Prophetic Comedians

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Welcome, welcome to the deep end. We're number 435.
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It's hard to believe we've been on.
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The air that long.
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We came here from radio and I have to say
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I've had the best time.
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I'm thinking about stuff. I love ideas.
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Here at The Deep End, we try to pull the
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thread of every idea we can.
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And this week, I had a great week.
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Has anyone else ever noticed, at least now, that some
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of the deepest and widest truths coming to.
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Us are now from comedians? So today, we make a
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deep dive into comedians. Comedian prophets.
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It seems comedy has a strange relationship with truth. They
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seem to be allowed to say things most of us
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are afraid to say. As well, they show us some
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different ways of looking at the world and our situation
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and our relationships to it. I think comedians stand out,
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stand there at the vortex of several forces that are
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working together.
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Comedian as prophet.
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When you start thinking that way when you start thinking
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that way and seeing it that way it's amazing what
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the world starts looking like you know to me there's
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this prophetic quality that comes from these forces uh and
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they i want to just look at them real briefly
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First of all, I think comedians stand a little bit
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outside the tribe. A comedian's job is to almost notice
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the contradictions everybody else has normalized. Bluntly put, a politician
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would say, this policy will bring us together. Well, everyone
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can see that that policy is dividing people. The comedian
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points out the contradiction and laughs. Distance gives comedy a
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kind of cultural peripheral vision. Another thing comedians understand is
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laughter lowers defenses.
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The laugh is important. The ego relaxes.
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It recognizes something's true before it doesn't have time to
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construct an argument against us. It's like the comedian can
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smuggle truth past the guards of the mind. As well,
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comedians are professional pattern recognizers. This to me is brilliant
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when I listen to comedians. They're constantly asking what's going
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on here. They watch language, behavior, technology, politics, relationships, advertising, status, hypocrisy.
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And fear.
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And they notice the small changes before those changes become obvious. Now,
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I'm going to suggest this is very similar to what
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a prophet does. A prophet sees a pattern in the
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present and extrapolates its meaning into the future. Another thing
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that comedians do, it's important for us to see that
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absurdity is often an early warning system. Many things look
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very ridiculous before they look dangerous. Can I mention our president?
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Years later, we realize that what they were laughing at
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on The Simpsons wasn't merely funny. It was a symptom.
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And they weren't necessarily predicting the future. They were seeing
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the present more clearly, a higher resolution. You know, and
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I wasn't a big Simpsons fan, but.
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I've gone back and watched a few. It's like, okay.
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As well, comedy thrives at the boundary between sanity and insanity.
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Some think that this may be the deeper connection, a
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society assumptions about what is normal that are developed. But
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normal has become profoundly abnormal. Think about what's going on today,
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trying to normalize the absolute absurdity that we're living in.
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The comedian stands at the boundary and says, does anyone
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notice how crazy this is? And that question can be revolutionary, which,
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of course, puts us back to the analog of the
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jester in ancient times. And we've talked about this before,
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the person who could tell the king's truth because he
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was ostensibly only joking. As well, and this was a
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comparison I really loved looking into, the comedian and the
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mystic have something in common. The mystic tries to get
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beneath the stories we tell ourselves. The comedian does something
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surprisingly similar. The mystic says, wake up. The comedian says,
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look at yourselves. The mystic dissolves illusion through contemplation. The
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comedian punctures illusion through absurdity. And I think both can
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reveal this gap between what reality is and what we
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think reality is. And both of these can be dangerous
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to established power. And I know Colbert, CBS says it
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was financial, but I don't believe a word of that.
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His power was getting too great. And there's an important catch,
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and I do want to say this. Comedians aren't automatically prophets.
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Some are tribal entertainers, cynics, propagandists, professional outrage machines. A
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comedian can be extremely funny while completely misunderstanding reality.
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So a distinction.
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The prophetic comedian has something more. It's almost like they
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all have curiosity, observation, and courage, but the prophetic comedian
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adds compassion. Without compassion, comedy becomes contempt. Without truth, it
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becomes entertainment. Without humility, it becomes ideology. And when all
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these qualities come together, something remarkable happens. And it looks
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to me like the comedian becomes the culture's unconscious speaking
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out loud. And perhaps that's why in an age, our age,
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this just, we're inundated, data, pundits, experts, and politicians. We
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sometimes recognize the truth most clearly when someone gets on
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stage and makes us laugh. And I'm convinced that a
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laugh creates an opening. Oh, my God, that's exactly what
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we're doing. All these little awakenings gives us new ways
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to think about our situation.
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And I think they are awakenings.
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I mean, I listened to Chappelle a few months ago,
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and I was blown away how he cracked open the
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egg of our culture and just spilled it out. And
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it wasn't pleasant, I didn't think. but the best prophetic comedians,
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they're seeing emerging patterns before the culture has a language
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for them.
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And I'd love to, you know, go through all of them.
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I can't tell you how, how many comedians I got
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to look into this. There's just go online and look
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for the top hundred comedians and the list.
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Goes on and they're amazing.
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I mean, for me, it's George Carlin, um, maybe the
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prophet of bullshit. Lenny Bruce, the prophet of liberated speech.
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Richard Pryor, the prophet of uncomfortable truth. And there's, again,
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I have to mention the Simpsons, the prophet of accidental
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collective awareness. They seem to predict a number of events
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from political absurdities to technological developments. And These writers, they
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were just understanding where existing cultural trends were likely to go.
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And they have, and regrettably so in so many ways.
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And I'd be, you know, there's John Stewart, the prophet
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of mediated reality, exposing the theater of political communication.
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And again, Stephen Colbert, come on, man, go Stephen.
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His whole stick on Comedy Central before he got his
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late night was one of the most brilliant presentations of
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who we are.
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And I have to say, I.
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Don't watch South Park much, but I do watch the
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new ones, especially when the devil was ready to have
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Trump's baby.
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That was pretty good.
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So I think these prophetic pieces show themselves over and over.
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And there's a deeper pattern here.
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We put Carlin and Bruce and Pryor and Stewart and
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Colbert and the Simpsons and all of them together. They're
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all doing versions of the same thing. They stand outside
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the dominant story long enough to see its contradictions. The
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mystic says, the story you think is reality isn't reality.
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The prophet says, if you continue believing this story, here's
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where it leads. The comedian says, listen to the story
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you're telling yourselves.
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Isn't it ridiculous? And then everybody laughs.
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And sometimes laughter is followed by a very uncomfortable smile.
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Silence. Think about our time.
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I would say there's more comedians today than ever before. And,
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you know, I have to say the Pope has a
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prophetic presence and he's the first spiritual person in a
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long time other than the Dalai Lama but comedians man
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they are cranking it out they are creating these small
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little awakenings that allow the truth to sneak past our
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defenses and somehow set up home in our souls so
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given all that I'm here with Bob Hayes from Florida
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and Mary Ann Ruddice from Ohio.
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Bob, what say you on this comedic front?
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Well, I think that that's a great analogy there, comparing
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the comedians to prophets. And I think that we tend
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to forget that comedians have been around almost as long
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They go back archaeologically and they find graffiti on old temples.
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They find.
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Dirty jokes written on the walls of the various places
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in Pompeii. You've already mentioned the jester in the court
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of the king who was the only one allowed to
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speak up against the king or point out the king's foibles.
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Comedians have always been connected to the media of the time.
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One of the.
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First politicians slash comedians slash prophets was Ben Franklin with
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his Poor Richard's Almanac. And he was jumping on the
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whole technological revolution of printing. He had his own printing press,
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and he could put out whatever he wanted to say,
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and he would interlace his political commentary with witticisms. And
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you see Lenny Bruce and Carlin, you mentioned, they're coming
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in on the first wave of the new.
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Video media.
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And now we've got these hundreds of comedians that you
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were looking at this week.
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That are riding the wave of the Internet.
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It used to be that they had to go and
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find a club that would let them get on an
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open mic. Now they can get on their own mic
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and post something, and if it's funny and if people
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like it, then they have an opportunity to continue with it.
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It's a whole new world.
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Go on tour, man. Yeah, and they.
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Don't even need to do that.
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They can just.
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create their own GoFundMe.
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I mean it's a different world but I find it
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interesting because there's so many comedians but most.
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Of them have their own little niche.
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They're not painting with a wide brush, they find a
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certain area of absurdity, if you will, and they focus
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in on that, whether it be politics or whether it
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be modern culture or whatever.
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And each one of them.
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Seems to have their own style, their own way of
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getting at it. which makes it fresh each time. You
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don't get bored going from one comedian to another because
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you're getting a different take, maybe.
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On the same kind of absurdity, but in a different.
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Flavor, if you will. And you know, you work your
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way up the circuit. You know what I mean? From
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stand-up to Nate Bergazzi, who we saw....
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Like at a basketball court, there were 7,000 people there.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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And it's so important because there's so many studies psychologically, sociologically,
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and so forth of the importance of humor, how it's
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an attention reducer, how it is used in cases where
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there's a tragedy and humor begins to lift one out
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of that tragic situation a little bit. And they almost
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become not just our political commentators or our social commentators,
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but they're kind of like our therapists.
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Yeah. Marianne, what do you have to say as an
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opening comment to this conversation?
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Well, I think.
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I think everything that you kind of laid out there
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and everything you've said, Bob, is just like, it's right on.
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And I would say, you know, with all of.
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These different voices, some of them, many of them are
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saying the same thing, but they're just saying it in
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a different way and it goes to a different audience.
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And so someone who can listen to Richard Pryor may
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not be able to appreciate George Carlin, or someone who
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appreciates Dave Chappelle may not really hone into.
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Some of the other ones.
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But underlying all of it, they're all creating social commentary.
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They're all looking at the absurdity of life, but they're
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also pointing out the truths. that underlie the hypocrisy that
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we all live with every day. You know, a comedian
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can only keep going if they get laughs, right?
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They have to also entertain.
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But between that entertainment, you're right, it is a doorway into.
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to finding, to exposing people to.
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Things they may never have thought of before and looking
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at things in ways that may assault their senses. You know,
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not everybody laughs at these comedians. Some people want to
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silence them. And so it's, but they are, I think
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they're a vital.
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Part, especially now. And this week I started.
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To look up different comedians and I stumbled across a
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guy named Bill Hicks who I'd never heard of before.
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And he was someone who was out there just, and
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he died very young, which I found really amazing that
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he was so young and yet he was out there
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talking about things that we are seeing permeating and playing
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out today.
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So talk about a prophetic voice.
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Um, here's somebody who's predicting things, but what I liked
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about him was he was also very hopeful, um, in
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the end. And I think most of them, um, you know,
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George Carlin, I love George Carlin, but he was pretty
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cynical and, um, There are, you know, Jon Stewart kind
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of lightens things up a bit.
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So, yeah. Well, and I think one of the things that,
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you know, I think about a physicist who discovers a
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new particle and then they have to name it. And
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I think society is producing new particles, new situations, new
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relational situations.
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And I love that analogy.
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And comedians are able to not just see them, but
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to name them. And I think of Colbert, what was
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it he said? That the great political concept of the
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early 20th century was given to us by Colbert, truthiness.
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Something doesn't have to be factually true. It simply has
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to feel true. And pointing out that is a great
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lens that you can start seeing. Well, that's truthiness. You know,
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it gives us a way of describing something that's happening
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before our eyes, but we don't know how to describe it.
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And I think that those pattern recognitions, I think human
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beings are inherently, and Bob, you're part of this Jungian
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thing that we've been in for decades now in our conversation.
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The pattern recognition is part of the human being. It's
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part of one of the main things we do perceptually.
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And these people, at least to me in my mind,
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they have higher acuity. Their resolution is a lot more fine-lined.
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They're beyond HDTV and K4 or whatever the fuck it is.
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It's not a coincidence that most cultures have had an
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archetype of the trickster slash jokester.
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As part of their pantheon.
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Of gods or of labeling forces of the universe. And
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maybe in some cases, one of the more important archetypes
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in Greek culture, Hermes was the god of the doorway
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that allowed you to move to new ways of thinking.
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And so this is nothing new. And it's just a
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new way of receiving it. And one other thing I
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was going to say, you mentioned, both of you had mentioned,
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they make us laugh. Well, I think that it's even
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beyond that. They allow us to laugh. Sometimes we don't
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even have control. We may not even know why we're
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laughing because it's like an autonomic function.
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And they give us.
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A cue that allows us to laugh at a situation
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and then see that situation in a different way.
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Yeah.
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Well, and I think things are funny because they're true.
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And as the old time prophets, I mean, if we're
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going to stick with this analogy of comedians as prophets,
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the old time prophets pointed out truths. And that's what
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these comedians doing. And that's what makes us laugh because
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we know it's true. And yet we allow ourselves to
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be deluded.
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It's funny, though.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, Red Hawk. I don't think
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that there's a humorous prophet in the Bible. At least
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not that I can recall. They were always very serious,
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you know. God is going to smite us if we
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don't do this and that. I wonder if some of
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the teachings might have gone over a little better if
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there had been a humorous prophet.
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And, you know, they might have. Just who wrote it
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down was probably not the prophet. It was somebody who
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was dogmatic and trying to encapsulate them. I mean, Jesus,
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one of my favorite pictures of Jesus was in a
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Harvey Cox article in Playboy. And it's got Jesus in
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a belly laugh.
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And, you know.
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I think he had a really good sense of humor.
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I think he was goofing on Caesar a lot. I
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think he was goofing on the foibles of status, you know,
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and things like that. And the Gospels catch a little
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bit of it.
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But it doesn't catch, I don't think, the spirit of
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it all the time.
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And I think that in this time, we can't look
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to the church for prophetic knowledge.
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Thinking although i think.
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Pope leo go man go um but the comedians are
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saying it i mean even the ones who aren't what
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i would call uh challenging culture at a big level
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they're challenging it at a small level uh there's this
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asian guy i can't remember his name but he's hilarious
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man And he's from Alabama, from a little town, and
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he's the only Asian there.
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Except for his wedding. Except for his wedding, yeah. And,
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you know, it.
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Just shows you the contrasts. of cultures you know like
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like oil and water or alcohol and water which ones
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are going to blend together and which aren't and those
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that don't blend together humor can somehow put enough heat
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on it that makes them melt together i don't know
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but i do know it leads us somewhere beyond ourselves
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and a way of looking at the world that is
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more complete even though What completes it is knowing how
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hypocritical we are.
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Well, you know, and something else that, you know, when
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you get down to that they are speaking.
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Truth, we're living in a time where we can't really
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discern what is true for the most part.
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And most of the media, the stories that they're covering
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are You don't know. Everything is slanted in a certain way.
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And I think the comedian is coming in and removing
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the slant and, like you said before, honing into what
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is that truth.
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I think of John Oliver.
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And he's brilliant in he does longer pieces. And he
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really digs into issues and what's happening. But he does
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it in such a way that is engaging and comedic.
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But it's very serious. He talks about some very serious
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flaws in our systems. And so I think being.
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Open to, you know, there was a time when I
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remember when Jon Stewart first started on The Daily Show.
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And there was a part of me that resisted that
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because it felt like we're going to start trivializing these things.
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important topics and yet those are the places where you're
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going to get.
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The truth now yeah and it's just.
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Yeah well you know one article i read on john
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stewart said here's the way it works and he called
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they call them the prophet of mediated reality he says
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he they he exposed the theater of political communication a
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politician says one thing The cable news personality interprets it.
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Another politician responds. The network packages the conflict. Everyone talks
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about the spectacle. Meanwhile, reality sits somewhere outside the television screen.
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Politics isn't necessarily the pursuit of truth. It has become
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the management of narratives. And that's, you know, if you
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start looking at what the different comedians were doing and
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what's the pearl of their intent, that was part of
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Jon Stewart's whole The Daily Show. And I think it's
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still doing that, although it's, you know, now has, I think,
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five different comedians or something doing it.
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Well, and Trevor Noah was another one that he brought
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to the forefront, who was absolutely brilliant.
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Boy, Tolkien.
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Well, they've got a few really brilliant ones. Daisy Leinick
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is absolutely terrific. And the names all escape me now,
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but the guy that goes out to the Trump rallies
380
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and interviews the Trump supporters. And he does it very calmly,
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but you see the absurdity so clearly.
382
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And the thing about it is, People don't know it's
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a comedy thing. They don't see that they're the brunt
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of the joke, and the joke is.
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One of two things.
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After high school, they were afraid to leave home, and two,
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they weren't smart enough to go to any college anyway. And,
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you know, no offense, but we need to start using
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the word stupid.
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Stupid.
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And I think that comedian, I don't know who he
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is who's doing those interviews, but I've seen a bunch
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of those. And it's just showing not just the absurdity,
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but the stupidity.
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Well, yeah, and they're oblivious to what's happening. And when
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they get.
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When they confront that cognizant dissonance, it's like they don't
398
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know what to do with it.
399
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But, you know, over 50% of America is under a
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00:27:00.809 --> 00:27:06.490
sixth grade reading level. You know, it's just amazing.
401
00:27:06.490 --> 00:27:06.670
60%?
402
00:27:06.670 --> 00:27:09.799
Something like that. I read it today that it was,
403
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you know.
404
00:27:11.390 --> 00:27:14.009
Uh, and then it took it state by state and
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talked about illiteracy, like in Georgia, like one out of
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five is illiterate in Georgia, something like that. Uh, we,
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00:27:21.279 --> 00:27:25.200
our education system has failed us in, in ways that
408
00:27:25.559 --> 00:27:27.980
are amazing. And I don't think it failed me. I
409
00:27:28.019 --> 00:27:31.250
got in under the wire, really good school. I think,
410
00:27:31.849 --> 00:27:34.069
you know, I learned more than I thought I did.
411
00:27:34.109 --> 00:27:35.289
And I was a troublemaker.
412
00:27:35.309 --> 00:27:39.420
Uh, But you were going through school a long time.
413
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Ago, too. That's what I'm saying.
414
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When I went through, the education system was post-war, and
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we're going to do this, and we're going to take
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care of our kids.
417
00:27:48.869 --> 00:27:51.509
You learned civics and all that kind of geography.
418
00:27:57.880 --> 00:28:00.880
You could go to music school and, you know, I
419
00:28:00.900 --> 00:28:05.079
learned to play ukulele. I learned about history of classical music.
420
00:28:05.119 --> 00:28:07.829
We had a concert time. You know, there were these
421
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we had a theory hour. It was awesome. And I
422
00:28:12.710 --> 00:28:16.130
just I took it for granted. And I think that
423
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part of what's going on today is. is there are
424
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cracks in the system. If you listen to our previous
425
00:28:23.220 --> 00:28:26.890
podcast on End of the World, one of the positions
426
00:28:26.950 --> 00:28:30.329
that we can go in this fork in the road
427
00:28:30.609 --> 00:28:36.170
is fragmentation. And I think that comedians are brilliant in
428
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giving us a language and also giving us a heart
429
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so that we can somehow compassionately believe embrace our own
430
00:28:47.299 --> 00:28:52.380
fragmentation in a way that isn't futile, but is one
431
00:28:52.420 --> 00:28:54.839
that becomes more hopeful, if that makes.
432
00:28:54.720 --> 00:28:55.619
Any fucking sense.
433
00:28:56.319 --> 00:28:59.940
Well, yeah. And it's also, it releases our pressure valves
434
00:29:00.420 --> 00:29:00.880
as well.
435
00:29:01.180 --> 00:29:01.839
Yeah.
436
00:29:02.500 --> 00:29:06.460
You know, giving us an outlet to be able to go, oh,
437
00:29:06.599 --> 00:29:08.319
I'm not crazy.
438
00:29:07.920 --> 00:29:09.000
And laugh about it.
439
00:29:09.519 --> 00:29:14.539
Or I am crazy, but I'm not alone. So, Marianne,
440
00:29:14.619 --> 00:29:15.480
final comments?
441
00:29:17.509 --> 00:29:26.589
You know, I.
442
00:29:24.480 --> 00:29:30.779
Think when we look at the world, the comedians among
443
00:29:30.960 --> 00:29:37.890
us are pointing out things that are the truth. And
444
00:29:38.630 --> 00:29:41.630
if we can just start to shift the way we
445
00:29:41.750 --> 00:29:44.509
see things, um, slightly, um.
446
00:29:45.269 --> 00:29:46.450
And I think they're doing that.
447
00:29:46.470 --> 00:29:49.150
I mean, you were talking about Jordan Klepper talking to
448
00:29:49.529 --> 00:29:56.349
people who had never considered, um, the, the, the, um,
449
00:29:57.390 --> 00:30:01.430
the dissonance that they were entertaining. And some of them
450
00:30:01.470 --> 00:30:04.710
you could see would go, oh, and I wonder what
451
00:30:04.779 --> 00:30:08.779
happens after they leave that interview. And if it does
452
00:30:09.039 --> 00:30:12.039
have an impact, if it does make something. So I
453
00:30:12.099 --> 00:30:13.880
think we just need to.
454
00:30:15.099 --> 00:30:16.720
Keep on keeping on and laugh.
455
00:30:17.000 --> 00:30:17.859
Yeah, amen.
456
00:30:18.259 --> 00:30:19.980
Laughter the best medicine, right?
457
00:30:20.140 --> 00:30:23.000
I love it. Bob, final comments?
458
00:30:23.740 --> 00:30:27.680
Well, I think we can enjoy comedians But I think
459
00:30:28.099 --> 00:30:35.160
I'll use one of Marianne's favorite terms, discernment. I think
460
00:30:35.220 --> 00:30:41.930
we can use the whole situation of the comedian as
461
00:30:41.970 --> 00:30:45.329
a way to discern what's going on outside of the comedy.
462
00:30:45.710 --> 00:30:49.220
Let's take a look at who are trying to stop
463
00:30:49.319 --> 00:30:54.480
the comedians, who are trying to silence the comedians. And
464
00:30:55.250 --> 00:30:57.809
take a look, use our discernment to say, well, why
465
00:30:57.890 --> 00:31:02.480
is this happening? What is it about these people that
466
00:31:02.660 --> 00:31:06.200
they want to hide? And that takes us to a
467
00:31:06.240 --> 00:31:09.640
whole new level of awareness and discernment.
468
00:31:10.240 --> 00:31:12.480
And a new kind of comedian that can point that out.
469
00:31:15.339 --> 00:31:16.779
You got a job, Bob.
470
00:31:18.720 --> 00:31:22.210
When I was in college, we were shown a movie
471
00:31:22.289 --> 00:31:28.029
on meditation, and the whole thing was about Alan Watts.
472
00:31:28.250 --> 00:31:31.359
It was narrated by him. And at the very end,
473
00:31:32.079 --> 00:31:35.599
he says, you know what? If we have all of
474
00:31:35.680 --> 00:31:40.210
this and we don't do what's most human— What's the point?
475
00:31:40.289 --> 00:31:43.869
And then he walks into the pond with all these
476
00:31:43.950 --> 00:31:47.769
lotuses floating in it. And he says, we have to laugh.
477
00:31:48.289 --> 00:31:50.190
And then he bursts out laughing. And that's how the
478
00:31:50.230 --> 00:31:54.319
film ends. And he calls it a form of meditation.
479
00:31:54.920 --> 00:31:59.859
And I would concur with that. You know, as I
480
00:31:59.880 --> 00:32:03.180
was doing the study this week, something that kept coming
481
00:32:03.220 --> 00:32:08.630
to mind was how fortunate I am. And that's because
482
00:32:08.690 --> 00:32:13.730
I have friends, not just my cohorts here. But, you know,
483
00:32:14.250 --> 00:32:16.750
we had a small little dinner party the other night,
484
00:32:16.930 --> 00:32:18.430
just a few different friends.
485
00:32:18.589 --> 00:32:20.670
Edie's learning guitar and.
486
00:32:20.609 --> 00:32:23.559
She wanted to show what she's learned so far.
487
00:32:23.579 --> 00:32:28.019
It was just a small little intimate thing. And we
488
00:32:28.039 --> 00:32:31.500
have a party. every year it's called we call.
489
00:32:31.420 --> 00:32:33.809
It the pond party we don't have a very big
490
00:32:33.829 --> 00:32:37.369
pond it's probably eight by five something like that but
491
00:32:37.430 --> 00:32:40.089
it's alive it's a living thing and we have a
492
00:32:40.170 --> 00:32:44.299
party we've had everywhere from 150 to 75 somewhere in
493
00:32:44.339 --> 00:32:48.839
there people and i look upon all those friends and
494
00:32:48.900 --> 00:32:55.259
i realize they're justice people You know, they work in nonprofits.
495
00:32:55.299 --> 00:33:00.259
They work as lawyers. They work as judges. Some are doctors, ministers.
496
00:33:00.279 --> 00:33:04.430
And I just want to talk next week about friends
497
00:33:05.269 --> 00:33:07.450
and how fortunate anybody is.
498
00:33:07.809 --> 00:33:08.609
That has a friend.
499
00:33:08.630 --> 00:33:14.769
Because right now, friendship is at a high, high cost,
500
00:33:15.250 --> 00:33:17.619
and fewer people have friends.
501
00:33:18.880 --> 00:33:20.500
Until next week, be well.