Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same

[Pretty Little Flower]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

Two responses:

1. If done for comedic or non-nefarious reasons, yes. As Carlin said, there are no taboo topics. You just have to do it right.

If you're saying something odious in earnest, you do not receive this pass. If you post alt-right shite, expect harsh blowback. You deserve it.

2. Response is always fine. If you don't like a joke, your exercise of free speech allows you to say so. But when you cry to the refs for a deplatforming of the comic, or pundit, you're beyond your free speech rights. You're asking for penalties to be applied to another for his use of free speech. This is chilling, and disproportionate. The penalty for offense should not be a mob compelling a network to remove someone from a movie or newspaper column.



Yes. Totally fine. Moving to have him thrown off HBO? Creepy. Overkill. Highly un-American.



Because it's whiny. The bigger person ignores it, or mocks the offender. And in regard to comedy, it shows lack of intelligence. Show me a guy who is easily offended by jokes and I'll show you one with limited capacity to grasp irony. And it's clinically established that lack of capacity to grasp irony, or humor more generally, correlates with low intellect.

It's also a character flaw to apply to the refs. Rather than cry for a foul, isn't it more effective, indeed showing more character and self-reliance, to throw a few elbows? I could have cried to mommy as a kid when I was picked on, but I found it much more effective to kick the kid's ass instead. (After which his friend who was stronger kicked my ass, but that's another story.) You get the point. I had a hell of a time doing plaintiff's work for this reason. I hated using the phrase, "Give him compensation he deserves" in court. Even when I thought it was a good case where it was indeed deserved.

I understand we need refs. It's okay to go to them when one has to do so. But it should never be one's first move.



As I stated above, I have no problem with attacking the shit out of people who espouse those positions. It's the ninnies who whine about some joke made in poor taste who are the problem. Like the objection that Maher is sexist or trans-phobic because he does jokes that can be perceived insensitive. Comedy often scars. Good jokes often have a bit of meanness to them. If you can't understand that, you're dumb, and therefore whatever point you make will be dumb. I can ignore that, of course, which I will. But when you seek to deplatform someone, now you're fucking with my entertainment. You've gone too far.

(This is not to excuse Maher's idiotic slur of a months ago. He should have been and rightly was taken to the woodshed about that joke, which went too far. But even for that, taking his show away from him would have been an execution for a misdemeanor.)



Agreed. I have a problem with that, as I do with any moron who supports an anti-vaxx policy. But I can compartmentalize. He's an entertainer, not family.



I disagree. Scientology is a way of life. You're either a soulless cynic in it for the payoff, or a complete fucking loon. Being anti-vaxx is just a really dumb view of a limited subject.

You can try to impose your arbitrary rules (comedy is off-limits from attack, provided it meets your subjective definition of "doing it right"), but nobody cares what you think. If I decide that Maher is an asshole and I think that he should be kicked off HBO, I am going to say so. That is my free speech, and you are anti-free speech for suggesting that I need to engage in some proportionality analysis. I can say what I want. If you think I should not be allowed to demand that Maher be kicked off HBO, then you can say so. But stop your whining about it, or invoking your non-existent right to the entertainment of your choosing. And stop saying things like I am "beyond my free speech rights," which I assume is just shorthand for you saying that you don't like my speech, as no actual "free speech rights" have been implicated whatsoever. You're just crying to the refs about other people crying to the refs.