In the tribute below, Crystal shows a progression of clips from Williams’ brilliant career starting with his early appearance on the Tonight Show and going to some standup routines. The clips highlighted Williams’ ability to improvise, including one scene where he borrows a pink scarf from an audience member in the front row and wraps its round his head like a Hijab, or Islamic headscarf. He then says “I would like to welcome you to Iran . . . Help me!”
The response was outrage on social media sites which called both Williams and Crystal racists and the tribute “offensive” speech. One critic objected that “After that, people who’d never heard of Robin Williams would think he’s Billy Crystal’s racist friend who was on a lot of talk shows?” Others called for apologies and sanctions. While Williams did a brief accent of a women from Bombay, it was the use of the scarf as a veil that led to the posting of most of the objections.
However, the critics ignore the alternative meaning of the joke. I took the joke as less as statement on Islam generally as a statement on the treatment of women in Iran — a subject of continued discussion on this blog. Clearly many women choose to wear burkas and veils and they should have every right to do so. However, we have also discussed how women have been abused in Iran and other Muslim countries when they have tried to resist discriminatory rules and compelled clothing requirements. Comedians use such controversies as the grist for their comedic mills. The best comedians have an edge and a point of view. While to some the veil is a religious symbol, it is also to others a symbol of the plight of many women who want greater freedom from Sharia law and cultural/religious restrictions. There are many women in Iran, Saudi Arabia, and other countries who have fought bravely for equal rights. The veil is often a symbol of that political struggle, including the continued abuses by morality police against women in countries like Saudi Arabia. This includes the recent sentence of flogging for a women who insulted the morality police and the earlier tragedy of girls forced back into a building school because they were not wearing veils and appropriate coverings.
The greatest concern is that in some Western countries like France, England, and Canada, we are now seeing people criminally charged after complaints have been filed over speech deemed to be offensive by particularly groups or individuals. It is part of a growing threat to free speech that I have written about. For recent columns, click here and here and here and here. When (as we have seen) this crackdown starts to include even standup routines, we have reached an unnerving point in our treatment of free speech and expression. In addition to the prosecutions of such cases, there is the creation of a chilling effect on many who do not want to be accused and potentially charged. The result is a type of self-censorship.
To be honest, I do find some comedians to be incredibly offensive and not funny: I would put Andrew Dice Clay and Kathy Griffin among them. I have even objected to the airing of inappropriate sexual displays during Superbowl shows or New Year shows due to the audience. Indeed, as many have noted, I tend to be a bit old-fashioned (some would say prudish) about crude jokes and a thuggish conduct. However, these objections go further than folks saying that they disliked the joke and raise the question of whether some jokes should be labeled and sanctioned as hate speech or racist. Kathy Griffin simulating oral sex on Anderson Coopers is hardly a disagreement of interpretation. It is appropriate (though in my view still decidedly not funny) in some contests (like a comedy club) and not others (like a television audience with kids celebrating the New Year). The Williams clip controversy turns more on the content of the joke and its meaning.
The clip below can be seen by different people in different ways. However we appear to be losing our tolerance for different or opposing views — even in a comedic routine. The result is pressure to strip away controversial or edgy elements — leaving a type of vanilla flavored level of discourse in our society. The free speech community needs to do a better job in advancing the notion of tolerance for speech in a pluralistic society. It may require giving the benefit of the doubt to people like Williams or Crystal and just not laughing at a joke.
What do you think?
When I was watching the kids Christmas pageant at Church I thght that, they have been propagandized.
I agree with you (I hear the of course she does chorus already)
When I was about 12 or so y sister and I went to a YMCA camp, We were the only 2 Jews. I will never forget the counselor, Morry, still remember her name, sweet as pie, every night saying “Carol I am going to read a story about (Moses, Noah, etc) and want to make sure that is okay with you”. Ironically her attempt to make me feel at ease just brought much attention to the fact that I was noI a Christian, and therefore “Other” and “one of them” Thankfully there never was any backlash from the other kids (at least to my face):
Leej, they made it fun most of the day, but the mandatory church services after dinner everyday were scary at times. But by that time I had got used to the antics from church services every Sunday, twice a Sunday, morning and evening. Wednesday night services and Friday evening “youth group”. We were encouraged to bring our friends from school, if they weren’t sacred away and kept comin with us, the indoctrination began in earnest. I never brought anyone,I was constantly trying to sneak out of church, got in lots of trouble with the elders and my parents for it. It’s not just Muslims that use indoctrination with children, most fundamentalist churches/ cults do it too. So now, let the backlash begin, I won’t stop telling the truth.
Nick I wasn;t referring to you specifically re “cultists”
Your ‘old man’ was spot on with that advice.
Annie wow, you went to them. The seem very scary. (not just for their cult behavior and what they try to instill but just for being a kid in that atmosphere.)
I haven’t seen the one you gave but I saw Jesus Camp a number of years back. Very chilling and as worrisome as the Islamic fundamentalists who are trying to turn their kids into ‘warriors for G-d (or Allah)
Leej, that movie Jesus Camp was my own childhood. I actually went to a ‘Jesus Camp’ in Benton Harbor Michigan for several summers in a row. People should also watch God Loves Uganda. To understand Christian Fundamentalism, these two films are a must. On Netflix now. If these documentaries don’t send a chill down one’s spine, well….
http://www.godlovesuganda.com/
leej, I have made it very clear there are cultists on both the left an right. I said, not long ago on this blog, that 2 Presidents in my lifetime have large cult followings, Reagan and Obama. A Dem or Rep is not a cultist unless they are the type that their leader or party can do no wrong.
Regarding PC. My son was called “spic,” “beaner,” and other epithets. I told him what my old man told me when I was called Italian slurs. “The ones who call you those things to your face are not the ones you need to worry about. It’s the SOB’s who smile to your face and call you those names behind your back that are the problem.”
Karen, but this is okay? http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/jesus-camp/
It is my understanding that male circumcision was a hygienic practice born from a time of widespread disease and poor personal hygiene.
Aridog:
I believe that female circumcision is still far worse than castration. A knife is required for the poor girl’s wedding night, to “open.” Relations with her husband will be inconceivably painful for her entire life, and she will have a much higher risk of death in childbirth. After childbirth, when she will have undoubtably torn badly, her husband will usually insist that she be sewn up tightly again, and have to be reopened with a knife when relations resume.
It’s torture on a very large scale.
And this:
http://www.jewishpolicycenter.org/53/how-unrwa-supports-hamas
Plus, there’s the video I saw of a school where the kids were taught to sing that they loved to see blood flowing, bodies piled up, and that they would go to heaven when they were martyred.
And when you read any denials, ask yourself if those denials are in the same vein as the Al Jazeera article that the Jews “knew about” 9/11 and stayed home without warning anyone else, so that no Jews died. Crazy stuff.
lee:
Just to clarify – you think fiscal conservatives follow PC more than Liberals?
Because, frankly, that is incorrect. Liberals are the “Party of Tolerance” that demands PC. It is an aspect of the party that has run amuck, much like its spending policy.
But a fiscal conservative like me opposes Tax and Spend philosophies.
I criticize conservatives all the time for failing to communicate their positions and reasoning. I’m surprised you do not criticize Liberals for PC.
Karen, I do not paint one group with the same brush. I have said what happened was wrong, it could be taken both ways actually but regardless it was an instantaneous reaction and twitter and facebook lets you “speak” without and before thinking.
I think few people, if you asked directly, believe that being PC by censoring speech, is not American or the right thing to do. It is when people speak that we know where they stand; racists, haters, “Cultists” which is a crazy right wing talking name for those with whom the right disagrees, etc.
limey:
“How come we are not talking about the real issue with Robin Williams, apparent suicide? The psychiatric drugs he was taking, possibly even forced to take, that lead to suicide”
It’s interesting that you mentioned that, because many drugs in this class carry the disclaimer that they can cause or worsen thoughts of suicide. I wonder if he was taking any medication with these risks. If there’s any silver lining, it’s that the shock of his passing sheds light on suicide risks, prevention, and drug side effects.
Here’s an article on some of the latest PC tirades against Hollywood. It’s like thousands of people do nothing all day but sit in their parents’ basement on their computers, complaining that they are offended, and inflating their own importance by demanding everyone around them accommodate them.
Perhaps nowadays people get 5 minutes of fame Tweeting about this actress or that awards show being racist, insensitive, or offensive, touching off a firestorm of criticism.
http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2014/08/29/political-correctness-in-hollywood-running-amok/?intcmp=features
Sometimes the truth doesn’t seem “civil”, but it still needs to be told.
A Jew ridiculing Muslims? This ain’t news.
@NickS
Regarding the female castration and Islamic militarism, you might want to read a comment I made on the Second American thread to Taser-This. A guy named Klaus Theweleit wrote a two volume work called, Male Fantasies linking the Nazi militarism to misogyny with application beyond to patriarchal cultures.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Any Old Guy,
Two comments have been removed for violation of our civility rule.
Female castration? Our expert on All Things is a bit confused.
Cowards from the pat trolling. Sad. No, pitiful.
And this too shall pass, Nick.
There used to be a guy here who scoffed @ saying the simple, “Thanks for your service” to veterans and GI’s. That was the dark ages here. This is the renaissance.