Michael Richards goes on beserk racist rant during nightclub act.

The BBQ Pit
61

This doesn’t raise my ire as Richards is nothing more than a washed up pop culture reference trying to find relevance, but there is a certain WTF factor. This is certainly the worst heckler meltdown since the comedian who hit a heckler with his accoustic guitar.

I can’t see how this is some sort of social commentary. No dog and cat exchanging emails for starters. He kept it up for way too long after the audience started walking out and telling him that he was out of line. He tried to salvage it after he settled down, but it was too late to play CYA.

I agree with Dio, Richards will check himself into rehab shortly.

62

Well, since you didn’t comment, I don’t know whether or not you agree with the assertion that “only minorities can make racial cracks”. I do know that it didn’t go over terribly well when Shaquille O’Neal called out Yao Ming in mock Chinese and, IIRC, included a remark about laundry. It’s not a matter of “minorities” being able to mock all other “minorities”. You can crack on your own group, and that’s it.

What do you call an Italian in a three-piece suit?

The defendant.

63

Can we non-minorities laugh at the ethnic jokes that minorities tell? I need to understand these rules, because no one ever tells me this shit!!

64

You have to buy the album and laugh in the privacy of your own home, with the shades drawn, and the headphones plugged in.

Putting the disk on the car stereo is right out.

65

And of course, I should have said “we.”

66

Whatever. You’re putting a hell of a spin on it to give him the benefit of the doubt when he deserves none. People weren’t laughing and cheering him on, there was nervous laughter of the “Oh my god, did he really say what I think he just said?” variety. And if you’re genuinely going to try to argue that cracker = nigger in the ethnic slur department, you’ll have to excuse me while I laugh hysterically.

67

Mel isn’t a stand up comedian, so he doesn’t get a pass.

Comedians get to tread on all sorts of territory that would get your ass fired in any other job. But when we’re sitting in the audience, we laugh and go “uh-huh, that’s so true.”

Chris Rock talking about niggers stealing your shit is funny. Richards making a point about the power of that word didn’t come across as funny. Fair enough.

But a drunk pulled over by the cops and spouting some racial & sexist epithets isn’t the same as a comedian falling really flat.

You’re the one putting your own spin on it. People were clearly laughing and there was no discernible “nervous” laughter until he said “nigger.” Then the audience reacted as conditioned. “What did he say? That was funny. Wait, an African American didn’t find it funny. Oh, that’s just not cool, man.”

68

I heard he will appear on Letterman tonight to apologize.

69

That’d be “disagree.” Which, really, is the point of that comic, which I thought did a good job of undercutting your argument on two different levels, one plain text, and one meta.

Textually, the comic presents a pretty common scenario. The two characters, Franklin and Jason, are friends. They can make comments that, in a different context, would be astoundingly racist, but they both know it’s just a joke, they don’t get upset about it. Surely, you’ve seen this dynamic in real life, correct? So there’s one instance in which your blanket prohibition against racial humor does not hold water.

Of course, that’s an interpersonal thing, and this thread is talking about using racial humor as entertainment. Which is where the comic works on a meta-textual level. The comic itself is using racial humor to entertain, and doing so in a wholly non-offensive way. The comic uses no less than six different racial epithets and/or stereotypes to get to the punchline. The customer makes an anti-Semetic joke to the ticket-takers. But he’s quoting from the movie Borat, which paints the citizens of Khazakstan as simple minded, backwards, and venemously prejudiced. That’s two in the set up. The punchline involves three more slurs: against blacks, Mexicans, and Asians. (“Chinese” isn’t a slur, obviously, but the character isn’t actually Chinese. IIRC, he’s Filipino, so calling him “Chinese” references the stereotype that all Asian people look the same.) Lastly, there’s a more subtle element in which the two ticket-takers are basically playing “fuck with whitey.” Franklin doesn’t object to the Borat reference out of racial sensitivity, but to play on the stereotype that white people are always afraid of accidentally saying something racist. That’s six different races mocked or insulted in some fashion by this comic, and unless Gordon McAlpin comes from a remarkably diverse family, I’m pretty sure he doesn’t belong to at least one of those groups.

Now, it’s possible you found all this as offensive as Kramer’s meltdown. I’m thinking that you didn’t, though. I don’t think the comic would register as offensive to most people. So it serves as a counter to your argument on two levels: both as a model of a common relationship dynamic in which people make racist jokes without offense, and as an example of how one may do the same in the public format of mass entertainment. I think it is acceptable to make fun of a minority group to which you do not belong, so long as you 1) make it clear that you’re joking, and not expressing a heart-felt belief and 2) actually be funny.

Michael Richards failed pretty spectacularly on both accounts.

70

Richards was not trying to be funny; he was aiming for the jugular, not the funny bone. There was no comedic value to what he was saying. This wasn’t a joke that misfired. He lost his cool and decided to voice some opinions in a extremely offensive way.

Who knows what he meant by the fork thing. I could care less what how that innuendo came to be a part of his stream-of-consciousness. None of that detracts away from the intent of his comments. The man was being racist and ugly. He gets no pass just because he’s a comedian.

71

Interesting that Seinfeld immediately started apologizing for Richards, falling all over himself, in fact. I suspect that he sees a potential dip in sales for Season 7, coming out for Christmas in a store near you.

72

I could have sworn he said “pitch fork”.

73

Did you find that comment to be funny, with the knowledge that he was talking to a black guy and that he was referencing lynching?

If you do think it’s funny, then what the hell is wrong with you?

If you don’t think it’s funny, then why do you think that would be funny to the audience? And isn’t that idea kind of troubling to you? That the audience would find that type of humor laugh-out loud hilarious?

I mean, you keep pointing to the audience’s reaction as if to say that Richards’ behavior was excused because some goddamn knuckleheads thought he was funny. But pardon me if I don’t find much comfort in the idea *that a bunch of goddamn knuckleheads thought he was funny. *

74

Really, you think Seinfeld was apologetic? Here’s what he said:

With the exception of the statement that “I’m sure Michael is also sick,” it doesn’t sound to me like Seinfeld is trying to make any defense for it and he called it “extremely offensive.” My take on it was that Seinfeld sounded kind of shocked and confused. I think he’s already got more money than God so I don’t know if he’s really that concerned about DVD sales. I think hos reaction sounds pretty sincere.

75

Holy shit, unless you personally know Michael Richards and can speak to his deepest feelings… how is this remotely defensible or not evidence of some pretty hard-core racist beliefs?

I’ve been annoyed and irritated, and yes, even pissed off by Black people, Latinos, Asians, Whites, gay people, Muslim people, liberal people… and I can’t ever remember lashing out with an epithet in response to their assitude. That’s not to say that I’m some perfect person. It means that the thing that irks me about those people is their actions, not their race/sexual orientation/religion. The fact that Richards goes there immediately indicates to me those kinds of feelings are just below the surface.

I’m a huge Seinfeld fan, and I have to say this has ruined my enjoyment of the show somewhat. Yes, I know Richards is an actor, he’s not really Kramer welcometorealitycakes, but his little tirade is sickening. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a vitriol-filled meltdown ever. It isn’t like a Fuzzy Zoeller taking a joke too far, or a Jimmy The Greek inserting his foot square in his mouth. It’s a hate-filled invective that clearly shocked the audience (witness the woman in the crowd saying “oh my God”).

The nigger stuff was out there, but the lynching reference? That’s the kind of shit those fuckers who dragged James Byrd to death were dropping. How is that remotely funny?

I’m very glad that many of the audience, of different races, walked out on his racist ass. Shit, how long you been in the game, Richards? You can’t crack on those guys in a funny way? Or even ask the management to toss 'em out?

I think people were laughing because… well, they’re in a comedy club and that’s what you do. I even think it’s possible that people didn’t get the “forks” comment. It may not even have occurred to them that the hecklers were Black. Once he started dropping “nigger” like snowflakes in Antarctica, it stops.

76

I believe Seinfeld sold away all the rights to the show (for some ungodly amt of money), so he won’t be influenced by sales at this point. Nothing in his statement seemed like damage control to me, either. It was just an honest reaction.

77

It was wrong when Mel Gibson was saying it. It was wrong when Isaiah Washington was saying it. And it’s wrong when Michael Richards is saying it.

78

The audience seemed to be laughing until right up to after that when he used the “N” word along with all its supernatural power. I never said it was funny, I don’t think it was funny and you and anyone else who feels like asking me if it was funny can take all that funny, roll it up into a big dildo and shove it right up your hairy twat.

Remember the Muslim chick who right after 9/11 started her routine with “Hi, my name is so-and-so, at least that’s what is says on my pilot’s license.”

Ha, ha, ha. It was funny.

Gimme a break. You’re all deciding what’s funny and what’s not. Go for it. Get off your high horses though.

79

His apology from Letterman tonight:

David Letterman: “Why don’t you explain exactly what happened for the folks who may not know.”

Michael Richards: “I lost my temper on stage. I was at a comedy club trying to do my act and I got heckled and I took it badly and went into a rage and said some pretty nasty things to some Afro-Americans, a lot of trash talk, and uh…”

Letterman: “And you were actually being heckled or were they just talking and disturbing the act?”

Richards: “That was going on too.”

Richards: "…You know, I’m really busted up over this and I’m very, very sorry to those people in the audience, the blacks, the Hispanics, whites - everyone that was there that took the brunt of that anger and hate and rage and how it came through, and I’m concerned about more hate and more rage and more anger coming through, not just towards me but towards a black/white conflict. There’s a great deal of disturbance in this country and how black feel about what happened in Katrina, and, you know, many of the comics, many of performers are in Las Vegas and New Orleans trying to raise money for what happened there, and for this to happen, for me to be in a comedy club and flip out and say this crap, you know, I’m deeply, deeply sorry. And I’ll get to the force field of this hostility, why it’s there, why the rage is in any of us, why the trash takes place, whether or not it’s between me and a couple of hecklers in the audience or between this country and another nation, the rage - "

Letterman: “But Michael, let me interrupt here for a second and ask a question about had the people doing the heckling or the people who were not paying attention, had they been white or Caucasian or any other race, what would have been the nature of your response then?”

Richards: “It may have happened. It may have happened. You know, I’m a performer. I push the envelope, I work in a very uncontrolled manner onstage. I do a lot of free association, it’s spontaneous, I go into character. I don’t know, in view of the situation and the act going where it was going, I don’t know, the rage did go all over the place. It went to everybody in the room. But you can’t - you know it’s, I don’t - I know people could, blacks could feel - I’m not a racist, that’s what so insane about this, and yet it’s said, it comes through, it fires out of me and even now in the passion that’s here as I confront myself.”

80

Just watched the Letterman segment…

I only have one things to say…

Wha?