Much has been made of the recent stoush between Jim Jefferies (whom nobody had ever heard of or cared about until he filled the Aussie flavour-of-the-month quota overseas, in much the same fashion as people who have trouble getting laid in their home country seek easier, less peer-competitive pastures abroad) and Piers Morgan on Bill Maher’s Real Time.
Those on the left who value emotion and feelings over cold, hard facts thought Jefferies won the debate. These people probably believe the U.C. Berkeley rioters are peaceful protesters as well. The rest of us thought Piers kind of had an indisputable point (that only a ‘f— off’ could shut down) with his ‘hate facts’ like bringing up the fact that the ban didn’t apply to 85% of Muslims on the planet, and the fact that it’s a little hard to swallow that Trump is literally Hitler when every celebrity on every stage is allowed to completely slander the President with roughly zero repercussions.
But it wasn’t Morgan who really made Jefferies and those of his ilk look rather silly and exposed their propensity for not getting ironic humour. It was the very quick-witted Godfather of Trash (director of Pink Flamingos) John Waters who put Jefferies, and the predominantly left panel and audience, in their place. Waters isn’t a Trump supporter by any stretch, but has always been fiercely counterculture. And it doesn’t get any more counterculture than calling out virtue signallers in 2017.
Waters begins what seems to be virtue signalling of his own by posing the question of ‘what might be the worst thing’ about a Trump Presidency. He then goes on to say that the most horrible thing imaginable would be if this group of old white men, and Ben Carson (who Waters cheekily claims is even worse than the old white men) actually made things better. Instead of going for low-hanging fruit like the least talented member of the panel (who came across as smug and irrational and will probably be resigned to the same redundant purgatory as other hysterical preachy comics like Amy Schumer and Sarah Silverman), Waters instead chooses to lampoon those who seem to actually be praying and hoping for Armageddon, and the despair they’ll feel if Trump leaves office at the end of his tenure with any measure of success and without a nuclear winter or a second holocaust on his resume.
Waters was in my cool book before this. I saw his one-man show a few years back, and would highly recommend it to anyone. I respect him even more knowing that while he’ll probably offer criticism where criticism is due in regard to a Trump presidency and will hardly be a sycophant, he hasn’t fallen for what is very much textbook hysteria, and isn’t afraid to poke a little fun at those who have.
The joke was completely missed by Maher, Jefferies, and 99% of the studio (his humour is wasted on those incapable of critical thinking), but it’s the funniest and most accurate observation I’ve heard in regard to the current political climate in some time. Well worth a watch.
It’s your XYZ.