Is Dave Chappelle's new special "The Closer" really transphobic?
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Yiz are both mistaken in that the purpose of a GRC is specifically to acknowledge that the State recognises the person’s preferred gender which means they acquire all the rights and obligations of their acquired sex -
18. (1) Where a gender recognition certificate is issued to a person the person’s gender shall from the date of that issue become for all purposes the preferred gender so that if the preferred gender is the male gender the person’s sex becomes that of a man, and if it is the female gender the person’s sex becomes that of a woman.
Both the Constitution AND Legislation do distinguish between sex and gender, and this was pointed out to you in the link I provided earlier where the point was being made that the legislation does not include transgender men. The ‘unintended consequences’ Simon Harris was referring to were likely related to this sort of case arising -
And with regards to whether or not any circumstances would constitute unlawful discrimination, would depend upon the circumstances in each and every case, because exemptions in Irish equality legislation do exist. Since you specifically mentioned sports -
5.—(1) A person shall not discriminate in disposing of goods to the public generally or a section of the public or in providing a service, whether the disposal or provision is for consideration or otherwise and whether the service provided can be availed of only by a section of the public.
(2) Subsection (1) does not apply in respect of -
(f) differences in the treatment of persons on the gender, age or disability ground or on the basis of nationality or national origin in relation to the provision or organisation of a sporting facility or sporting event to the extent that the differences are reasonably necessary having regard to the nature of the facility or event and are relevant to the purpose of the facility or event,
There are a number of exemptions in Irish equality legislation on any of the nine grounds. Gender is not a special case any more than the rest of the eight grounds aren’t. None of these rights are absolute either, in any case it’s a question of determining which rights apply, and balancing those rights which are in conflict to determine whether or not the discrimination is either lawful or unlawful -
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Because money = power regardless of all other criteria. That is your philosophy.
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Sounds like more nonsense you just made up that you’re trying to attribute to me tbh. I’m not sure a second or even third reading of my posts is going to assist with your inability to address anything I’ve actually said.
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The first link to to the British Supreme Court. They don't have the same laws.
As for the second point the use of gender here would apply to women and trans women alike, and men and transmen alike. As we are told, a transwomen is a women. A transman is a man. And that's correct in law, the preferred gender is the legal gender since the GRC, provided someone has a certificate.
Most of the equalities acts were prior laws, back when gender was read as biological sex.
So a man could be excluded from a female sport but not a transwoman. Even if to the naked eye there isn't much difference between em.
At least this is how I read it, and if it isn't true then the birth cert of someone who has legally changed their gender is useless, as is the gender recognition act.
I did say that this hasn't been tested yet in Ireland, though. As far as I know.
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Did you purposely miss the part where I said that the ‘unintended consequences’ which Simon Harris was referring to were likely relating to the sort of case arising that I gave an example of? You’re doing that thing again where you can refer to the US and your example of a “World Hegemony” as if US standards apply in Ireland, but when I refer to an example of a case in the UK, you try to make out it’s not a legitimate example because it’s not Irish!
I was using the case as an example of what he was likely referring to because our laws in relation to motherhood and pregnancy are exactly the same as the UK, that’s why he was reluctant to include provisions specifically relating to transgender men in the legislation - because of the possible unintended consequences, one of which being the example I gave in making the point. It’s similar to the way in which same-sex couples who are men do not have the same parental rights as same-sex couples who are women (it’s easier in the case of women because person who gives birth is automatically regarded as being the child’s mother) -
As for the second point, I’m honestly baffled that anyone can read an exemption in certain circumstances and still say that it’s not an exemption! That’s exactly what it is, and that’s exactly the circumstances it provides for. It doesn’t matter whether the person is a man or a woman, what matters is whether or not they were lawfully or unlawfully discriminated against, and there are provisions or exemptions which permit discrimination in certain circumstances. Maybe a link to the full section might help -
I don’t know how you maintain that the birth certificate of a person who has legally changed their gender becomes useless? An amendment is made to their birth record to register their preferred gender, it doesn’t wipe out their life between the two points?
Further to that it doesn’t automatically mean that the gender recognition act is useless, because without it, they would be in the previous position where they had no legal recognition in Irish law, and thereby no protection from unlawful discrimination on the basis of their gender. It has been tested too, that was the whole purpose of Lydia Foy taking their case, because their argument was they were being discriminated against on the basis of their sex -
Foy began legal proceedings in April 1997, to challenge the refusal of the Registrar General to issue her with a new birth certificate. Unemployed, Foy was represented in the action by Free Legal Advice Centres. The basis of her action was a contention that the Births and Deaths Registration (Ireland) Act 1863 did not justify the practice of using solely biological indicators existing at the time of birth to determine sex for the purposes of registration. According to Foy, she had been born a "congenitally disabled woman" and the error recording her sex on her birth certificate was not only embarrassing to her but also could interfere with her constitutional rights, as she would be unable to ever choose to marry a man.
The practice of using solely biological indicators to determine sex for the purposes of registration is still a legitimate practice, and if they choose to in later life, a person can request that the birth record be amended in accordance with their acquired sex and be issued with a revised birth certificate. It’s still an important legal document if you do wish for example to apply for a passport or other circumstances where a birth certificate may be required.
Or did you mean that there hasn’t been a case pursued in Ireland by a person who is transgender who was discriminated against on the grounds of gender when they wished to play sports? If so, I’m not sure why you’re trying to create a fuss about something that hasn’t happened, and if it were to happen, the case would be determined upon it’s own merits, as opposed to this idea you appear to have that transgender women cannot be discriminated against under any circumstances and that this means anything with regard to having any effect on women as you were alluding to earlier in the thread.
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I’m just answering your first sentence in case you are thinking I’m “purposely missing” the rest of your text. The quoting system in the new site is appalling. I’d like to quote a partial quote
i didn’t purposely “miss” your claim about Simon Harris because I didn’t reply to a post where you made that claim. What I did in my actual post was
1) point out that you didn’t understand, or deliberately lied, about the British Supreme Court judgement implying it was Irish. Or perhaps you made a mistake. Feel free to acknowledge that, and to apologise for being disingenuous
2) I pointed out that the definition of gender has changed since the GRA. Therefore saying that there can be discrimination based on gender in sports isn’t helpful as in 2015, the definition of gender changed from being biological to gender identity.
nobody is under obligation to answer every single part of your overlong posts in every single rebuttal.
I’ll answer the second part of your post (and what Harris supposedly said) in a later post
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At no point did I imply the example I gave was Irish? Why would I when I was making the point that the circumstances of that case were likely something Harris was referring to as ‘unintended consequences’, something Harris was hoping to AVOID, if transgender men were included in the drafting of Irish legislation? He was advised against it.
The definition of gender hasn’t changed since the GRA? It didn’t change from being biological to gender identity either. I don’t even know what you’re saying when you say that saying that there can be discrimination on the grounds of gender in sports isn’t helpful. It isn’t helpful in what way? Earlier your claim was that there was no distinction in Irish law between sex and gender, and when that was shown to be untrue, now your claim is that the definition of gender has changed since the GRA, telling me I either don’t understand, deliberately lied, or perhaps I just made a mistake and should acknowledge it and I should apologise for being disingenuous?
Get up the feckin’ yard! 😂
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So you quote Harris, an Irish politician, and then linked to a decision about the "supreme court". Your previous sentence was "The ‘unintended consequences’ Simon Harris was referring to were likely related to this sort of case arising -"
Then you linked to the UK Supreme Court. Sure, you didn't say that "This link is the Irish Supreme Court" but I think it was very strongly implied.
What did Harris exactly say, a google of "Simon Harris unintended consequences" just gives me a link about vulture funds.
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Yes, I linked to a CASE in the UK where a transgender man had wanted to be named as the father on their child’s birth certificate, and the appeal was rejected because the person who gives birth is named as the mother on the birth certificate. From the link I provided earlier -
Sir Andrew McFarlane, president of the Family Division of the High Court and the most senior family court judge in England and Wales, had initially ruled against Mr McConnell after a High Court hearing in 2019.
He concluded that people who had given birth were legally mothers, regardless of their gender, and said there was a “material difference between a person's gender and their status as a parent”.
Three appeal judges, including Lord Burnett, the Lord Chief Justice, and the most senior judge in England and Wales, upheld Sir Andrew's decision in April.
They said the issue involved complicated “interlinked” legislation and any reform of the law was a matter for Parliament.
A registrar told him that the law required people who give birth to be registered as mothers, and he took legal action against the General Register Office, which administers the registration of births and deaths in England and Wales.
How the absolute fcuk you thought I was trying to imply it was an Irish case is beyond me! Did you actually read the article before coming to that conclusion? You read newspapers in three different languages ffs!
As for what Harris actually said, you didn’t look too hard -
A number of TDs have raised concerns about how the language used in the Bill could affect members of the trans community who may require an abortion. Coppinger is among those to call for the term ‘pregnant person’ to be added to the Bill, saying the current wording is trans-exclusionary.
Harris said he would “dearly love” to amend the Bill to say ‘pregnant person’, saying he originally thought this would be possible, but has received legal advice to the contrary.
He said including this term could cause problems for trans men in terms of other services they currently access, adding that including trans-inclusive language in this Bill might unintentionally cast doubt on all other legislation which doesn’t include it.
Coppinger said she fails to understand how this is the case, noting that members of the trans community have expressed concern about accessing abortion services. Harris said he is willing to discuss this issue with representatives from the community.
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I personally didn’t ever think your link applied to Ireland because this new website shows details of what is being linked. That’s not what I am saying. I’m saying that in the context of a discussion on Irish laws you tried to prove your point by linking to another country’s laws. You’ve done it again, this time also quoting most of it. What do you think this proves exactly? The U.K. doesn’t have the equivalent laws as here. There’s no gender act. Therefore the arguments are different there.
compounding that you then posted something Harris said about pregnancy which I could have apparently “easily have googled”. But you said previously that Harris had said something about “unintended consequences” but nowhere in your post does he say that. In fact im unsure what you think he was supposed to have said.
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Dude, come on now! There’s no gender act in the UK? The hell is this then?
The argument that only the person who gives birth is named as the mother on the birth certificate is exactly the same argument here as it is in the UK, exactly the same. They could not be named as the father on the child’s birth certificate. Harris wanted to avoid that whole scenario.
I know you’re not unsure in the slightest what I think he’s supposed to have said. The previous article mentioned the fact that he wanted to avoid unintended consequences. If you’d read the article you’d have understood it wasn’t a direct quote, and I wasn’t making a direct quote either, so when you asked for what he actually said, I provided you with what he actually said. Here’s the previous article and what it said -
It has been reported that Health Minister Simon Harris has been advised that mentioning transgender men in new abortion legislation would have unintended consequences.
Simon Harris has claimed to support transgender men’s reproductive rights, while The Times reports that the government’s position is that transgender men “should have the same rights and liabilities” as women under any new abortion law, but TDs are calling for the bill to be more inclusive.
The government believes that the 2005 Interpretation Act, which was introduced to makes laws gender-neutral, means that the wording of the new abortion legislation should allow references to women to be understood as trans-inclusive. According to a source, specifically referencing pregnant transgender men could “open up” the argument that gendered references in previous legislation could be interpreted as not trans-inclusive.
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What are you on about. There is of course a Gender Recognition Act in the UK. Their law is a little bit different from ours in that they still focus on medicalisation of gender so they dont have self ID.
Also both UK and Irish laws were introduced because of similar cases that went to the European Court of Human Rights and found both countries lack of legal recognition contravened the European Convention on Human Rights. As well as that with both UK and Ireland having common law systems a UK law case may not be as irrelevant to Ireland as you think.
It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
Terry Pratchet
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“Rushed through” though, apparently, according to some people anyway, in spite of the fact that Government sat on it for four years since 2011, even following criticism from the Council of Europe for our failure to recognise people who are transgender in Irish law -
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The difference between not having a medical reason for change of gender and having it is the main issue. Requiring a medical certificate means that people who get to change their gender legally are road blocked by medical science, and are not given the same rights as in countries where it’s just the persons own self defined identity.
the U.K. has a gender recognition panel which “includes medical and legal experts [which] considers evidence submitted to it to assess whether the criteria for issuing a Gender Recognition Certificate have been met.[5]” which clearly is an impediment to change. Sports are also exempt as some other religious exemptions.
Although often considered together, Gender dysmorphia isn’t the same ideology as gender identity; in the former biological sex is not really denied, in fact to get a cert or undergo a transition the patient would historically have had have to live in their preferred gender for two years, it’s seen as a medical intervention
In the latter gender identity trumps biology. Gender identity is a personal idea and doesn’t need as much as the wearing of a wig. Sign a form, notarise it and send it in and you are done, no questions asked.
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I’ve been looking for a this for a while and found it. It’s a webpage from TENI which is the transgender equality network Ireland
it’s basically a description of what happened as the GRA went from committee stage to final approval. At all stages safeguards for sports, or anything that stood in the way of simple self declaration were removed
September 2013, the Committee took written submissions from groups and individuals addressing the various Heads (sections). This was followed by two-days of public hearings in October. This process resulted in a comprehensive report by the Committee on Education and Social Protection which was published in January 2014 The Committee’s report was positive in many ways and addressed the shortcomings of the proposed legislation. Following the publication, the report was publicly debated in Dáil Eireann in May 2014 by TDs and the Minister for Social Protection. At the debate, four TDs from the majority of the main political parties (Labour, Fianna Fail, Sinn Fein) and one independent TD spoke positively about the legislation and encouraged the Minister to address the gaps and restrictive measures that remain in the proposed legislation.
In June 2014, the Minister for Social Protection published the revised General Scheme of the Gender Recognition Bill following Cabinet approval. The revised scheme included several significant changes to the proposed Bill, including the removal of a sports clause (which would have severely hindered trans people’s participation in sports) and provided a pathway for legal recognition for 16 and 17 years olds.
and all other restrictions
the Minister noted: “The process will not require details of care including medical history or confirmation of a diagnosis. Nor will it require that the person has lived in the acquired gender for a specific period of time after their transition.” The General Scheme of the Bill was then referred to the Office of the Parliamentary Counsel for drafting and the Gender Recognition Bill 2014 was published in December 2014
not enough. By March there was universal demand from politicians that any medical certification or barrier be removed
TDs from constituencies across Ireland spoke to the Bill, including members of Independents (9), Fine Gael (8), Labour (4), Sinn Féin (4) and Fianna Fáil (1). TDs were unified in addressing shortcomings of the Bill: Requirement that a primary treating medical practitioner affirm an applicant’s identity, need for applicants to be single (‘forced divorce’), absence of protection for, and acknowledgement of, young trans and intersex people.
After the debate, and under significant pressure, Minister Humphreys agreed to consult with GPs on their inclusion under ‘medical practitioners’. On 3rd June, it was announced that trans people over the age of 18 would be able to self-declare their gender identity and there would be no requirement of certification from a medical practitioner.
anyway I think it’s clear that sports was designed not to be exempt, so those thinking it can be exempt, or that these are unintended consequences are mistaken
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The sports clause was no more a safeguard than the requirement of a medical diagnosis or the requirement that a person who is married wishing to apply for a gender recognition certificate would have to first be divorced. The sports clause was removed simply because it was a barrier to people’s equal participation in sports. It had literally nothing to do with safeguarding in the first place, same as the other restrictions which were removed because they were barriers to people’s equal participation in society. This is what’s meant by the social model approach which was discussed earlier, and where we differ from the UK in the way they still use the medical model approach.
There was the hope recently that England and Wales would implement the social model and allow for self-identification, but they chose instead to retain the medical model and establish three new gender clinics instead by way of addressing the ever-growing waiting lists of people waiting for an assessment, never mind a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria which is the distress experienced as a consequence of an incongruence between their gender identity and biological sex.
It’s being discovered that not all people who are transgender experience gender dysphoria, and that’s why the social model is favoured over the medical model, because gender is no more a medical condition than sexual orientation by which homosexuality was once considered a medical condition requiring treatment. Gender identity doesn’t trump biology, and biology doesn’t trump gender identity - they are as you pointed out two separate concepts.
They’ve always been treated as separate concepts in law in both Ireland and the UK, and in terms of the Equality Acts in Ireland, discrimination has always been based upon gender, as opposed to your idea that gender was redefined after the 2015 Act. Here’s an example of an article in the Irish Times written in 1999 that refers to the new grounds of discrimination that were introduced when the Employment Equality Act of 1998 replaced the Employment Equality Act 1977 -
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I think you mean gender dysphoria not gender dysmorphia. Theres no such thing as gender dysmorphia.
Comparing a trans woman to a man wearing a wig really does show your bigited attitude on this.
You're right though from a rights point of view the Self ID system is much more preferable as doctors do not retain the power to specify how the person should live, what the person should be and whether or not the person can live in their preferred gender. Much more preferable and we've had had it for 6 years now and so it really does show all the scaremongering is nonsense.
It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
Terry Pratchet
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And in fact in the Louise Hannon case in 2011 the Equality Tribunal recognised that the gender ground includes trans people so BEFORE the 2015 Act it was recognised that gender identity existed and it was recognised legally that trans people could be discriminated against because of their gender identity.
It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
Terry Pratchet
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Butler writing in The Guaridan today, a 'special guest'.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/commentisfree/2021/oct/23/judith-butler-gender-ideology-backlash
It is not easy to fully reconstruct the arguments used by the anti-gender ideology movement because they do not hold themselves to standards of consistency or coherence. They assemble and launch incendiary claims in order to defeat what they see as “gender ideology” or “gender studies” by any rhetorical means necessary. For instance, they object to “gender” because it putatively denies biological sex or because it undermines the natural or divine character of the heteronormative family. They fear that men will lose their dominant positions or become fatally diminished if we start thinking along gender lines. They believe that children are being told to change genders, are actively recruited by gay and trans people, or pressured to declare themselves as gay in educational settings where an open discourse about gender is caricatured as a form of indoctrination. And they worry that if something called
“gender” is socially accepted, a flood of sexual perversities, including bestiality and pedophilia, will be unleashed upon the earth.
Of course LGB Alliance, nor I, nor anyone else on these threads have said anything like what she's claiming here. It hasn't gone unnoticed by me that the really bad augments are focused on by people like her. It's a good tactic of course because she's not speaking to me or LGB Alliance but rather people who are clueless on the subject.
They fear that men will lose their dominant positions or become fatally diminished if we start thinking along gender lines.
That certainly one I haven't heard before. Quite creative, but that's her thing. I didn't read the rest or I'll be here all day. I did scroll to the end though and saw this:
- Judith Butler is visiting distinguished professor of philosophy at the New School University. Butler’s latest book is The Force of Nonviolence (Verso)
I don't know if they ever refereed to Kathleen stock as 'distinguished', but anyway.
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You clearly havent read any threads at all about trans issues on this site if you are claiming that noone here is saying what Judith Butler claims
It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
Terry Pratchet
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The real inconsistency is butler’s. She insists that biological gender doesn’t exist (or rather she ignores it) and indeed that gender distinction itself is an oppressive binary construct. She also says that a transwomen is a woman. And a transman a man. Which leaves us with two binary genders again.
the rest of the post there are just lies - if the primary opposition to trans are generally called TERFS then why would, how could, these radical feminists believe anything she says they do.
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The emphasis is normally on sports.
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Not really. Sports isnt bought that much into the discussions
There have been a lot of threads on this site where the arguments are exactly what Judith Butler describes;
Gender ideology is dangerous
Gender ideology denies biological sex
Children are being encouraged to change genders
Gender is a form of indoctrination
Gender being accepted is the tip of the iceberg
It was so much easier to blame it on Them. It was bleakly depressing to think that They were Us. If it was Them, then nothing was anyone's fault. If it was us, what did that make Me? After all, I'm one of Us. I must be. I've certainly never thought of myself as one of Them. No one ever thinks of themselves as one of Them. We're always one of Us. It's Them that do the bad things.
Terry Pratchet
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So Dave hasn't been cancelled and his show is still being watched on Netflix ....
Seems the world has moved on
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Some people are too popular to be cancelled. Doesn't mean cancel culture doesn't exist.
The change in our society that transformed 'I think Dave Chappelle's show is transphobic' into 'I think his show should be removed from Netflix' / 'I think Netflix should not work with him again' is a totally repulsive one.
On the show: he wants us to think he's unhappy about the woke heirarchy. But when he stops telling the jokes and starts preaching, it's obvious: he's just unhappy he's not at the top of it.
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Barely have time for Comedy these days - but I was running a report in work today that is taking a long time to debug so I put on "The Closer" in the background to see what the whole fuss was about.
While it was enjoyable it was not blisteringly funny. A couple of clever moments and technically the man is clearly a master of his class and art form. I have never watched his stuff before. It was good enough for me to feel compelled to work through the rest of the catalogue on Netflix. So later today I might put whatever the next chronological episode was before this one in the background while I work too.
But I could literally not find a "phobic" anything in it. If he was "against" or "phobic" of anything I would say that it is activists or specifically mob activists. And I think the story he closes the show with goes a long way to splitting the real lived experience of individuals from both the groups they are part of and - more specifically - the groups advocating on their behalf. Not always the same groups of course.
His processing a clearly traumatic and personal experience too was quite moving (to me). It made the show half comedy and half sermon (to me). And the final line in the story where he says he plans to meet the girl some day and say "Young lady, I knew your father and he was a wonderful woman." bordered on the tear jerking climax of that story (for me). Hateful or phobic? Not a bit of it. I came away from it awash in empathy and love and caring.
I love the unintended comedy of the protest about his show though where a counter protesting guy showed up with a placard on a stick saying he loves Chapelles comedy. The anti Chappelle people tried to rip it form his hands - and stamped on the placard bit until it broke - leaving the innocent man with just the stick part. At which point - and truth really is funnier than fiction - at least one of the Anti Chapelle people started claiming he "had a weapon" :-) That was more laugh out loud for me than any of the jokes in the show itself and just shows you the quality of some of the people who enter into these "protests". That one then started chanting "repent m*th*rf*ck*r" at him over and over was just icing on the joke.
Maybe there is hate for someone somewhere in the bones of this comedian. I do not know the man. But it was not on display in this episode of his shows that I could find. Going on this show alone I doubt he hates anyone at all. Except possibly himself which appears to be not unheard of in comedians.
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I find US standup to be the most tediously bland, inoffensive nonsense. I've watched some Bill Burr and Louis CK stuff and at that point I gave up. When the first sentence of the OP of a thread contains rhetoric like "wokerazzi whingebags", it's clearly intended to promote more culture war BS. I think on that basis and the fact that US standup is terrible in general, I'll be giving it a miss.
The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.
Leviticus 19:34
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Theres no such thing as a culture war...just like theres no such thing as cancel culuture 😂😂
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I think Chris Rock and Chappelle are very good. My criticism of Chappelle would be that lately he's beginning to just rant and then finish with a punchline. Still funny though. Certainly not transphobic in 'the closer' IMO.
Never got Louis C.K. and Bill Burr is passable.
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Not sure I felt the same as you. Not saying you are "wrong" but just saying that when he finished with the line I mentioned before it did not feel like a punch line. It felt like a line that happened more inside myself than it did on the stage. Not sure why. He played me like a fiddle and the line about "I met your dad" just ripped me from the inside out.
But if I were to respond to the line above yours from the poster above you about American comedy - I would refer to something I said in my last post. DC is clearly a master of his art. I watched the special. The way he moves. The way he talks. The way he moves to the back of the stage almost to the back wall and moves back towards the audience almost like he "hates" to do it - it is technically perfect. he really is a master of the art of comedy.
But I look back on how Dave Allen or Billy used to command a stage - or the invisible conflict between the two ronnies - and I think "They are just not that !!funny!!". And I look at the craziness - which some people love and some hate - of people like tommy tiernan or dara o B - or even god forgive his soul des bishop - who was a lot better than most people give him credit for.
I have never heard the likes of joe rogan talk about it - but I think there has been a long long divergence between the technique of comedy - and actually being funny. And there are legitimate artists in both fields. And a lot of american artists are getting really really good - and rich - at the former.
But having watched the special and the last special later on - there is so so little of the latter going on. And I miss it. I really enjoyed "The closer" and I enjoyed even more "Sticks and stones" - but it's just not what I think of as "comedy".
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