No Joke

"The right is starting to get better at comedy and it’s making lefties nervous.”

One of the weirder aspects about the new American conservatism is its utter lack of humor. Maybe this isn’t a new phenomenon. I mean, nobody looks at the old John Birchers and thinks, “Now that was a funny group of guys!” Joseph McCarthy also not known for his comedic timing. Pat Buchanan - decidedly less than hilarious. On the other hand, there have been plenty of funny conservatives in our past. William F Buckley, the pompous founder of National Review and host of Firing Line, was funny. So was Ronald Reagan. One of our sharpest political humorists, PJ O’Rourke, was a conservative. Today’s conservative thinkers, however, are the least funny people in the history of a nation founded by actual Puritans.

Consider their leader. Plenty of people find Donald Trump funny, but that’s only because plenty of people are as stupid as Donald Trump. This is a man who has never said anything that could pass for witty. He has never poked fun at himself. Never used humor to put people at ease. Never uttered an even accidental aphorism. For a man whose mouth spews as much shit as his, you would think at least a few of those words would occasionally form themselves into something approaching a witticism. Nope. What passes for humor in Donald Trump’s world is saying something cruel and having people laugh.

His main rival for the Republican presidential nomination seems, if possible, even less capable of humor than Trump. Ron DeSantis has been wrung through the political consultant grist mill so many times, whatever sense of humor he may have once possessed has now been stripped clean. Instead, we’ve got serpentine jaw-unhinging in the presence of babies and vaguely dystopian slogans like “Florida is where woke comes to die.” Not sure if that’s supposed to be funny or just kind of scary but it’s the closest thing to intentional humor we’re likely to get from Team DeSantis.

Ted Cruz has tried, and failed, for years to land a joke in public. The closest he’s ever come is doing impressions of The Simpsons. Imitating funny characters isn’t, in and of itself, evidence of a sense of humor, but at least it demonstrates that he understands jokes. I’m going to post the full, awkward-as-hell video but be warned, you will walk away feeling so sad, so very sad.

Mike Pence? :(

But those are just the politicians. Current conservatism is a multi-dimensional influence-peddling machine with a panoply of superstars. And holy shit are these people miserable. Consider a few of their superstars. Yesterday was Father’s Day and Ben Shapiro posted this:

One could plausibly make the argument that it adheres to a comedic structure and makes a satirical point, therefore qualifying as a joke in a loose sense of the word. But when one considers that he’s made some version of this same joke every Mother’s and Father’s Day for close to A DECADE, one has to consider the possibility that he considers this his crowning achievement as a humorist. Even worse, he might be correct. Ben Shapiro is so unfunny that the funniest thing associated with him is this actual joke.

Tucker Carlson? We’ve all heard the maniacal laughter but has the man ever said anything funny? Nothing comes to mind. I wanted to be fair so I Googled “Tucker Carlson funny quotes.” Here’s a couple that I found:

“To be a feminist, you have to cut your hair really short. You have to be angry about something.”

“One area of liberal phenomenon I support is female bi-sexuality.”

Funny!

Matt Walsh, Steven Crowder, Candace Owen. Are any of these people, in any way, shape, or form… funny? If you’re not familiar with their work, I’ll save you some time: no, no, and no.

Then there’s the towering intellectual giant of the modern conservative movement, the walking frown line, Dr. Jordan Peterson. You would think that somebody who dresses like a steam punk villain would indulge in a little self-deprecation from time to time. A little levity sprinkled in with the overwrought Jungian analysis.  Not so much. Peterson is Canadian, and it seems like a terrible injustice to the long line of hilarious Canadians that he should come from that country but just as John Candy, Jim Carrey, Mike Meyers and other geniuses crossed the northern border to seek their fortunes, so too did Jordan Peterson. These days, this is the nation where he makes his cheddar, and so I feel obligated to include him among humorless conservatives.

The Left has our share of scolds, too. Bernie Sanders is the least funny Jew ever created. Ilhan Omar doesn’t strike me as, exactly, hilarious. The crew from The Young Turks, despite their boisterousness, are not funny. Al Gore would not be my choice to host an open mic.

In general, though, the Left seems to understand that humor has a purpose beyond cutting down one’s political opponents. It can also be a way to express empathy, bond with people, put others at ease. But when your entire political movement is based on being a dickhead, none of those things have much importance. Humor, in fact, might be seen as a form of weakness. Mirth might very be well be perceived as feminizing if it’s not in the service of cruelty. Putin, for example, not known for his sparkling wit. There’s a reason “the charming fascist” isn’t a trope.

Americans are the people of Mark Twain, Will Rogers, Richard Pryor, Carol Burnett. Humor is an American superpower. So it’s at least a little concerning that a sizeable chunk of our electorate seems drawn to the least funny among us. Not convinced? The success of Greg Gutfeld’s nightly talk show is pretty damning evidence of the growing power of their corrosive “comedy.” It’s not just what they say – it’s how they say it.