When you watch old comedy shows or stand-up, you forgive the performer many things because the jokes are often a child of their times. Many of them don’t have the capacity to become classics because their ideas age badly. In his Netflix special, Dave Chapelle seems to not care how dated or poisonous many of his jokes are. Not that he ever cared, but the times have changed and, I guess, so has my personal tolerance.
The audience might be laughing, but I’d bet all the oil left in the ground that a huge portion of them had a weird pit in their stomachs when they walked out of the theatre. That being said, I don’t think a comedian’s job is being a model citizen or a beacon of political correctness; they can say what they want. I actually like it when someone has different opinions to me. It makes me realize that I actually have opinions. Side note: In my experience, the people who are most vocal about the freedom of speech, are the first ones to start crying and moaning when someone criticizes them for being jerks.
Dave Chapelle talks about the difference between being broke and being poor and that poor is a state of mind while being broke is a financial situation. He never mentions being cheap, which is what many of his jokes are. It’s easy to shock and say things a teenager says when he’s trying to discover who he is by being contrary to everything. Comedians are, for the most part, smart people and Chapelle is obviously highly intelligent. That’s probably the reason why this show bothered me. I don’t get why a smart person would decide this was a great idea. I’m starting to understand my mother better now. In her words: I’m disappointed in you.
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