Seinfeld: The color of comedy

“Should a comedian be judged by the color of his skin, or the quality of his humor?” asked Jennifer Gratz in DailyCaller.com. Jerry Seinfeld was confronted with that question last week, when an interviewer asked him why 21 of the 25 guest comedians on his Web TV series Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee were white males. “Who cares?” he replied. “People think [comedy] is the census or something, it’s gotta represent the actual pie chart of America.” Seinfeld added that he doesn’t judge comedians on their race, gender, or other “PC nonsense.” Only one thing matters. “You’re funny, I’m interested,” he said. “You’re not funny, I’m not interested.” Those remarks whipped up a firestorm on the Internet, with Seinfeld being accused of “white privilege, sexism, and even racism.” Oh, please, said The Washington Times in an editorial. Seinfeld’s job is to make people laugh, not fill quotas.

Seinfeld is entitled to “prioritize humor over diversity,” said Lily Rothman in Time.com. But he shouldn’t flippantly dismiss the very real problem that in an industry dominated by white males, many women and minority comedians never get a real shot. By dismissing them as unworthy of his show, said Kyle Chayka in Gawker.com, Seinfeld implied that “any comedian who is not a white male is also not funny.” Has he ever heard of Richard Pryor, Bill Cosby, Mindy Kaling, or Aziz Ansari? Apparently, this multimillionaire white jerk from the Upper West Side thinks all humor—like his hit TV sitcom—must be about the problems of white people from the Upper West Side. True comedy should reflect the entire American experience, which is why “the glorious, multicolored diversity pie should be thrown directly at Jerry Seinfeld’s face.”

You’re reading Seinfeld all wrong, said Dave Schilling in Vice.com. This is a guy who worships Bill Cosby and hangs with Chris Rock, and his famous TV sitcom didn’t celebrate Upper West Side elites—it mocked them as “monstrously selfish” and ridiculously neurotic. Seinfeld’s comedy and comic taste naturally reflect his experiences. Rather than complain about the lack of token blacks or Hispanics on his show, people should demand that women and minorities get “the chance to create their own shows that speak their unique language.” Wouldn’t that be better than Seinfeld putting “George Lopez on his show just because he’s Latino”?

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