that show is funny

One month straight, then one month gone.

I needed something to watch just now while I was doing the laundry. Chappelle's Show was on. The show's hilarious, but I feel a little guilty watching it.

They apparently gave the guy like half a billion dollars to do the show and he walked away from it. Most people will tell you that the guy simply couldn't take the pressure of such a contract -- that nothing that was eventually produced could live up to such a number. I don't think that was the case.

The guy made a show that wasn't so much shocking as it was subversive. The guy had things to say. I think he not only wanted to make people laugh, but he wanted to use the show as a forum. I think he wanted to empower (hopefully I don't sound foolish as I tread carefully here) the black community in America.

The show got big enough that it went beyond empowerment, though. I think he had a hard time seeing progress made when 90% of all white kids used "I'm Rick James, bitch!" as their catchphrase.

Remember that sketch that had something to do with slavery reparations suddenly happening? If I remember correctly, the joke was that many of the people who got the reparations spent the money in extremely frivolous ways rather than building a better society for themselves. While he was trying to send a message to black America, the rest of the country was laughing at the joke a little too hard.

I wanted to write just now and just wing it, but I went to Wikipedia to verify that there actually was a reparations sketch. While there, I came across a peculiar quote from the guy during a stand-up performance in the final days of the show:

"You know why my show is good? Because the network officials say you're not smart enough to get what I'm doing, and every day I fight for you. I tell them how smart you are. Turns out, I was wrong. You people are stupid."

(Apparently he said this after so many people in the audience said "I'm Rick James, bitch!" over and over again).

It wasn't about the pressure of the money that made the guy quit, but I think the money had something to do with it. I think it further emphasized, in his mind anyway, that he wasn't changing the world for the better. His show was doing the opposite of what he set out to do. Rather than educating through comedy, it was helping enforce the stereotypes he was trying to break down. And on top of it all -- to add to that guilt -- Chappelle was bought at a very large price. Millions and millions of dollars to keep boarding a train that had all the momentum but was going in the wrong direction.

Now every time I watch the show I'm afraid I'm laughing a little too hard.