{"id":1497591,"date":"2022-05-31T07:17:31","date_gmt":"2022-05-31T11:17:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1497591"},"modified":"2022-05-31T07:17:42","modified_gmt":"2022-05-31T11:17:42","slug":"in-supernature-ricky-gervais-defends-comedy-from-leftist-spinsters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/in-supernature-ricky-gervais-defends-comedy-from-leftist-spinsters\/","title":{"rendered":"In \u2018SuperNature,\u2019 Ricky Gervais Defends Comedy From Leftist Spinsters"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fin-supernature-ricky-gervais-defends-comedy-from-leftist-spinsters%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1497591&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/Screen-Shot-2022-05-30-at-8.47.54-PM.png\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<p>There\u2019s no way to discuss this without offering spoilers, so if you haven\u2019t watched Ricky Gervais\u2019s \u201cSuperNature,\u201d go <a href=\"https:\/\/www.netflix.com\/title\/80225917\">watch it<\/a> now. I shouldn\u2019t mention that, because if you do watch it, then you\u2019ll have no need to read this article because that\u2019s how bad the coverage has been.<\/p>\n<p>The set opens with Gervais whipping out the old saw about how women aren\u2019t funny. (Can I make references to \u201cwhipping out\u201d without coming off as cisgender? Let\u2019s see.) \u201cWhat about all the funny female comedians,\u201d he says before stumbling when attempting to offer examples. He then goes on to explain the special is heavy with satire, which allows people to \u201claugh at the wrong thing because you know what the right thing is.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He continues, \u201cIn real life, I know there are loads of funny women, like, um \u2026 No, but there are! <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Barry_Humphries\">Dame Edna Everage<\/a>. <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Eddie_Izzard\">Eddie Izzard<\/a>.\u201d From there he riffs on Twitter and the art of comedy for a bit, before finally diving into the \u201cproblematic\u201d jokes about the new-fangled women, the ones with beards and wedding tackle, such as Izzard, that has the <a href=\"https:\/\/deadline.com\/2022\/05\/ricky-gervais-supernature-netflix-special-criticism-trans-jokes-1235031385\/\">internet aghast<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Never mind that people aren\u2019t bent out of shape about his jokes about how there are no funny female comedians or that coverage of \u201cSuperNature\u201d erases women in favor of defending men. The patriarchy always wins, I suppose.<\/p>\n<p>Nevertheless, people are big mad about his trans jokes despite the fact that most of the show, while punching in all directions, comes from a place of doctrinaire liberalism. The name of the show itself was inspired by Gervais\u2019s atheism. As he says, \u201cAnything that exists is by definition part of nature and is explainable, if not now then eventually.\u201d Right-wing provocateur Gervais is not.<\/p>\n<p>But given that, also in Gervais\u2019 words, the most offensive thing that can be said right now is that women don\u2019t have penises, it doesn\u2019t matter that he\u2019s a member of the team, no pun intended. Of the special, GLAAD had this <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/glaad\/status\/1529159333589680132\">to say<\/a>: <\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote\">\n<p>We watched the Ricky Gervais \u2018comedy\u2019 special on Netflix so you don\u2019t have to. It\u2019s full of graphic, dangerous, anti-trans rants masquerading as jokes. He also spouts anti-gay rhetoric &#038; spreads inaccurate information about HIV.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Yes, because in 2022, people are looking to Ricky Gervais for information about HIV. Something tells me that the second sentence from GLAAD is merely an attempt to make the complaints seem to be more than simply a response to his jokes about new-fangled women.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s almost as if his critics are trying to prove his point. Lefty comics are generally given a bit more leeway on the topics they discuss, after all. Anthony Jeselnik explained it in a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/04\/30\/arts\/television\/anthony-jeselnik-netflix.html\">2019 interview<\/a> with The New York Times. When asked why woke comedians don\u2019t criticize him, Jeselnik replied, \u201cIt\u2019s because they know I\u2019m woke.\u201d He added that his onstage persona is an act, saying, \u201cThe character is such a monster that you know I\u2019m on the right side of things.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He might have a point. At least one trans comedian thought his joke on the topic, delivered in 2015\u2019s \u201cThoughts and Prayers,\u201d was <a href=\"https:\/\/junkee.com\/transphobic-jokes-are-lazy\/293132\">great<\/a>. Dave Chappelle and Gervais, though? Not so much. Or perhaps we\u2019ve just reached a point in the years since where there is one, and only one, group of people that we cannot make fun of.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s a sentiment Gervais agrees with. Toward the end of \u201cSuperNature,\u201d he returns to the jokes that have gotten him in trouble, this time proclaiming his support for gay people, trans people, all people except furries. (I\u2019m assuming that part because he doesn\u2019t mention them. He erases them, just as his critics erase women.) <\/p>\n<p>His issue isn\u2019t with women with penises, but the fact that identity politics are the one thing we can\u2019t joke about. As a comedian, he likely realizes that putting barriers around certain topics, and refusing to humanize them, makes it difficult to discuss them.<\/p>\n<p>As he\u2019s on the liberal team, this is what\u2019s truly problematic for him. Just as Chappelle and Jeselnik are on the \u201cright side of things,\u201d so is Gervais. They\u2019re looking at the power of comedy, from Lenny Bruce to George Carlin to Richard Pryor to today. Whether or not you agree with them, they use their skills to try to effect social change. And they cannot do that if they can\u2019t discuss certain topics.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s reminiscent of another extremely <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/2015\/4\/23\/8479871\/shakespeare-dirty-jokes\">ribald comedian<\/a>, one who wrote a tragedy in which the main character said some things he shouldn\u2019t have, given his audience. Of course, we\u2019re talking about Shakespeare and \u201cThe Murder of Gonzango,\u201d the play within a play, designed by Hamlet to determine if his uncle Claudius truly had murdered his father. Hamlet, in other words, was using entertainment to try to smoke out a killer.<\/p>\n<p>With \u201cSuperNature,\u201d Gervais is attempting his own \u201cThe Murder of Gonzago,\u201d using entertainment to smoke out those who wish to kill comedy. But while Hamlet used the play as the thing to catch the conscience of the king, Gervais instead has caught the ire of the woke kings, queens, and everything in between. Nobody let them in on the secret. \u00a0<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<div class=\"article-author-description fst-italic\">\n  Richard Cromwell is a writer and senior contributor at The Federalist. He lives in Northwest Arkansas with his wife, three daughters, and two crazy dogs. Co-host of the podcast <a href=\"https:\/\/coffeeandcochon.com\/%E2%80%9C\">Coffee &#038; Cochon<\/a>, you can find him on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/jrichardcromwell%E2%80%9C\">Facebook<\/a><br \/>\nand <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rcromwell4\">Twitter<\/a>, though you should probably avoid using social media.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There\u2019s no way to discuss this without offering spoilers, so if you haven\u2019t watched Ricky Gervais\u2019s \u201cSuperNature,\u201d go watch it now. I shouldn\u2019t mention that, because if you do watch<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":701,"featured_media":1497653,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1497591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1497591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/701"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1497591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1497591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1497653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1497591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1497591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1497591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}