Funny Thing about Racism...sometimes it's not that racist

"I kid...I kid," Don Rickles used to say.

People believed him. This is the guy who said, "What do we need blacks for? Oh yeah, for cotton in the drug store."

Did anybody take a knee because of that joke?

One reason is that the PC Brigade didn't become humorless villagers with pitchforks until recently. NOW it's "Resign! Resign! Never work again!"

Funny, people who don't have well paying or prestigious jobs are the first to scream RESIGN at somebody who does.

Here's something else about FUNNY.

At times, FUNNY combats RACISM. At times, FUNNY diffuses tensions and these tensions melt away with laughter.

Dick Gregory's catchphrase was "So you see, we all have problems."

Was Don Rickles a racist? By strict definition, yes.

Was he absolved from it because he attacked ALL races and religion? Somewhat. He always had his critics, but they had to admit that he didn't spare anyone. His theme was basically that everybody's an idiot. Everybody's accent, everybody's costumes, everybody's prideful ethnicity is a bit silly.

The problem is that not everybody is comfortable with that comic truth.

People get OFFENDED.

Or as Mort Sahl's catchphrase defiantly went, "Is there any group I haven't offended?" He's the salty guy who said that the NAACP was after him: "They want to know why there are no blacks in my act."

Now we have the Governor of Virginia who, with the exception of Obama, has been called on to RESIGN. GET OUT. GO AWAY.

You've risen to the position of GOVERNOR? Leave in DISGRACE. Spend the rest of your life as a humiliated quitter, and RIGHTFULLY, RIGHTEOUSLY SO!

Today's headline has a colleague declaring that DESPITE the fact that this man is not a bigot, that his black college classmates don't recall him as being anything but a "nice guy," and despite no evidence that he denied appointments to blacks or in any way created laws against them, or had the State Police get tougher with blacks than whites...he should RESIGN.

Over a jokey stupid photo in his college yearbook.

You're a great guy, you've not done anything racist in 35 years, but GET OUT OF HERE!!

The media began pawing through that yearbook and guess what. They found other examples of racial assholery. There was a picture of some white guys in black DRAG. They were dressed up imitating The Supremes.

Funny? Not very. But sometimes, that's all that "racists" were going for.

You might argue that Eddie Cantor doing a movie scene in blackface (and later in redface!), was emphasizing how easy it is for an obviously DIFFERENT race to be treated differently. He was Jewish and he'd seen a lot of antisemitism, including the racism spewed on the radio, and accepted, as spoken by Father Coughlin. It can be argued that he chose to attack racial differences by assuming the identity of a race treated even worse in America than Jews.

Likewise, his pal Al Jolson, though more than capable of singing the mournful "Kol Nidre," also expressed the misery of racism better in blackface, singing "Old Black Joe." And expressing joy via "Camptown Races."

Let's add that this was a century ago. This kind of thing thing isn't needed NOW. Or is it? Ask the Wayan Brothers who chose whiteface drag in a movie not THAT long ago. But they did it to be FUNNY, pretty much.

They'd tell you that FUNNY is not THAT racist.

Another thing about racism in humor. While sometimes it's intended as a cruel but effective means of releasing anger and frustration, it MIGHT sometimes make people laugh and ease up on their fears.

It's possible that all those stupid 78 rpm "coon song" records were basically saying "Don't be FRIGHTENED of these big strong black people. They're just harmless. They like watermelon. Give 'em some and they're not gonna kill you."

That's an over-simplification, and it doesn't excuse being offended, but isn't that possibly what the comedians and singers meant? Certainly we know that Eddie Cantor was a big friend to Bert Williams. It was to Eddie that Bert confided about racism, "It wouldn't hurt so bad if I didn't still hear the laughter and applause." I'm paraphrasing, but the gist of it was that Bert was good enough to entertain the audiences on stage, but not good enough to use the same hotel as the other performers. Nothing funny about that.

FUNNY racism? Choose your own examples. It could be Chico Marx's fractured Italian accent. Was that offensive? Some Italians felt it was, but many thought that by mocking the accent a little, it encouraged assimilation. Maybe it even celebrated being Italian. People often imitate what they want to be. Rich Little doesn't go onstage and do John Wayne because he HATES John Wayne.

More than offensive, to some, was the "Mr. Kitzel" character on Jack Benny's radio show. It can be argued that Jack was Jewish, so why would he insult his own race that way. But Mr. Kitzel spoke in a high wimpy voice, and was a stereotype of the ineffective, weak Jew. In a way, Woody Allen did a lot of that in the 60's and 70's, but with a little more wit and a lower voice.

One might say that Lenny Bruce performed a lot of antisemitic routines, and mercilessly mocked his aunt on stage, the "Jewish seagull." Someone else would say this was self-hatred. And others would say he was just being FUNNY. Why no kid around with race, religion and ethnicity?

Why not? Don't ask the cartoonists who drew Mohamed! There ya go. SOME Muslims (that's a fine, fine religion) murderously objected, but NOT ALL. Is it better to NOT joke around with religion at all, and try to be as PC as possible? The result could be pretty boring. Comedy is based mostly on mockery and devastation. It can be very cruel. Do we just tell the comedians to RESIGN?

We might as well, if jokes about stupid people are insensitive, and jokes about fat people are insensitive, or jokes about homely people or nerds or virgins or movie stars. Hey, movie stars are people too. Maybe Rich Little was homophobic for impersonating Truman Capote in the 70's, and all tapes should be destroyed and for what he did 35 years ago, HE should be banned from ever working again.

Somebody else would say that imitating Capote's effeminacy was some kind of tribute to the writer's guts and gall in being so open about himself. Others would say that anyone impersonating him was also flirting with his own fantasies of being submissive and not having to live up to ideals of masculinity. Sexism and racism...funny...maybe not? Maybe so.

The interesting thing about the situation with the Virginia governor is that there's been some kind of dialogue. While much of it has been shouts of RACIST! and RESIGN! some of it has been about: why in the world would offensive photos be allowed in a yearbook in the 80's? Well, perhaps for the same reason Prince Harry wore a swastika decades later than THAT. Stupid is stupid. Thoughtless is thoughtless.

Thing is, nobody's telling Harry he can't be a PRINCE anymore.

Is it because 8 million Jews didn't perish in the 1940's in Germany, a far greater number than the Blacks enslaved in the 1860's in the South? How do we measure OFFENSIVE, or how painful someone finds any depiction of lethal racism? In the photo, it's not just blackface. Someone is standing around in a Klansman costume. The Klan killed blacks just as the Nazis killed Jews. How is that funny? It takes a very great comedian to make it funny, that's for sure. It takes one hell of a movie scene for Klansmen or Nazis to be spoofed and ridiculed to the point where most of the audience is laughing with relief and not cringing in disgust and dismay.

Mel Brooks STILL has people complaining about the "Springtime for Hitler" song. Nazism is a topic so serious and repulsive, that NO jest can be made. Others say..."Funny thing..."