David Letterman, the transphobic comedian - Page 2

Amanda Hugginkiss.

You're like a worse version of Hitler, you know that?

The Tiger jokes are about acts he committed. He's got no one to blame but himself.

Of course, you could argue that jokes based on skin color or sexual orientation are bad because a person can't do anything about those, but jokes based on changing ones sex aren't because that person chose to do so.

I just think that's trying to paint the whole thing over with a very broad brush. That implies that we're simply uptight over comedians, uptight about making jokes about any public figure in general, etc. Which, clearly we're not not or we wouldn't be posting at these forums. To imply that this is no different than Rich Little making fun of Nixon just tries to bury the real issue of this discussion, I think. Namely, that the idea of changing one's sex is still a very uncomfortable thing for some people. So does a joke lighten everyone up about it, or does it make that person a target? Implying that it's no different than making fun Richard Nixon and Sarah Palin isn't the same thing - but I guess you know that.

I think most folks who have sex changes say that the drive to get one is overwhelming, akin to the desire of a closeted person to come out.

I just wish she'd leave the federal government and make another Matrix movie.

They make the decision to have a sex change, but they don't decide to feel like they're trapped in the wrong body.

Plus, the other thing to keep in mind is that the joke wasn't made within the confines of a small private forum or a dinner party of 10 people. Not that that would be okay either - but the joke was made on national television in front of millions. That kind of ratchets things up a notch.

I can see why she didn't like the joke, but she doesn't have to be a dick about it.

When you're a public figure, people are going to make fun of you. You've got to learn to take it like a man.

I'm sorry, but 10 person dinner party or national TV audience, there's nothing in that particular joke to "tsk tsk" about.

It wasn't a full-on "hey! Let's all point at the disgusting tranny and laugh!!! Ahahaha. FREAK!" type joke. Most of it is laughing at the guy and his situation.

And in that sort of a situation, someone should feel NO shame in being weirded out by the discovery that you'd slept with a tranny.

Putting it in a real world/realistic scenario, that would mean that said tranny deceived you on a very personal front (no pun intended). They didn't say, "here's the deal. I used to be a man, but I'm more comfortable living this way. I hope you'd still like to pound me silly."

If they did that, and "you" complied, then yes, "you'd" have no room to run around and act disgusted/shocked/etc.


ETA: That said, I can see the worry that this sort of thing just leads a large percentage of the people down the wrong path. But an ignorant asshole is usually going to remain that way. I shouldn't have to worry about my comedy being trounced upon because of some ignorant asshole conservative's fragile mind.

So help us if compassion and basic respect for other people's business makes the world an unsafe place for top-notch humor like in the Letterman sketch and in the posts above. HOLY SHIT, HOW WILL WE LIVE?

ETA:
It wasn't? Why else would it be embarrassing to Kalter that he fucked a transsexual, then?

Are you lining up to have sex with a transsexual? Would it be fine with you if you were deceived, hypothetically, by one?

I agree with, Jake(?), in that making it about this particular person rather than a generic, imaginary transsexual takes it to a different sort of level.

And yes, Letterman isn't the height of quality-comedy. But, slippery slope and all that.

And I think you can, actually, have compassion and respect for someone's lifestyle choices while having a laugh. There is a line in there somewhere, I'm not saying there isn't. I just don't think this crosses it at all.


ETA: Also, society and comedy IS changing all the time, always. Jesus, just look at some of Eddie Murphy's stand up from the 80s. The amount of "faggot" humor that was "acceptable" is staggering.

I'd like to debate DaveB on this point but I'm afraid there's no way I'd win.


I guess I just don't have the balls I used to.

I'm sure when she heard the joke, Amanda Simpson buried her head in her huge, huge hands and wept.

Are you being serious? Man, save your righteous indignation for something else, really.

Covered on the last page, chief.

Yeah, that point sounds familiar. Might want to re-read that last page again.

Are you afraid our God-given right to comedy will fall under the jackbooted oppression of the transsexual ruling party? Please. If the slippery slope you're talking about means fewer jokes at the expense of people who are far more often mocked than celebrated in this culture, isn't that sort of a good thing?

Mm-hm. Do you think Murphy just decided one day to give it up? Nope. Gay people and gay-friendly organizations had to work at effecting the societal changes that demanded he give it up.

And has the comedy world suffered for it? Not really.

Yet the comedy world does suffer...
Ugh.

Is it really that much more indignant of me to support a previously made point that a joke's in bad taste than of you to self-righteously defend it on the grounds that... I don't know. Why exactly are you defending it? It wasn't that funny in any sense. Is it just the principle that we desperately need tranny jokes?

The joke actually isn't about the transgendered person. Also, the only reason that they use the particular person is the headline sets up the gag. It's not calling attention to her in any way. The joke is calling attention to and mocking the juvenile response to the concept of transgendered people that Kalter's performance portrays. It's kind of a progressive joke.

ETA: Fuck it. Have at it, everyone.

1) The joke is the reaction. Not that he slept with a tranny but that he reacts this way. This is obvious, real Humor 101 stuff. That people don't get this aspect of it is troubling, but not surprising.

2) The second you start saying 'Be nice' when it comes to jokes, you've killed comedy. If you're doing comedy right you're going to offend SOMEONE because you're going to be having a point of view. Comedy is only worthwhile when it has some kind of point of view, even if that point of view is silly.

3) Saying 'You shouldn't make fun of this group because they've had it tough' is such a shitty stance. It's also endlessly condescending - make fun of these people, but these other people are way too fragile to take it. Maybe it would be better if we just ignored that group altogether? Or are we only allowed to interact/feel about that group one specified way?

Seriously, the second anybody starts in with cries for comedians to be nice is the second I quit listening to them.

I'm defending the fact that neither Letterman and Alan Kalter aren't transphobic at all, and implying that a heterosexual man just might be grossed out that the woman they were sleeping with was actually transgender (i.e. previously a man) is pretty natural. Hell, even the guy from the show I mentioned had a moment of pause when he found out, and he ended up still wanting to bang the chick.

That's a point I made as well. If Kalter was in a relationship with her, then they're implying she's good-looking.

You yourself said you might not be entirely comfortable being in a relationship with a woman who used to be a man, so what the fuck? That's flirting with hypocrisy right there.

The joke is Kalter, not Simpson.

Brian Posehn made a harsh joke about Cloris Leachman's age in one of those Comedy Central roasts, and even though the audience and her laughed, he still shook his head seconds laters and said "Ohh, that was mean, I'm sorry". Was Brian Posehn taking part in some kind of age discrimination, or was it a case of "joke" followed by "hahahaha" followed by "no, but seriously folks"?

David Cross made a joke on his CD about dogs beins smarter than woman and a girl in the audience complained and he basically said "Okay, I'm gonna come clean and reveal that I don't actually believe dogs are smarter than women. It was what's referred to as a joke, and I'm gonna be making more during the night."

Like I said, save the righteous indignation for something that, you know, actually matters and is genuinely offensive and out of line.

I know. I just realized I was basically regurgitating my (poorly illustrated, perhaps) points.

And lo and behold, as soon as I retract mine Devin articulates what I was trying to say better than I could.

I kind of hate myself for not responding with another dick joke.

Humor sometimes works because it is transgressive and offensive. Eddie Murphy and Bill Hicks, Blazing Saddles and (theoretically) Blake Edwards' Switch.

If some people want to use Letterman's joke to try and make a teaching moment out of this, to spread some positive knowledge about transgendered persons, all well and good. And you may of course personally find the joke offensive or distasteful.

But if Letterman ultimately feels like he needs to apologize for the joke in any way it will make me sad, and if he were to be officially reprimanded in any way that would be wrong. His job is to be funny and that means shocking and even insulting folks on occasion. To equate the joke to a hate crime or to call Letterman "transphobic" is, in this instance, wrong.

No, the real issue is that it makes one uncomfortable to discover a former lover is a chick with a dick.

The real question is, when do we start protesting outside Jim Carrey's house? He must be punished for this vicious and hate filled character know as "Ace Ventura".

I AM OUTRAGED!!

Devin, everyone gets how the joke is supposed to work. Thing is it's not solely at the expense of Kalter, a willing participant in the humor, but also at the expense of Simpson. The intended humor isn't only in Kalter's stupidity or reaction, but in the fact that he was fooled into fucking a transgender person.

This wouldn't be the same kind of joke if Kalter had been fooled into fucking someone who was half-black, for instance. I imagine that version of the joke would have gone over well in the right company half a century ago - but, alas, social values change. And they change not just due to some inexplicable force of progress but because of action - like, for example, calling people's attention to the fact that maybe black people/homosexuals/transgender people aren't intrinsically funny after all...

Is comedy worthwhile if it's not funny? As mentioned before, Eddie Murphy's homophobic stuff from the 80s would never fly today, not just because it would be censored or whatever, but because it's just not as funny. As with anything, subjects of ridicule go in and out of style in comedy. At a certain point, making fag jokes became not just politically incorrect, but a comedy killer for a lot of mainstream America.

Now, is the best way to alter this via a media campaign? Perhaps not. But I don't get the impulse to dig one's feet in and make a stand for a particular type of joke if one group objects. Comedy adapts; it doesn't die. Either make your jokes about that group funnier (real humor is bulletproof; this joke isn't all that good) or switch your subject. If you're the all-LCD-tranny-humor-all-the-time guy, maybe you're fucked, but them's the breaks.

Does your hyperbole know no bounds? How many posts before you're bringing up Orwell?

Clearly, transgender people aren't "way too fragile to take it" since the vast majority of exposure they get in the mainstream is in the form of mockery (and I'm sure Simpson is an old pro at this point, having gotten to this level of power). As far as I know, there aren't any transgender people who post on this board, and I'm in no position to speak for them in any case. But if that community took some offense from the joke (as we might assume by the HRC getting involved), I don't see where any of us non-transgender folks get off deciding that their concerns are unwarranted. I'm inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt, since I'm not in a group that's constantly ridiculed.

As CHUD's foremost defender of comedy, don't you feel a little dirty defending a hackneyed tranny joke that's been done a million times before?

I don't think it's "You shouldn't make fun of this group because they've had it tough" but "You shouldn't contribute to the sense of disgust a lot of people seem to feel at the thought of accidentally touching a member of this group." Although everyone seems to disagree with the argument, I don't think it's an invalid one.

Also, you can't control comedy, but I don't think civil rights groups should worry about being humorless. They're trying to get a specific message across any chance they get; with this subject, trying to get in the public eye at all. The Late Show writers are very boring. For me, this controversy is entirely worth dumping on their joke. I admit when Palin objected to a Letterman joke, I thought it was ridiculously aggressive and shameless. But here I agree with the overall cause. If David Letterman feels momentarily guilty and has to think about trans people for one second, I don't think it's a horrible crime.

The day-to-day ostracism of the people in question is. This may be equally aggressive and misguided, but the world will forget about this press release in a week, and it will still have generated more press than the appointment. I don't think there will be a chilling effect on Letterman's writers or any limit to discourse establishing a protective zone around transgenders or any recognition of them at all beyond this scrap from the Obama administration.

You really can't compare the two.
And yes, it is a mediocre joke at best- but that doesn't justify all this tut-tutting.

This. I mean, if your life long love of comedy is gonna be wrecked by a decrease in tranny humor, then I don't know what to tell you. But if the transgender community took offense to it, then maybe it's not up to the rest of us to decide that they just need to lighten up.

Right, because other communities haven't overreacted before.

What?? Like we can't tell when someone's overexaggerating? Especially when the current climate almost behooves them to get more attention? Yeah, because a "lobbying group and political action committee" (per Wikipedia description) would never try to take advantage and blow out of proportion anything to try and get more attention in their favor.

Also, "hyperbole" is saying we shouldn't laugh at the joke because we can't comprehend the psychological complexities and drama a human being goes through when they find themselves in this situation, etc. etc.

I mean, seriously, really? Would you have been less offended had it been a "guy in drag" joke? The mind boggles at how bent out of shape you people are getting over such a harmless, throwaway gag that wasn't even directed at the person everyone's trying to defend.

Irony.

Letterman issues an apology.

It's pretty sad that Entourage has the better, more fresh take on this kind of topic. Worldwide Pants should apologize for being lame more than anything else.

Not that I have much of a take on this story beyond "eh, it was a pretty cheap gag", but the whole "it actually makes Simpson loook good because she's hot!" thing you're trying to push just doesn't make sense. Whilst the gag certainly suggests that, it also suggests that Simpson would lie about her nature in order to pursue a relationship with some schlub from the Letterman Show. So it's not exactly flattering to her.

Wait, we are not allowed to make fun of transgendered people any more? When did this happen? I didn't get the memo. What's this world coming to when I can't snicker at a dude in a dress? I'm going back to Russia.

Hardly.

At certain points in history, the dynamics of the joke would work almost exactly the same: butt of joke fucks someone who's perceived as inappropriate/taboo, and he's revealed to have done so without realizing it.

It's absolutely much ado about... well, not nothing, but a pretty small thing. Still, it's a shitty joke at the expense of transgender people, and I don't see anything wrong with them pointing it out, especially when that group, when it gets press at all, is typically dehumanized - just as it is in this joke. Also - it's entirely possible to construct comedy around Simpson and transgender issues without being a tool about it. Thank Stephen Colbert for saving us from the HRC's mean-spirited blow against comedy.

He's from Puerto Rico Lisa. Give him a chance.

Now, see? Funny, without being all, "DUURRR HURR HURR! You slept with a tranny!" That's the way you do it if you're going to go for a joke.

"Switching things out like a Mr. Potato Head?" "Who knows what the government's been tucking away?"

Those jokes are definitely funnier, but they're just as insensitive as a surgically-created vagina.

This thread makes me think of the scene in Funny People where Sandler's character, who's getting his life back together, is set up with this Jewish girl and in the first five minutes makes a holocaust joke, causing her to storm out. You watch it and you totally understand that he can't censor himself and that everything needs to be a potential source of humor (presumably Apatow believes the same thing). But the scene definitely seems to side with the girl--in fact, the whole point of the scene is how dehumanized and cut off from other people Sandler has become through his humor.

I think that relates pretty effectively to this discussion. You have to be able to laugh, but there's also a line where it turns you into an asshole. In this particular case, the joke is shit, and regardless of who the butt of the joke is it's playing into the "OH MY GOD I SLEPT WITH A TRANNY" attitude (if Kalter had fallen face down into a pile of manure, the audience would laugh at the fact that it happened to him and not them, not the fact that he ought to be more open and tolerant towards manure). And has been pointed out, it IS about the humor--making fun of the underdog just isn't funny. In this case, as has been pointed out, pretty much every exposure transgendered people get in the media is mockery and revulsion, so it's not exactly cutting-edge stuff to make "Ewwww, icky!" noises and call it comedy.

I didn't think Colbert's bit was particularly funny either, but at least he was trying to come at it from a new angle. Which is where "good comedy" and "not being a bullying asshole" intersect. I'm sure there is a way to make jokes about this situation, and even mock trans people directly, without being a dipshit, but it's obviously going to be difficult, so simply phoning in the most obvious joke imaginable opens you up to this kind of criticism. The Sacrosanct Rights of Comedy don't apply if you're going to abuse them.

Well, at least this means we won't have to suffer through a Speed Racer sequel.

Sorry Dave, you are going to have to explain to me how Colbert's jokes are acceptable if Letterman's was not, where the humor in Colbert's are based primarily on veiled allusions to the (transgressive! taboo!) fact that she's had some work done to her plumbing.

"I'm a human being! I've had a sex change operation! Why is that something to be pointed out and laughed at?" could be presented as her response to Colbert's jokes just as forcefully as it could be made to Letterman.

BTW, if the Bush daughters were offended by constant jokes about how dumb their daddy was, does every english-speaking comedian on the planet owe them an apology?

Colbert discusses the work - he makes no insinuations about the inferiority of the person. Explanation enough?

John Cameron Mitchell makes the same sort of "plumbing" jokes in Hedwig & the Angry Inch, but they're never at the expense of the character, herself, or at the expense of transsexuals in general.

I explained the difference between Colbert's and Letterman's jokes. I don't think it's on me to also explain the difference between making fun of the former most visible, powerful man in the world's intelligence and making fun of transsexuals because they're "icky." Next, you'll be asking me how to tie your shoes for you.