Almost every review or comment I read about The Closer was negative. The reviewers attacked not the content as much as Chappelle. He’s always been controversial, especially on the topic of trans people. He also cuts deep into race relations.
Thus, after reading the reviews, when I watched the show on Netflix, I was surprised. I thought he made many great points using the mode of comedy, which often tells truths we can’t hear otherwise. He touched on the absurd inconsistencies in so many people and movements. He acknowledged what he knew the critics would say. Some of the reviews even attacked him for those acknowledgments, but for me they were a sad reminder that being offended is a past-time for many.
There are those that say I have no right to weigh in on his comments about things that don’t directly affect me. Fine. But the reality is, we all affect each other. Extremism, regardless of which end of the spectrum it comes from, is not good. It ignores the bigger picture. Our country is burning down around us and there are people worried about where exactly they’re going to be standing when it collapses on all of us.
The core message of the routine was one that has to be at the forefront: empathy. We have an entire part of this country that has sworn allegiance to a man who not only lacks any empathy at all, but is the exact opposite. He has publicly stated many times how much he enjoys hurting people. It gives him pleasure. He views his followers with contempt yet they literally are dying by the hundreds for him on a daily basis.
We’ve suffered close to a million dead from the deadliest pandemic in our country’s history and yet, a group of people have managed to politicize it to the point where over 1,800 people died yesterday, almost all unvaccinated, and no one even notices. We’ve had close to 100,000 unnecessary deaths of unvaccinated people who had access to it and yet the pundits, themselves vaccinated, and isolated from the masses, continue to press on with their disinformation campaign. To make money.
We have health care for profit, war for profit and now death for profit. Every time there is a mass shooting the utter lack of empathy on the part of firearm advocates sickens me. It’s not their position as much as they simply don’t give a shit about the victims, even when they’re kindergartners. There are people on the other end of the spectrum who also have little to no empathy while proudly proclaiming they do. They destroy people’s lives over a tweet.
Here’s the deal. It’s a routine. It’s billed as entertainment. No one is forcing anyone to watch it. Feel free not to. We live in a society that is becoming more and more siloed. Where we limit ourselves to consume only that which agrees with our preconceived notions. Where anything that goes against those is attacked. We rip apart freedom in the name of freedom.
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