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To Michael O’D and the others defending Richards, let me argue a point or two….“Kramer”--or whomever you imply Richard’s was channeling—was not being insulted; it was Michael Richards who was being insulted and it was Michael Richards who lashed out. He was not in character (unless you count being “manic” as being in character—and if manic energy is the sole requirement of Richard’s character “Kramer,” then anyone could have played him).
The difference between a comic successfully addressing race (as I’ve seen Chris Rock, Richard Pryor, George Carlin and sometimes Bill Maher do) and a comic going nuts and revealing his racist core is pretty evident—the former is cognizant of WHY race as an issue is so loaded, complex, and yes, sometimes utterly ridiculous; the latter only knows THAT race is loaded and complex—and probably has no idea of race being used in a ridiculous or even ironic context because he’s still at the primal level that has us identifying by race in the first place. Richards was clearly the latter—all id, no cognition whatsoever.
The “PC”-backlash is a powerful force, convincing everyone that if they’re “not PC” that they’re somehow edgy. We know that’s not the case. Sure, the problem with being overly concerned with promoting political correctness are the same problem with the obtuseness that engendered it—mitigating cultural life with such a broad brush (as bigots are wont to do), that it allows no room for thought, and, in the end, censors many gadflies (comics, writers, artists, etc.) who help us understand thorny conundrums like race in new ways. Yet the horror of the PC backlash has caused people to embrace all the bigoted ways of the past as being potentially enlightening—everything is excused because it’s seen as “raw or “real” or “honest,” and that’s a problem; defending everything as permissible is just as bad as proscribing everything from being permissible.
Richards was not just using the word “nigger” but invoking lynching as a supposedly once viable solution to any dissent from blacks. How is that edgy? How does that provoke me into seeing something different about the race dynamic that wasn’t already there? And last but not least, how is that funny, even in intent?
I am a true believer in the Moebius strip that is humor, how it inverts and converts both mind and heart in one neat twist—it is difficult to be sure, and in my view, more difficult to pull off than straight drama. Jean de La Bruyere said life is a tragedy to those who feel and a comedy to those who think; well, we assume our comics, writers, artists have done their fare share of both, plumbing the depths of human experience and coming back to bring us what they’ve learned and experienced BEFORE they get on stage, or set pen to paper, or brush to canvas. I think it’s safe to say that in a rage-filled state no one is prepared to dole out lessons nor be cognizant enough to be “edgy.” And for the record, let’s note that being edgy is entirely different from being “on the edge.”
Moving on to Richards’s hecklers. The problem with his hecklers is the same problem with ALL hecklers--that they’re obnoxious; they count on it being easier for them to be funnier for a few seconds while insulting the comic as opposed to the difficulty of the comic being funny for a whole set. THAT is the heckler’s “crime.” Not being black. The fact that Richards’ made their blackness a target is, by definition, racist. That he seemed to yearn for the bygone days when offending blacks could be strung up with trees is sickening. That a good half of this forum undoubtedly spends more time defending someone like Richards rather than doing anything truly constructive to help alleviating the dilemma of race in America—well, that’s quintessentially American.
