GIT'N-R-ON

By: B -- 12/16/05

I’m over a week late on this, but apparently comedians David Cross and Larry the Cable Guy are at odds with each other; and while that may be obvious considering their polar-opposite stage personas, they’ve now taken it public. My favorite comedian pitted against my most hated; it’s a storybook scenario.

The argument started with a Rolling Stone interview in which David Cross said about Larry, “He's good at what he does. It's a lot of anti- gay, racist humor -- which people like in America -- all couched in 'I'm telling it like it is.' He's in the right place at the right time for that gee-shucks, proud-to-be-a-redneck, I'm-just-a-straight-shooter- multimillionaire-in-cutoff-flannel-selling-ring -tones act. That's where we are as a nation now. We're in a stage of vague American values and anti-intellectual pride.”

Not particularly glowing, but I’d bet top dollar that even those comments were tempered by a trying-to-be-respectful Cross (and it’s safe to assume the majority of comedians agree with Cross’s viewpoint).

Larry got upset over the quote and called out Cross in his new book "Git-R-Done," saying, among other things, “According to Cross and the politically correct police, any white comedians who mention the word 'black' or say something humorous but faintly negative about any race are racists.”

Cross promptly responded last week with a long letter to Larry on his website explaining his POV. The lengthy diatribe is caustic, funny and spot on; truly a must-read.

I could write an opus on my hatred for Larry The Cable Guy (the character, not the actual human being), but Cross perfectly captured my thoughts with his letter. Cross points out that, while Larry plays a Confederate-flag-waving Southern redneck, he actually grew up in Nebraska. Cross also quotes a few of Larry’s most bigoted comments (of which there are many – scarier still, they seem to get the biggest laughs) and generally exposes Larry as a fake in just about every sense. (How anyone can actually admit to respecting this guy is beyond me.)

So to recap, Larry is a phony, a racist, a moron and, worse yet, a hypocrite. Plus, he clearly doesn’t respect his audience’s intelligence (though they probably don’t deserve it), or the practice of stand-up comedy in general. Stand-up is more than just a tightly-rehearsed series of punch lines and dick jokes. If people wanted only to laugh, you could fill theatres with home videos of people getting hit in the nuts with various objects. People always laugh at shit like that (myself included). But stand-up can – and should – do more than elicit a few chuckles by way of easy targets. Contrary to what Larry the Cable Guy says or does, it is possible to enlighten as well as entertain. The two objectives aren’t mutually exclusive.

Stand-up comedy is one of the purest forms of storytelling, and is as important to our psyches as books, music, movies, television, etc. The media we consume, the stories we hear, mean more than just hollow entertainment. They can inspire us and shape our opinions, values, personalities and relationships, and they have since the beginning of time. (I thought that was obvious, but the popularity of Larry flies in the face of the whole idea.) For a person like Larry the Cable Guy to treat his audience like half-wits, to celebrate bigotry and to embody that “I’m just telling it like it is” persona, all the while using a fake drawl and purposely misspelling words in interviews and fleecing his audience members with high ticket prices and useless schwag…well, that’s not only pathetic, but it’s offensive to those of us who view stand-up as a significant cultural outlet.

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