This year, Jerry Seinfeld caused a stir when he said that the “woke left” was killing comedy.
His words, “Nothing really affects comedy,” were true. “People need it all the time. They really need it, but they don’t get it.”
“This is the result of the far left and PC crap and people worrying about offending people,” he said. “When you write a script and it gets passed around four or five different people, committees, or groups, saying, ‘Here’s what we thought about this joke,’ That’s the end of your comedy. They move the gates like when you ski. This is it, the gates are moving. Your job is to be quick and smart so that I can make a gate wherever they put the gates.”
I don’t think Seinfeld has ever been proud of his political ideas, but I’m sure he leans left. It was a breath of fresh air when he recently agreed to criticize the “woke left.” It’s not the first time he’s done this either. In an interview with Buzzfeed ten years ago, he scolded reporter Peter Laurie for bringing up the lack of diversity on his famous sitcom Seinfeld.
He said that the “woke left” was killing comedy months ago, but now he’s taking it all back.
On a podcast recently, Seinfeld was honest with comic Tom Papa and said that he “got it wrong.” He also said that it is “not true” that the far left has destroyed comedy.
Now, Seinfeld says that artists should adapt to how society changes.
“I did an interview, and I stated that the far left has ruined the art of comedy,” he said.
“I did say that,” he said. “That’s not true.”
Papa asked, “No?”
Seinfeld said, “No!”
Seinfeld then used skiing in the Olympics as an example.
“If you are Lindsey Vonn, if you are a great skier, you can put these gates anywhere you wish on the mountain,” he added. “The gate will be made by her. That’s funny.”
“We make the gate for every culture. If you don’t make the gate, you are out of the game,” he said. “The game is, ‘Where is this gate, How do I make this gate and get down the hill in the way I want to?'”
He asked, “Does culture change too? And is there something I used to say that I can’t say now that everyone is always moving? Yes. You cannot say certain words about groups, so what? That’s the biggest and easiest target. You have to be a hundred times more accurate with your observation for it to just be funny.”
Author: Scott Dowdy
