The Rembis Report and Other Fascinating Topics - Volume LXXVI

Show me the logic.

As you are well aware, I have been "Witnessing Stupidity Since 1964." I used to use this as my email tagline but caught flak for that by some folks who didn't think it was funny. So, I changed it to "I'm way more fun than those other people you hang around with."

Again, more flak, from people who just did not want to believe it. But you know better. You know it is true.

But I do not use a tagline in my email anymore. For a while I was using "Teach a man how to shop for seafood and he will never have to fish a day in his life." Nobody liked that one either.

Why are so many people unable to take a joke?

I don't know, Mike. Are you going to explain it to us?

I am not sure that I can. It astounds me that so many people don't find the same things funny that I think are funny. I still listen to old recordings of Richard Pryor, Redd Foxx, Cheech and Chong, Freddie Prinze, and Gallagher, who all pushed the envelope of comedy to controversial and extremely funny places. They used stereotypes and foul language and they were hilarious.

Comedian Dave Chappelle caught a lot of flak over the years for his comedy, most recently with his Saturday Night Live monologue last month, and a while back for his Netflix stand-up comedy special, The Closer. In these performances he told jokes about Jews, Transsexuals, and the LGBTQ community. A lot of people could not take the jokes because they did not see them as jokes. They were seen as slurs. When asked about the flak he got from critics, Dave Chappelle answered "I said what I said."

I thought both performances were funny, as he meant them to be. I got the joke, and I did not sense any malice in his words. In fact, I found The Closer, in addition to being funny, to be one of the best laid out arguments for acceptance of others that you will ever hear. I am not going through it joke by joke here, you can watch it yourself. In The Closer, Chappelle references controversial things he said in his own past performances and what others had been saying about him and ends the show with a microphone drop (that every AV person hates, so please don't do that unless nobody needs the microphone for the rest of the night and you can afford to buy a new microphone), that was worthy of a standing ovation. It is a brilliant monologue comparable to a genius TED Talk.

Why doesn't everyone find the same things funny?

There are dozens of reasons. Most of those reasons are rooted in upbringing and tradition. Some are out of fear and ignorance. Some stem from a sense of pride or taste. The reasons reach out to every branch of humanity you can imagine. Not everything is for everybody, and that is all there is to it.

Every once in a while, it feels like there is a war on entertainment. Some people find something to pick on, not just about comics, but other productions they may consider inequitable, or contrary to their preferred entertainment. A person may not care for a style of music, or some kinds of books, or have a problem with the subject matter of plays. That is not a big deal. Everyone has their own taste. Again, not everything is for everybody.

But problems arise when the people who dislike certain forms of entertainment think that everyone else should dislike those same forms of entertainment. Most notably, folks like this will support banning books, protest gay bars, and rally others to their cause because when they find something they don't like, they don't want anybody else to like it either. I think that is sad. That anyone thinks their taste is better than anyone else's to such a degree that they would want to erase somebody else's entertainment.

Yet, it happens. So, they say.

Who says?

The people on the news. I don't mean the reporters. I mean the people they are reporting on. Last week there was a drag show in North Carolina. Some people got riled up because they thought that drag show brought a bad element into their neighborhood. So, they tried to shut it down. They harassed the performers and stood outside with signs, to spread the lie that it was a sex show and inappropriate.

That is just sad. It was not a sex show, and even if it was, it is nobody's business if they are not attending. People who don't like drag shows or sexcapades should just not go. Trying to ruin a good time for everybody else who likes to have fun is just not cool. What a waste of time.

If you have never been to a drag show, you are missing out. Watch a few episodes of RuPaul's Drag Race and have some laughs. It is good, clean, family friendly fun.

Like all stage performers, drag queens put a lot of effort into their work, maybe more than most. They squeeze into garments not specifically designed for their body types. They plaster makeup all over their faces. Some sing pretty good, and some try quite hard to sing pretty good. It is a lot of glitz and glamour. Sometimes the ladies don't look exactly like ladies, because it is a real feat to achieve. You try and make a guy look like a girl; see how you do.

The work they put into their shows is at the same energy level of any other stage production in the world, be it a ballet, a symphony, a rock band, a Broadway show, or community theater. Every performer takes a lot of pride in what they do to bring their audience an experience they won't soon forget.

Drag is no different. The effort is there. They prepare and do dress rehearsals, just like other shows. I am sure the performers in North Carolina were ready to put on an awesome spectacle, especially because they were being harassed and picketed, because as performers, they had a show to put on that they intended to make shine and show their audience that they could not be bullied away.

Then there was a power failure. Forty-five thousand customers lost power in the region.

OMG! What happened?

There was an attack on two local power stations. There is widespread speculation that this was done to shut the lights out on the drag show, but no proof of this at the moment.

While the protests against the LGBTQ and drag community is a shame, I don't believe these events are related. I think it was a coincidence. I may be proved wrong, but my gut says this had nothing to do with the drag show. Just like the queens getting ready for a live audience, I think this was a dress rehearsal.

And that is what makes this scarier. Attacks on power stations have grown more prevalent recently. In these attacks nobody has been captured and whatever leads authorities have, they are being closely guarded. The only watchwords we have right now are to be vigilant and if you see something, say something. Because this was a test. Whoever they are, they have resources, and they have an agenda. They keep hitting stations back-to-back, and then nothing happens. The power goes out and they watch and see what happens. They will assess the responses, the down time, how the grid returns, and where the greatest liabilities are. They will keep the dress rehearsal moving along, small station by small station until they have it right. Then watch out.

Something big is going to get hit and the goal won't be just to shut out the lights on a drag show, the targets are going to be much bigger. I don't know what, or when, or who, or why, but I think this is leading to a massive attack on the USA and if done right it can be catastrophic for a while.

Imagine no nothing for a few months. No lights. No internet. No refrigeration. No clean water. It can happen.

So, go out and catch whatever shows you like while the lights are on, because next time, it might be your kid's school play, or your Knights of Columbus meeting, or the movie you wanted to see, or a stadium full of people that end up trampling each other in a panic.

But no matter what, don't ever let somebody else dictate what you should or should not read, or watch, or sing along with, or do for your audience.

That is Un-American.

Thanks for reading.

If you are new to the Rembis Report and would like to read any of the previous issues, PLEASE CLICK HERE to access the archives. To read it from the beginning, PLEASE GET A COPY of The Rembis Report: An Observation.