That's what Sarah Silverman is, and always has been. I remember her when she was on the cast/staff of SNL. I remember her frankly despicable routine about her sister's wedding on Weekend Update. She hasn't changed. She couldn't make it in New York or L.A. as a writer or a stand up comic until she turned herself into the IRL version of The Misanthropic Bitch, but that wasn't much of a stretch, because she already was. And is anyone surprised she dates Jimmy Kimmel, the Dark Prince of Eternal, Nihilistic Adolescence??

Thanks, Stephie, for once again not getting it. You imply in your review that there's something to learn from Silverman, implicitly invoking the great transgressive comedians of an earlier time, like Lenny Bruce, George Carlin and Richard Pryor. But what you don't get is that with Silverman it's all about the Benjamins. Tell a joke about your grandmother surviving the Holocaust? Why not? After all, it's only us "hypocrites" - you know, the ones who understand that some things are so unspeakably evil as to be beyond humor - who get offended.

Truth can still sometimes (often?) be found in the offensive. More importantly, talking about the "unspeakable" is an important counter-balance to society's desire to clam up. Issues of race, rape, and genocide should always be talked about and acted upon, not merely waved away with a dismissive morality as taboo.

Silverman might misstep, as all comics do, and comparing her to past greats is perhaps a bit much without more years in which to judge her, but I'd hardly say that she's a worthless hack. I'd say she's a provocateur in the best sense -- someone who pokes us with a sharp wit where we are most tender.

I'm taking a guess that Rod is one of those people who smugly proclaimed after 9/11 that irony was dead.

Rob's assertion that anything is off limits to comedy is laughable. The most obvious question is: who is Rob to decide what belongs in that catagory, "off limits"? How about Zebra humor? Can I make jokes about how Zebra are eaten by lions? And how that strikes me as sad, from an animal rights point of view, until I realized that at last Zebra are being treated the same as early Christians? Honestly, Rod, say that you don�t like that kind of humor, but don�t try to substitute your personal taste for some kind of universal standard--that's called fascism. (If I were Sara Silverman [SS] I might say that comedy was the first victim of the gas chambers.)

Two other things: you say that SS is �all about the benjamins.� First: what�s so wrong about that? Do you want to tell me that Henry Ford was about anything OTHER than the benjamins? Yet, his products (to say nothing of the assembly line) are of immeasurable worth to his country. So, being �all about the benjamins� isn�t so bad in and of itself, is it? Now, you might argue that Henry Ford, an anti-Semite, was making cars, not art. And you might argue that SS is trying to make art, so she should somehow be �above� the allure of money. Yet people�like me�will pay for that art precisely because it does mean something to us. What it means is this: you know that bloviators are full of excrement, and so do I, and we are going to take their seriousness away from them.

She is identifying with us when we know that Ad Men, politicians, and news casters take our most meaningful memories and experiences and turn them into sound bites, attacks ads, TV Commercials, and talking points. (Saddam Hussein is another Hitler, Guantanamo is a Gulag, 9/11 is Pearl Harbor, etc.) SS reminds us that these things still have the power to shock, to unsettle, to disturb, to discomfit, to upset.

What is a laugh after all? It is the human response to a surprise that isn�t a threat. We are surprised at the places SS goes, but she doesn�t threaten us, so we laugh. Perhaps the reason you don�t laugh is because she does threaten you-the person who says that some things are off limits to comedy (but are slung around by any Senator or President looking to score points and intimidate opponents). The things she jokes about make people laugh, ergo they must be funny. Perhaps you realize that it is people like you who are the butt of her jokes?

I can see why you wouldn�t want people to laugh.

Having seen both Lenny Bruce and Richard Pryor in person, I can assure you that Sarah Silverman doesn't go far enough. She reminds me of when my two-year old walked around the house saying "fock fock fock". It didn't mean anything, but it sure got a lot of attention. Maybe if she'd told a "kike" joke instead of a "chink" joke she could have been called edgy. But no, that might have upset nana......

Is there any such thing as a racist joke? If it's funny it can't possibly be wrong or offensive, right? Sarah Silverman strikes me as just one more comic capitalizing off the low-level racism our cable channels and movies are awash in. But more disturbing than the jokes themselves are the apologists quick to defend them, arguing that any of us who actually get pissed off are either prudes or tools of the Machine. While I'm not advocating for jack-booted thugs to carry out tv sets away, I have to ask if there really is something wrong with questioning the value of a show that jokes about rape and genocide.

Jokes about zebras and jokes about murder are not the same; to compare the two is patently absurd, just as it is absurd to claim that because you personally weren't offended by a joke there is no way that joke could be deemed as offensive. In my life I've heard plenty of all-out bigots laugh at jokes about blacks and Mexicans. But I guess if the bigots weren't offended, well, the joke must be unoffensive, right?