Ought comedies be censored? Take Dave Chapelle and Ali Wong as case studies

Abstract

Nowadays, the comedy industry is threatened by Cancel Culture and comedians are cautious about sensitive themes. Dave Chapelle and Ali Wong are standup comedians in American, their comedy performances The Closer and Baby Cobra released on Netflix were considered ‘insulting’ and ‘offensive’ by cancel culture. This article examines the relationships among cancel culture, comedians, and commercial institutions by the case study of Dave Chapelle and Ali Wong. Exploring whether comedy is limited by the censorship system and cancel culture. I argue that the cancel culture supporters will pressure on institutions that have real power on the cancelling of public figures. To prevent misjudging the intentions behinds the jokes, the cancel culture should examine the ‘offensive’ materials carefully. I will further explain the argument in detail by focusing on the rebellious nature of comedy, the multiple stakeholders involved in the censorship process, celebrity Schadenfreude culture, freedom of speech, and the price of repression, all of which are likely to make the censorship of comedy short-sighted.

Keywords:

• Cancel culture
• censorship
• comedy
• humor theory
• celebrity
• political correctness

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Qianni Zhou

Qianni Zhou received her Master of Arts and Cultural Management from the University of Melbourne. Her research interests are cultural studies and arts history.