Dave Chappelle, Bill Maher and Ricky Gervais' Sizable and Ever-Growing Conservative Fanbase

They have fun!

I spend way too much time on Facebook clicking the “Main Profile” button on the many, many, many, many fools who express ignorant opinions on the Internet. Who are these people? Where did they come from? What do they do for a living? Where did they get all of their hateful ideas? 

They’re unsurprisingly often very big fans of the usual suspects, unthinking acolytes of Ben Shapiro and Candice Owens and various other self-styled right-wing intellectuals. But I’ve noticed that they often reverently quote, or post clips of comedians who are ostensibly leftists, or at least still like to think of them as still being creatures of the left. 

I’ve blogged about this before but I am forever amused and enraged by the deluge of comments from social media Conservatives to the effect of, “I don’t agree with Bill Maher about much but he is dead on about (insert hot button issue addressed on the latest episode of Real Time).” 

I read comments like that when Maher is invariably a trending topic after he says something controversial, provocative and more than a little reactionary on Real Time with Bill Maher, which is literally every episode.

Here’s the thing. In 2022, the average Conservative actually agrees with Bill Maher about a LOT of things. They agree with him that the Woke thought police are out of control. They agree with his casual transphobia and snarky disdain for the feelings and desires of young people intent on remaking the world in their diverse image instead of unthinkingly venerating rich, powerful, famous straight old white men like himself. 

Comedians in particular seem to get crankier and more Conservative with time. As they get older, they begin to see young people not as allies or the hope for the future but bitter enemies with the unhinged audacity to challenge them on their choice of words and worldview. 

That certainly seems to be true of Dave Chappelle. Chappelle could have gone down as the greatest, most important and incisive stand-up comedian of his generation. 

Instead he decided to aggressively re-brand himself not just as A transphobic comedian but THE transphobic comedian. In the process he lost former fans like myself but held onto a great deal of his fanbase as well, as evidenced by the huge venues he plays and the fortune that Netflix is paying him. 

In another context, a stand-up comedian like Chappelle bringing out the richest man in the world at one of his shows and having the crowd boo him vigorously for ten minutes would be incredibly subversive. 

In this context, however, it was abundantly clear that Chappelle was on the side of the obscenely, amorally wealthy right-wing transphobic billionaire and not on the side of his own fans. 

Chappelle’s politics now are the politics of wealth and power. That’s why he seemed more aligned with the richest man in the world than fans who paid a great deal of money to see him perform. 

A hatred and fear of “woke” young people and their demands for dignity, sensitivity and consideration along with transphobia unite Conservatives from ostensibly leftist comedians like Bill Maher, Dave Chappelle and Ricky Gervais. 

It doesn’t matter how you feel about taxation or universal health care. If you’re a famous comedian who spends a lot of time railing about the evils of “Woke” culture or the thought police or the evils and indignities of pronouns then Conservatives are going to like you and identify with you and amplify your words of reactionary hate and bigotry. 

In Gervais’ case, the Conservative hard-on is partially attributable to his mockery of celebrities, something they somehow see as brave and bold and essential and not pretty much the fucking job of a comedian and/or awards show host. 

I wonder sometimes how comedians like Chappelle, Maher and Gervais feel about folks whose timelines are otherwise full of PragerU videos, Trump worship and “Let’s Go Brandon” memes effusively praising them and their words and ideas. 

They probably don’t think about their unfortunate new fanbase because doing so would require a level of self-awareness and humility they don’t seem to possess. 

This right-wing shift is self-sustaining. A comedian like Dave Chappelle is criticized by young people on the left, particularly in the LGTBQ+ community and rather than taking a look in the mirror, he reflexively develops a knee-jerk contempt towards young people, to the point of delivering a speech at his old high school attacking them for challenging rather than celebrating him. 

The more Chappelle is criticized, the more angry he’s likely to be at the people challenging him and the more sympathy he’s liable to feel towards right-wingers who think he’s absolutely right and brave and essential to boot. 

That’s how you go from being the next Richard Pryor to a dude who talks about how poor people suck onstage alongside Elon Musk. 

Are Chappelle, Gervais and Maher embarrassed by their sizable and ever-growing right-wing fanbase? Probably not. I would be, but then I do not use my voice and my soapbox to rail against “woke culture” and antagonize vulnerable communities. 

Trump supporters consequently have zero reason to support me or my ideas, and that suits me just fine. 

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