Chris Rock speaks out against cancel culture
May 21, 2021
Washington [US], May 21 : American stand-up comic Chris Rock recently spoke out against cancel culture, noting that it has led to "unfunny" and "boring" content from comedians.
According to Fox News, Rock talked about cancel culture while appearing on 'The Breakfast Club' radio show earlier this week, where he went to discuss his entrance into the horror genre with 'Spiral', which is a spinoff from the highly popular 'Saw' franchise.
During the interview, Rock was asked about cancel culture and how it has impacted him as a comedian. He noted that, after a year in quarantine due to the coronavirus pandemic, he's found the landscape to be drastically different.
Rock opened his statement on cancel culture by noting that, for comedians, there was already a built-in method of letting them know that their material doesn't work.
He further explained and said, "It's weird when you're a comedian because like when you're a comedian when the audience doesn't laugh, we get the message. You don't really have to cancel us because we get the message. They're not laughing. Our feelings hurt. When we do something and people aren't laughing we, like, we get it."
He continued by calling the cancellation of comedians "disrespectful" to the audience who is there at a live performance for the sole purpose of judging the content "Honestly, to me, it's a disrespect. It's people disrespecting the audience like, 'oh, you think you know more than the audience?' The audience knows more than everybody, OK."
He then talked about how this has led to comedy becoming boring and added, "You know but hey, some things don't need to be said. Some people need to be looked out for, I definitely understand that but not letting comedians work is, you know -- what happens is everybody gets safe and when everybody gets safe and nobody tries anything, things get boring."
As per Fox News, the star then went on to lament that fear of getting cancelled has led many comedians to avoid taking risks, thus leading to a slew of unfunny comedians as well as unfunny shows, movies, and other projects. "Everybody's scared to make a move," Rock declared.
