Defenders of free speech often argue that the best answer to free speech that offends is more free speech that offends back. Salman Rushdie famously said that without the right to offend, free speech ceases to exist.
Right now, we’re getting a great lesson in that principle, thanks to, of all people, Kanye West.
When West made his remarks about “a Jewish underground mafia”, the media reaction was as predictable as it was swift and brutal. Instead of clutching his pearls, Dave Chappelle did the best thing possible: he laughed at it.
From the podium of woke “comedy” central, Saturday Night Live, no less.
“Before I start tonight, I wanted to read a brief statement that I prepared: ‘I renounce antisemitism in all its forms and stand with my friends in the Jewish community.’ And that, Kanye, is how you buy yourself some time,’” Chappelle, 49, began his 15-minute SNL monologue. “I got to tell you guys, I’ve been doing this 35 years and early in my career, I learned there are two words in [the] English language words you should never say together in sequence. And those words are ‘The’ and ‘Jews.’ Never heard someone do good after they say that.”
As Chappelle noted:
“[Adidas] dropped (him) immediately,” Chappelle said. “Ironically, Adidas was founded by Nazis, and even they were offended. I guess the students have surpassed the teachers.”
US Magazine
Chappelle’s monologue is also tacitly referencing one of his earlier routines, in which he outlines the unspoken iron rule of show-business: No matter what you do in your artistic expression, you are never, ever allowed to upset the Alphabet People.
As he’s finding out, though, upsetting the Ashurit People is even more dangerous.
Even before the show, staff writers quit in protest about his supposed “transphobia”. The “Jews” monologue has become even more controversial, although that depends on whether people get the joke or not.
In general, the reaction to Dave Chappelle’s Saturday Night Live monologue falls into several camps: those who feel that the comedian is further promoting anti-Semitic tropes in the guise of joking about them and those who feel that he is satirizing anti-Semitism via comedy.
Giant Freakin Robot
Of course the Anti-Defamation League chose the obvious, first, choice:
“Why are Jewish sensitivities denied or diminished at almost every turn? Why does our trauma trigger applause?”
CNN
Other Jewish writers and comics, however, rightly opted for the “more free speech” route.
Over at Takimag, David Cole isn’t pulling punches (as usual). His target isn’t Chappelle or Kanye, but nutty basketballer Kyrie Irving.
Behold, another low-IQ black multimillionaire who thinks blacks are the real Jews.
Why’s anybody surprised? Blacks think everybody in history was black. The Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Olmecs, the Vikings, the earliest inhabitants of England, even the Salem witches. Everything ever invented was invented by a black. Every great king, queen, emperor, pharaoh, philosopher, and scientist was black.
When blacks fantasize that they have a more impactful history than they do, they’re not being “based.” They’re being pathetic. You should laugh at them, not ascribe to them a nobility of intent that doesn’t exist.
Takimag
Jewish (obviously) comedian Aaron Berg delivered a (slightly) less abrasive backatcha to Chappelle.
“There’s this movement where you can’t conflate the Holocaust with slavery because if you wanted to make a joke about it you would say: you know the Holocaust, 6 million Jews died and slavery was just a whole bunch of people getting cheap labor,” he said.
Mediaite
And that’s how you do free speech, folks.
Now, pass the popcorn. This gets funnier by the day.