematic elements, as long as the set up and delivery is executed perfectly. You can understand why it's funny from a comedy theory stand point while fully acknowledging the elements that are problematic.
If your joke is shock value offensive bullshit with no actual comedic timing, i will not laugh.
However there is the weird middle road, im going to use Dave Chappelle's comedy for example, because he is an expert of comedic theory and the joke im going to summarize in bullet points is incredibly funny on execution, but uses very problematic elements (rape mentions), i bring it up every time because the funny part is execution and delivery of the punchline, not the offensive bits.
-Set up starts early in the show, Chappelle is doing this skit where he's talking about pitching ideas for super heroes to different people, the joke here is that he's trying to pitch heroes tailored to what the person will like, in this case a rich old southerner white guy
-Chappelle describe a hero who is a white guy with all the powers of superman and who hates latinos, the catch is, in order to have super powers he needs to molest women, stating that he does it only because it's what allows him to save people, Chappelle introduces the phrase "he rapes, but he saves", the joke here is that the idea is horrible, but the rich old southern white dude loves it.
-Chappelle continues his routine and he gets to the point where he starts making jokes about Bill Cosby and takes a tiny tangent about how sometimes women come to him and say he's being insensitive to the plight of women and how he doesn't understand oppresion, he cracks a few jokes about "oppression olympics" and how white women try to pull this on black men who obvipously know oppression (and then jokes how you can't beat a Jew at Oppression Olympics), he ties this into talking about cosby again
-Chappelle gets a bit serious here and talks about how, as a black man who grew up looking up to cosby, the revelation of what Cosby did broke his heart, specially because Cosby had done so much for the african american community, in essence, he "saved many people"
-Chappelle ends the joke and the show by doing a call back, saying "He rapes, but saves".
This is what is usually known as a callback joke, and basically Chappelle could have been talking about about ANYTHING, and it would still be funny because "Rape" is not the joke, the joke is the introduction of an absurd concept and then bringing it up again in an unexpected but organic manner, Chappelle just choose this callback joke to be themed around rape, which is the offensive bit, but not the source of the comedy.
Another joke that comes to mind is Louis CK's N-word routine ("[N-word] fell asleep on the forklift!"), which is a joke about him relaying a story of him being weirded out by people using the N-word around him (which of course involves him saying it himself as he tells the story) and the punchline is incredibly funny because it's about something else entirely, CK gets the audience so immersed on the whole discourse about people using the N-word to the point where when the punch line, "Wait, how does anybody even falls asleep on a forklift?", comes it's the most hilarious thing ever and it's completely unoffensive.
So, what im trying to get here is, a great comedian can make anything funny, from the most pure, innocent word, to a joke themed with insanely problematic elements, as long as the set up and delivery is executed perfectly. You can understand why it's funny from a comedy theory stand point while fully acknowledging the elements that are problematic.
It definitely comes down to what exactly we mean by "offensive" and the context and delivery. Was watching Seth Rogen's little "hilarity for charity" special over the weekend, and one woman did a funny bit about how the best way to not accused of being a creep or sexual harasser is to be hot. Now if a guy had done a bit like this, I would've been appalled, but because it was a joke coming from a woman, with an appropriately sarcastic delivery, I ended up laughing.