What many people don't seem to understand is that a comedian's job is not to just make people laugh. If Carlin and Pryor were still around today, and heaven forbid they produced a Netflix special, Twitter's servers would explode with the amount of outrage. If someone becomes offended by anything they seek to cancel it. Perhaps it is just a sign of the times, that the way we deal with controversial content now has evolved. I don't agree with some of his statements nor approach, but I support his ability to express himself how he chooses. Apparently, his so-called controversial specials from previous years never offended people enough to do so.Ĭhappelle's special was not the funniest comedy special I have ever viewed by any means.
People have ironically turned to Twitter, which Chappelle describes in his special as being “not a real place,” to voice their offence and further announce intentions to cancel their Netflix subscriptions. He was never cancelled for it.ĭave Chappelle's Netflix special “The Closer” is the most recent example of cancel culture in action. Some of the comments he made, by any standard, were offensive. One of Pryor's most controversial moments worth noting was his 1977 performance at the Hollywood Bowl for “A Star-Spangled Night for Rights” in front of a crowd of 17,000 people. His raw language and emotion are what made him the trendsetter for many comedians to come. Pryor didn't just say what he thought about the world around him. Carlin was already seeing the way things were turning, the early stages of the incoming cancel culture.Ĭarlin's thought-provoking and rapid-fire routines were some of the best comedy specials ever put together, but nothing tops the work of Richard Pryor.
In his later career he addressed topics revolving around language and political correctness. He was one of the few who stood out within the counterculture movement coming out of the 1960s. Nothing was untouchable to Carlin as he commented on the left, the right and everywhere in between. Everything from genocide, suicide, religion, feminism. The late George Carlin dealt with a lot of topics considerably controversial by today's standards. Others delve into the darker regions of comedic expression, touching on rather forbidden fruits. Many offer a fairly PG variety of content. Of course, that is not the case with all comedians. You kind of have to check your moral standards, your idea of what is right and wrong, at the door when you go to watch a comedy special. When it comes to comedy, one thing I have never been left feeling after watching a comedian perform was a sense of offence.