Patton Oswalt's epic Twitter rant about Trevor Noah, and the fair weather ally

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I came to say some things I’m happy to see other people think as well.

Everything for the last 5 years, it seems, has developed into a moral outrage panic.
People are outraged at everything. All the time. Everything must be unoffensive, always!
And how dare anyone insinuate otherwise!

Every tweet, every comment anyone makes is being dissected like a goddamn 17th century
Basho haiku, and taken about as seriously. And I hate to break it to you, but most people do
not have that kind of depth in meaning to their tweets. Nor do they intend to.

This, combined with the ability to retroactively hold any person’s entire digital history against
them, always, is the equivalent of giving every human being on earth online the equivalent of an endless crowd of catholic nun soccermom paparazzi stenographers following their every move forever, and the second they say anything anywhere, online or in real life, it is logged, noted, and appalled at by the entire earth.

I can’t stand this vapid, overwhelming wave of pc bullshit and meta analyzing of every goddamn thing everyone of note or not has ever said.

People of the world, there are times when you should be outraged. Like when a cop beats an unarmed man to death in broad daylight. Or when the leader of the free world invades a foreign country under the guise of freedom and outright lies. Or when someone trys to herd you into a “free speech zone” to speak your mind. That shit is worthy of real outrage.

Some standup comic’s jokes from 4 years ago that you didn’t even notice until they took a new job are not. Andrew Dice Clay material I could see. Maybe.

Comedy is supposed to be just that- taken as comedy. Not as a serious reflection of reality. If you feel the need to meta analyze jokes, and you are constantly outraged by everything you hear, you have a long, hard and miserable life ahead of you, because noone is ever going to invite you anywhere.

So can we please, PLEASE stop getting offended at the slightest goddamn thing all the time already, and save it for when its really needed?

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Fortunately we have an army of millions of volunteers to vet everything anyone has ever said in any context and whip up a frenzy of controversy, so we can at least bathe in the illusion of progress. USA! USA! USA!

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If this is considered offensive comedy by Trevor and Patton, we are doing okay. What is there here other than un-nuanced, mediocre, lazy jokes?

In this context python, Carlin, the mighty boosh, Tim minchin, etc. are incredibly more devastatingly offensive.

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This felt weird. Anyone who sees the world this way isn’t worth taking seriously. If someone starts talking about people being allies for their cause or enemies I smile politely and exit stage left. The author seems to be unable to accept differing viewpoints and lumps people into with/against categories depending on how much they agree with her personally. No room for nuance or debate - all must agree.

‘I’m a man. I get to be wrong. And I get to change’ .You admired him for writing it, but did you truly understand what the words meant?

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I’ve never really believed comedic freedom to stand in opposition of progressive thought, but if one views activism in a zero-sum game, “if you’re not with us, you’re against us” kind of way, then I can understand how Oswalt’s response would be disappointing.

At least, we can all agree that the dredging up of dumb jokes Noah made on Twitter years ago is a pretty thin pretext for outrage? Maybe? I can dream.

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I am also seeing a lot of the opposite. Whenever anyone criticizes anything… Whenever someone discusses whether something is funny or not, it is assumed they are calling for bans and censorship. There is a middle ground here. I can say I think those Twitter jokes are unfunny, and a little offensive, and have a discussion as to why, at the same time not demand that the author be fired or banned or imprisioned.

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One reason people are criticizing Trevor Noah’s tweets is that several criticized Israel, & so the ‘antisemitism’ card is played. #Idon’tthinkthatwordmeanswhatyouthinkitmeans.
Criticizing Israel IS NOT antisemitism.

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There’s also the fact that we’ve been given a high standard by his predecessor, period. Aside from whatever virtues Stewart had, he left a spot that is likely a rather coveted comedic role. That makes being picky both more reasonable and a great deal easier.

The lower down the food chain you go, the less power you have to demand exactly what you want in a candidate(and the more doing so smacks of permanently banishing people). The higher up the food chain, the easier it is to be particularly demanding about a candidate, since there will be plenty of good alternatives.

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Nice try, but we all know that’s not how the internet works. I’m eagerly waiting for the battle-scarred veterans of past culture wars to line up once again and do bloody battle. No quarter, sirrah, no quarter!

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This is, of course, not what happens, and especially not in this case. “Funny” is subjective, and one’s opinion of a joke is just that: an opinion. If you’re in a club and you don’t like a joke, you don’t laugh. If you read a tweet that falls flat, you go to the next one. If someone’s feed doesn’t meet to your liking or taste, you ignore them altogether. Any other public response belies an agenda (which may be a good or bad thing depending on the particulars of the case, but still, that is what you are doing).

NO ONE plows through a back catalog of tweets and highlights “offensive” ones because they are worried that Noah might not be high-caliber enough for the vaunted TDS seat. It is being done to either embarrass him (done), extract an apology from him (also done), or put pressure on CC to change their minds (thankfully not done).

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I found it hilarious to watch her switch be between " he’s on my side, he’ll stand beside me, he’s an ally!" to “wait, I’m no longer sure where he stands, maybe he’s a horrible monster!” In a veritable heartbeat. Next she’ll be talking about how the show is no longer a “safe place”. The world for these delicate little spun-sugar butterflies is an ever shifting landscape of danger and oppression.

People, if someone starts talking about how they see you as an “ally”, politely excuse yourself and run far far away and never get near them again. It’s only a matter of time before you say/do/fail to say/fail to do something and go under the bus, too.

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Imagine if instead of #BeatsByDreidel he had denied the holocaust and cited man’s dominion over women with quotes from the bible.

/s

If you have to disfigure the material to match your outrage, it may be worth recalibrating your outrage alarm.

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I did not “disfigure the material”. I was using his formula: “racial stereotype” leads to “play on brand name”.

Also, I’m not at all outraged. I think this kind of jokes is pretty cheap and aims for the lowest common denominator, but it doesn’t make me mad. I don’t think that they are the hallmark of a progressive. I think TDS could have done better, particularly since they could have had practically anyone they chose. I think a lot of people in this discussion would be speaking differently if the target of his cheap jokes was someone else.

edited to replace lt and gt with quotation marks.

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You can count me as one who would not.

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Case in point, to find the copies of the actual tweets that caused offense, I had to go to Fox News.

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Being a comedian now must be an impossible gig. Everyone everywhere is offended and outraged all of the time at every thing. It’s an utterly unwinnable situation. You’re either bland and not funny or someone wants you fired and takes to the social media airwaves to scream it from the rooftops. What a tough spot.

Good luck Trevor.

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I’m putting on my pedant hat for a minute and saying you probably mean orally, as verbally refers to all things put into words be they spoken or written.

That said, I completely agree that tone is often lost in text.

I think there is a bigger issue beyond what he meant at the time. Has anyone here not said anything they regretted? How about learning from one’s mistakes? In an era where everyone gets the opportunity to have their statements recorded and kept forever, is it even remotely fair to treat the individual as if they were static and unable of evolving new views and opinions? We’re judging a man not on his actions, but on his past actions, because twitter…

Let Trevor step up and give it a go. If he starts spouting hate we can judge him then.

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I was really looking forward to where you ranked this in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Or at least a personality test so I can discover which Marvel product I am most like.

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It’s why Chris Rock no longer plays universities. He says it’s just not worth the trouble anymore…the last thing universities want now is edgy speech.

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I mean the discussion in general, not specifically here on BB. I don’t follow the comments here closely enough to form an opinion about specific people.