Louis C.K., Dave Chappelle and the Bullshit Cornfield Faux-Redemption

A few days ago I saw a photograph from a comedy show that made me feel a wide range of intense emotions. It made me sad. It made me angry. It made me melancholy and nostalgic. It even made me jealous. 

I was not the only one. I suspect that anybody who loves comedy looked at that widely disseminated image and felt all the feels, to put things in John Green terms. 

As you might imagine, this was not an ordinary photograph from an ordinary show. Instead it was a photo from Dave Chappelle’s series of Summer stand-up shows entitled Dave Chappelle & Friends: An Intimate Socially Distanced Affair in the cornfields of Ohio, featuring a gaudy assemblage of big names like Tiffany Haddish, Michelle Wolf, Common, Sarah Silverman, the actor who played Urkel and Talib Kweli along with special surprise guest Louis C.K. 

There was a time when seeing Louis C.K. come out as a surprise guest at a Dave Chappelle show would have rocked my world. It would have been a dream come true: my two favorite comedians in the same place at the same time! Needless to say, that was a long time ago. A whole lot of shit has transpired since then involving these two gentlemen, and I use that phrase very loosely, almost all of it overwhelmingly negative, to transform me from being a Louis C.K. and Dave Chappelle super-fan to being someone who looks at C.K. and Chappelle and feels an overwhelming sense of sadness and disappointment.

I had such an intense response to the picture that it made me question why this particular image made me so sad and so mad. The picture made me angry because it felt like the cool kids of comedy and music were officially welcoming the sexual predator in their midst back into the fold. 

It felt like this particular group of comedians and musicians had officially forgiven C.K. on behalf of society as a whole, that he was no longer a pariah and a #MeToo poster boy but rather a #MeToo martyr who only ever wanted to masturbate feverishly in front of women with whom he had professional relationships, and keep that boundary-blurring compulsive self-pleasuring a secret from the world for the sake of his career and reputation, yet was sadistically and unfairly forced to face consequences for his actions during the biggest cultural reckoning involving sexual assault and harassment in the past century. 

Here’s the thing: Dave fucking Chappelle is not in a place to forgive C.K. on behalf of the comedy world because when he isn’t using his incredible power, popularity and platform to denigrate the trans community he’s bravely mocking the women who came forward about their experiences with C.K. for not being strong enough to handle a little frenzied masturbation from a powerful colleague. 

I don’t care how Dave Chappelle feels about Louis C.K. now. I already know: he’s a defender and an apologist and a friend and a fan. I care about how the women C.K. has hurt and sabotaged feel about his half-successful attempts to re-build his career as a comedian in the aftermath of the revelations about his predilection for wildly inappropriate onanism. 

Name a more iconic duo!

I’m interested in what Tig Notaro thinks about Louis C.K. now. I’m interested in what Jen Kirkman has to say. I want to know what Pamela Adlon thinks about C.K. I don’t particularly care about the opinions of people who think that it’s all good now for C.K. in part because what he did was never that bad in the first place. 

I’m sad as well because when C.K. was exposed he vowed to listen to his critics and the women he hurt, and grow and evolve and learn as an artist and a man. Then he decided that moral and spiritual growth would be too hard, and that he’d never be able to redeem himself in the eyes of people who saw him as a monster and a misogynist so he might as well not bother trying when he can cater his comedy to friends and fans who will accept him with open arms. 

Chappelle and friends’ decision to aggressively cosign Louis C.K. surprising unsuspecting women with his masturbatory comedy stylings in un-billed appearances at comedy shows seemed particularly poorly timed. 

In the month before C.K. made his comeback in the cornfields, Chris D’Elia and Bryan Callen  were both accused of unspeakable sexual crimes including rape and pursuing underage girls, leading to the abrupt end of a prank show the two were working on. AND Joe Rogan, Spotify’s one hundred million dollar man, got into trouble for laughing uproariously in an old clip where friend and fellow comedian Joey Diaz bragged about making female comedians perform oral sex on him in exchange for stage time. 

I’m not surprised that there are a string of ugly, disturbing revelations involving disgusting men in comedy flagrantly abusing their power to hurt and exploit vulnerable women. I’m surprised that it didn’t happen sooner but, as we have unfortunately learned, there are lots of folks in the business who care more about the emotions of their friends who are abusers than the lives and feelings of the women that they abused. 

Help ensure a future for the Happy Place during an uncertain era by pledging to the site’s Patreon account at https://www.patreon.com/nathanrabinshappyplace

Buy the RIDICULOUSLY SELF-INDULGENT, ILL-ADVISED VANITY EDITION of  THE WEIRD ACCORDION TO AL with dozens more illustrations and a new cover as well as over a hundred pages of new material covering every facet of Al’s career, including The Complete Al, UHF, The Weird Al Show, the fifth season of Comedy Bang! Bang! and the 2018 Ridiculously Self-Indulgent, Ill-Advised Vanity Tour for just $23.00, signed copy . tax + USA domestic shipping included here