John Cleese: We Can't Have Comedy and Be Politically Correct [video]
bigthink.com
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However, it's an issue of boundaries.
I make terribly politically incorrect jokes with my girlfriend, who shares my un-pc sense of humor. But I wouldn't be caught dead saying those things at work or around my friends who would be upset by such joking. I respect their boundaries.
Being politically incorrect with people who are going to be upset by it is just a form aggression. It's not funny, it's pathetic and juvenile.
For comedians it's a matter of marketing: do they want to appeal to a larger crowd and kowtow to political correctness or do they want to be authentic and cultivate a niche market?
My guess is that John Cleese wants it both ways. Sorry pal, not going to happen. If you want to be politically incorrect you're going to have to go the Doug Stanhope route and be authentic and poor instead of politically correct and rich.
I made a minor, off the cuff remark to my roommate and her friend about how my brother is a couple of inches shorter than me and they went off for at least a half hour about how they won't date a guy unless he's at least 6'2". How they don't know why short guys even bother trying to date. How they'd never, 'even if he was the last guy on earth' subject themselves to dating somebody shorter than their 'standard.'
I couldn't help but to think to myself, 'wow, I haven't seen this level of off the cuff bigotry since the last time I lived in the south and experienced real, American made, southerner racism.' Talk about hating on a class of people about characteristics that's beyond their ability to change.
2. Having your event canceled isn't equivalent to censorship. No one has put a gag order on Smurthwaite to not perform. You're not guaranteed a platform to speak either beyond the voting booth or to petition. It's not the onus of individual organizations or individuals themselves to listen or debate you. The freedom of speech also implies the freedom to not listen to your speech. Or to not associate one's organization or self in regards to that speech. If you don't like this either, then IMO you're demanding to be coddled.
So, all these false claims of PC being out of control smacks of social conservatives demanding to be taken seriously by their opposition. Guess what? They don't talk their opposition seriously either. DEAL WITH IT is my motto. If you can't then you're a brat.
Having your event cancelled in a university because of a few people is censorship. The comedy society in Goldsmiths wanted to hear what Kate had to say and arranged for her to talk at the university even though she was labeled a sexist. Their right to listen to other ideas were denied when the feminist society threatens to picket at it. We have a group of people who want to listen to "sexist" material and a group that don't, Would you not agree that the correct outcome would be to let Kate have her event and people who want to listen can go and people who don't want to listen don't go?
The university denied the people who had arranged the event with Kate the ability to listen to her. The university favored the censors over the tolerant. Its important that the offensive have the ability to speak even when there is a backlash from the minority.
Would you feel any different if instead of the politically correct there was a rabid group of religious zealots in university picketing to get people kicked of campus because they are seen as sinners?
It seems you want minorities to listen to any and all bigoted opinions without protest and you want to treat such opinions as morally equal. When you're part of a minority that gets assaulted, murdered, and discriminated in general you don't have to listen to any and all people's opinions. If you think that I as a transwoman must listen to TERFs, social conservatives, and hand wringers then you're greatly mistaken. Their opinions are morally invalid for many reasons chief among them is their desire to control others. Being ostracized/protested by a minority is nowhere near being harmed by said minority.
And if a private party like a university feels its reputation is contingent on reaching out to those minorities then that's their authority to do so. It doesn't matter what you or I think either way. If you don't like that university then don't attend it. Or call your representative and see if they can cut its public funding. Either way, you, the comedy society, and the comedian are not entitled to any platform. Free speech is not about fairness, it's about whether or not the state or collusive corporations are intentionally impeding your ability to speak. The comedian isn't out of work because of one gig. The comedy society isn't defunct because it has to find another venue to present comedians. If said university went out of its way to tell every other venue holder to not let that society or comedian act in their interests then that would be true harm.
Also, the fact people throw the word censorship around seems troubling to me for a couple reasons. First, it's turning into the modern bogey man of our day. If Twitter bans someone I swear every other day I see someone claiming its censorship whether the account was by a political conservative or liberal. It's ridiculous. Stop using a word as a bludgeon to get your way. Deal with the fact private parties can and will protect their reputations. Second, calling anything censorship at will has the same effect as censorship especially when the opposing side has pointed out rightly the bigotry of a specific opinion (ex. people who refuse to desist from using racial slurs). And that's exactly how I've seen it used both on Twitter and on here. If you don't like being called a bigot then ask the accuser why they called you one. You'd be surprised how easily such an accusation is disarmed by one question (Wil Wheaton did that easily despite the slow uptake by certain people on Twitter yesterday).
Simply put, learn to interact with people, especially minorities. And stop blaming them when they're in the right.
Nobody was "forcing" any person to listen to anything, so this critique has pretty much gotten off on the wrong foot right at the start.
No, they are not in favor of forcing them to do so. You are making the unfortunately common mistake of confusing advocating something with making it legally required. These are not the same thing, and you'll be a more convincing advocate for your side once you really get that.
What free-speech advocates are stating is that while private universities are legally allowed to ban speakers, because as you correctly state they have no obligation to provide a platform to anyone or anything they don't want to... that this is illiberal behavior, not in the spirit of freedom of speech, and these universities are not living up to their claimed principles when they do it.
Which it is.
Nope I'm not. Try again.
>because as you correctly state they have no obligation to provide a platform to anyone or anything they don't want to... that this is illiberal behavior, not in the spirit of freedom of speech, and these universities are not living up to their claimed principles when they do it.
This is still trying to force a private institution to conform to your wishes. If you can't deal with a university telling you to eff off and your response is to try to bully them into opening their platform then you're a bullying twit imo. The HRC, GLAAD, and etc never demand that Liberty University (socially conservative institution) let say Dan Savage speak at their university. Why should the door be open only one way? You can speak big lofty words about free speech all you want, but the reality is that it's built on hypocrisy as the majority of online "free speech" advocates are socially conservative (they now call themselves culturally libertarian which IMO is an insult to libertarianism as a political position). So, I can't say I'm a supporter of the majority of free speech advocates since their agenda is as clear as day (i.e. to force widely rejected view points into class rooms of moderate to socially liberal institutions but not to open the door the other way to socially conservative ones for liberal speakers).
I'm curious what your opinion is of our current advocacy campaigns attempting to "force" tech companies to hire more women, or "force" movies and TV to to have more characters who are ethnic minorities.
> The HRC, GLAAD, and etc never demand that Liberty University (socially conservative institution) let say Dan Savage speak at their university.
Maybe they should! They'd certainly be well within their rights. Although I'd be interested to learn more about a situation where someone like Savage was prevented from speaking at Liberty University, as I hadn't heard of that.
There's a huge difference between writing a crappy article on Kotaku and some jerk threatening to dogpile Twitter w/ false SEC/FTC reports. This has been the crap that's been circulating since NRx/alt-right and GG reared its collective fugly head. And they often operate under false pretenses of "free speech."
>Maybe they should! They'd certainly be well within their rights.
Or maybe they know something certain free speech advocates refuse to disclose: institutions are largely fossils of their time. Trying to convert an evangelical university to their cause is as Quixotic as you can get.
>Although I'd be interested to learn more about a situation where someone like Savage was prevented from speaking at Liberty University, as I hadn't heard of that.
Because social conservatives know what the believe and will exercise it to its fullest within the law (and sometimes outside of it)? Just saying.
So you can stump for a cause that does not need protection (considering the strength of EFF and the ACLU on these matters) or you all can admit that maybe just maybe being PC isn't all that bad. And maybe just maybe a bigot should be freely called a bigot and jeered by the general audience whether or not John Cleese wants that to happen. Guess what? The Marx Brothers dealt with jeers and rotten tomatoes thrown their way so I'm sure modern comedians can deal with mean tweets and crappy Kotaku hit pieces.
Yes, it is (if it is due to content). Its not government censorship, and so it may not invoke the same considerations as government censorship does (many consider private censorship, particularly by entities with substantial social power, to have issues similar to, though not exactly the same as, government censorship, and may still be concerned.)
Of course, of course its censorship.