I always thought that the extremely important role that comedians played in society was to tell us our limits as a culture, to show us what we're willing to tolerate and laugh about. Guess they didn't get the memo.
As Eternal Cat War commented, "It's just fucking lazy." We're still talking about comedic geniuses like Richard Pryor, Lily Tomlin and George Carlin because they put the work in. Jo Koy bombed at the Golden Globes because he tried to get away with a half-assed monologue.
The hypocritical thing about this type of modern stand up, is that being "edgy" is a lot more profitable than being "woke". Ricky Gervais is getting 8 digit deals off jokes from 2015 4chan, but there's nobody thriving who's gimmick is "I'm an empathetic, decent person". That doesn't sell tickets.
Did you ever see the docu about Jewish humour? Mel Brooks and others of the 'old guard' along with younger comics. I can go digging for a proper title if you're interested.
Speaking as comedy producer, the culture is swinging toward dumber and meaner.
Those chud-jocks used to be outiers, bombing at open mics and then hosting their sad bro shows for 6mos before giving up.
Now there is an entire industry for them.
Mike Birbiglia, who's comedy style is a lot more 'depressed camp councillor' than anything else, once said that if you don't know about comedy, a lot of stand up shows sound like somebody making a really mean speech.
It's the crybabies who annoy me. If a comedian makes the choice to be mean, be honest about it and own up to it. I'm not a fan of Ricky Gervais, but at least he's upfront about being a sneering bastard.
This isn't true. I can say that some fuckin cop looks like a glue huffing, sister fuckin, wife beating piggy with a bad hair line and worse skin all day and the only people who clutch their pearls are pig lovers, who aren't actually even human themselves. It's all about picking targets.
