Sorry for the double post, but my first one was already terrible enough: Part of what rubbed me the wrong way about what Carolla said was the stridency of it (a similar criticism could be levied at the title of the Hitchens piece). It's a nuanced issue with a lot of causes, and for him to reach the conclusion that he would push his daughter into comedy writing so she could be mediocre feels, crass and tone-deaf. Which is a fairly easy criticism of Carolla, but it makes him no less wrong and no more endearing.
The phrase "to me" is probably implictly assumed in the sentence. What you're looking for is "commonly accepted as funny." Which is equally problematic, because Larry The Cable Guy, Jeff Dunham, and Dane Cook are commonly accepted as funny. You've said this multiple times as if it were literally true, while accusing others of not actually reading the interview. Are you reading a different interview than the rest of us? Because while maybe you interpreted his statement as obviously meaning this, he did not us those words or any synonymous phrases in the New York Post interview.
Dude, if you actually read my two posts, and not just gloss over the words and assume what my argument is based on who I am, you would see that I agree with you. Or, at least, I don't disagree with you. I am not claiming whatsoever that women are funnier than men, or than female stand ups are funnier than male stand ups. The only thing that ever bothers me is when someone goes "Women aren't funny. Period." Because it's wrong. But, me thinking that giant blanket statement is wrong doesn't automatically equate to me thinking that every single woman has the equal opportunity to be just as funny as every single man has the opportunity to be. Because that's also wrong. I think the people who get so up in arms about Hitchens' article never read past the title. I don't love every single point and every single sentence of it, but overall I think what he has to say is interesting, and a bunch of it is very pro-woman. Carolla's quote is the equivalent of people never reading more than Hitchens' title. I'm sure his opinion is actually more nuanced that what he ended up saying but he didn't elaborate because it was something he said off the cuff in an interview. When taken at face value yeah, it is annoying, but I don't care. And I'm still interested in what people think about this: especially you since you seem so confident in your ability to determine exactly what's funny. I'm not meaning this is an argumentative/baiting way. I'm genuinely interested in how people do that, but that was the only thing you didn't reply to. For me, determining whether something is funny at all is really simple. If I think it's funny, then it's funny. If I don't think it's funny, but someone else thinks it's funny, then it's still funny, just not to me. But, apparently, this is astoundingly wrong based on the reaction it got from RCGT. (Sorry if I got your name wrong.) But I have no idea how I'd determine whether something is funnier than something else besides a gut feeling.
For every situation that has ever occurred, there is someone - past, present or future - who would laugh at it. (You are welcome to provide counter-examples if you have them.) By your logic - the "anything is funny if someone finds it funny" logic - this means that everything that has ever happened, or ever will happen, is now "funny." You have robbed the word "funny" of all meaning. The point is only tangentially related to the discussion (and the discussion not at all related to the focus), so I'll stop there.
Adam mentioned saying "his experiences" when relating the New York Post interview on his podcast, and while the disingenuous interviewer didn't transcribe it, it's clearly implied. Nevertheless, you're correct; that quote doesn't actually appear in the published article. My mistake. However, what does it change? Do you think Carolla would get any less flack if that was in the interview? Luckily for us, no one has actually said this; neither Carolla nor anyone in this topic.
Yes. Which is why I'm not disagreeing with you...or mad at Carolla...or Hitchens...or anyone in particular.
I'm surprised this entire thread has skipped over this part of Adam Carolla's quote: This is racism. If you disagree, try replacing the words "basketball team" with "armed robbery suspect." He then defends his claim about men being funnier than women using that same, prejudice-rooted "playing the odds" logic: The problem with what Adam said, and the reason he's pissed so many people off I think, is that he didn't just say "In my experience, I have met more funny men than women" as Tucker implies he did. He then followed it up with what boils down to "As a result, I assume that men are funnier than women in my everyday life" (just as he assumes that black people are better at basketball than Jewish people, according to "the odds"). That's an asinine and insulting assumption to make because there are over 3 billion women in the world and they are not all exactly the same.
What are you basing that upon? Anecdotal experience? Hard data on black people physiology and the ability to swim? Hard data on drowning rates broken down by ethnic groups? Skimming through TV shows on the Olympic Trials for the 400m backstroke and seeing no black folks? How do you "happen to know the odds"? And "making a decision"? Are you being for real with that? I'm not crying racism or sexism, I'm just a little surprised here. (I've had one glass too many of wine and my kidneys ache, I'll take any answers off the air. Night all)
You're full of shit, of course you can generalize. If we both had a gun to our heads and we each had to pick a basketball team to play for our lives your PC bolloks would go out the window faster that you can say "skinny jeans look gay". Or I would get to watch you get shot in the face, either way I win.
As I explained to the guy in rep, "racism" means a belief that one race is superior to another. Not that certain races, as an overall group, tend to be better or worse at certain pursuits. (For whatever reasons) Anyways, the guy has sent me a lot of really stupid shit defending his views, but none more insane and moronic than this; There you have it. Ignore the evidence of your eyes. Ignore statistical evidence. Ignore REALITY COMPLETELY if it's politically incorrect. It's an insane way to go through life, and as LessTalkMoreStab noted, it's all a bunch of hypocritical bullshit, anyways. If Muse's life was on the line, and he had no other information, he would pick the black player every time.
I don't really care about being PC, but I would pick the tall or athletic-looking guys regardless of their race, and my hypothetical team of multi-racial athletic dudes would stomp your hypothetical all-black team that for all you know could have included dead ringers for Urkel and Gary Coleman. Since we've taken the PMs to this thread I'll post my response here as well: Not at all, I don't really care about political correctness. But in the real world there's so much variation amongst an entire race of people that you can't normally safely assume anything about any one person in that group (besides, you know, their race). No correlation between race and any other characteristic is nearly strong enough to safely make an assumption like that. If you seriously think that any random black person you pick out will most likely be good at basketball then you must not know very many black people.
Whenever confronted by reality, PC defenders backpedal and change the rules. You have no other information except that one of the players was Jewish and the other was black. You don't get to see them and judge how "athletic" they look. Are you still going to defend your choice, with your life on the line? If so, awesome; there's a good chance our gene pool just got smarter. No, but we can say that there is a y% chance that a black guy is good at basketball and a x% chance that a Jewish guy is, and that y > x. It might only be 10% versus 6%, but a difference undeniably exists. According to you, we need to ignore this statistical evidence because it's not PC. This last line is especially hilarious. You can ignore reality all you like, but more often than not, life experiences will tend to support, not disprove them. See, my present girlfriend is black, as are many of my exes. And guess what? The girlfriend played varsity basketball throughout high school, and (going back to scootah's point) can't swim. In fact, out of large giant extended family, with numerous cousins, uncles, aunts, and step-relatives, only two of about 50 family members can swim. Since you discount any difference in any capacity between any races, the only conclusion I can draw is that you don't know many black people yourself.
Ummm....nobody said any black person, random or otherwise, would automatically be better at basketball then any white person. They(and I) are talking about generalizations. The VAST majority of basketball players in the NBA are black. Are you honestly trying to say that wouldn't factor into your decision-making in the gun-to-your-head scenario? Bullshit. And deliberately picking supposedly unfit black people for his basketball team like Urkel(who I hear is actually a pretty decent athlete), and Gary Coleman(pretty sure you can figure out a midget isn't going to be good at basketball), proves that you still aren't getting the whole "generalizing" thing. Your statements prove otherwise.