Surely You Jest

By Douglas Murray

Thursday, April 29, 2021

 

When did America agree to be lectured at by comedians? The question went through my mind again last month when I made the error of watching Late Night with Seth Meyers. On his own, Meyers is unfunny enough, but on this occasion the offense was squared by his being joined by the British-born comedian John Oliver. Perhaps the COVID-remote nature of the interview made it especially hard for them to judge things. Ordinarily Oliver and Meyers are used to live audiences in studio who are directed when to clap and when to laugh. Over time, this might warp anyone’s sense of their own hilarity.

 

So perhaps it was a special mistake for Meyers to lead Oliver onto the recently announced news of the death of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, husband and consort to Queen Elizabeth II. Late-night comedians must have something to talk about, and I suppose a royal passing counts as something happening, even if it is not a perfect basis for humor. After all, what is there to say about the death of someone at the age of 99? You might observe how sad it is for the widow he leaves behind. Even if you have no special fondness for the royal family, you might at least feel some sympathy for the relict of a marriage that lasted an astonishing 73 years.

 

But Meyers and Oliver could express none of this. Instead, you could just feel them gearing up to say something ugly. The first thing they plumped for was the same crack that Bill Maher and other people short of material went for, the “taken from us too soon at the age of 99” shtick. It isn’t an original gag, but it might act as a bridge for a very average scriptwriter to get onto a more naturally amusing subject. But Oliver wasn’t content with that obvious material. Lined up for the gag by Meyers (who asked him how he was feeling about the royal death), Oliver said, “It is difficult, isn’t it, when a 99-year-old with such a checkered moral history leaves us. It is hard to know exactly how to feel.”

 

Needless to say, this was all greeted by Meyers and Oliver himself as though it were material of the utmost hilarity. Oliver himself pretended to find it all so funny that he could hardly speak. Who knows, perhaps the two men just find death to be an unusually amusing subject. But it was that second part of what the grimacing John Oliver came out with that particularly struck me: “such a checkered moral history.” Where did that come from? What did it even refer to? And who the hell did he and his fellow comedians think they were anyway?

 

By most accounts, the late prince might be said to have lived not just a moral life, but an exceptionally moral one: a life whose moral nature was not just outstanding but provable. He fought the Nazis at sea during World War II and distinguished himself in battle by saving his men at considerable risk to his own life. Afterwards he carried out a lifetime of public service for three-quarters of a century: busily, loyally, and uncomplainingly. True, he was fondly known for what were called “gaffes” in his lifetime, none of which consisted of anything more than the occasional bit of banter with one of the hundreds of people a royal must make small talk with every week. Occasionally these hit the wrong target, but in general the prince was a rather witty man — wittier, it might be said, than John Oliver. And, unlike Oliver, being witty was not the duke’s main job. Still, in lieu of any other known complaints against the duke, it does seem surprising that a few misplaced jokes uttered over the course of a century might allow someone to label your moral life as “checkered.” And if it does, then who would ’scape whipping, to quote an earlier scriptwriter.

 

Still it was the position that Oliver seemed to imagine himself to be in that was so revealing. A joke is a joke: Either you laugh or you don’t. But an assertion such as Oliver made is a quite different thing. It must be either proved or countered. A moral assertion — such as whether or not another person has led a moral life — is another matter entirely.

 

Of course, it isn’t remotely clear in the current era exactly where the public are meant to look for moral guidance, let alone moral judgment. In most societies in the developed West we have moved on from looking up to priests and bishops. And it is certainly true that people do not look up without question to monarchs and princes, let alone politicians. Other contenders for the task — writers, philosophers — come and go with their variously sized audiences. But there could be nothing odder than an era deciding that the right to hand out moral guidance and moral judgment should be devolved to the jesters.

 

Yet to a remarkable extent, that is the situation that America finds herself in. At the better end of the spectrum there is the aforementioned Bill Maher. And if Maher can be overly preachy on occasion, it is slightly relieved by the fact that he can also be brave and consistent. Even with him, though, there is something strange about watching him dole out advice and judgment as though his job were not to entertain but to judge. This now appears to come with the terrain. The comedian gets a show. They have to say something every night. Many nights there is a dearth of funny news, and so before long you find yourself preaching to the camera about other matters.

 

That is what seemed to happen last year when another British-born comedian, James Corden, found himself doing a piece to the camera about the death of George Floyd. Corden came to fame by being a funny fat man who makes jokes at his own expense about his size and weight. How is it that someone who has come to fame for being funny and fat should ever be found lecturing a society on police brutality and racial justice to an audience of foreigners? Only because something in the system tells them that this is what they have to do — that this is what is expected of them. That once they are up, there is no other way, because to be silent is to be complicit. So it was that on that occasion last June Corden emoted to his CBS audience about the injustice of what had happened in Minneapolis, and rounded off his sermon by insisting, “It is time for change in the U.S.”

 

To this foreigner all this is a source of considerable wonder. Wonder that in the absence of anyone else to fill the role, a society should have chosen to elevate its comedians into a new clerical class. The old clergies faltered when their congregations found out that they had feet of clay. But what delusions does it demonstrate that the people now telling Americans nightly how to behave, what to think, and how to judge should be superannuated jesters? One reason why writers and philosophers tend to form sketchy moral guides is that they live — perhaps by necessity — sketchy and often contradictory personal lives. If that is the case with writers (and every biography that emerges only seems to prove it), then why give so much weight to the lowest figures in the entertainment food chain? The people whose sole job is meant to be to make you smile. Anyone marveling at the present state of America might look at who has been elevated to lecture the population and only marvel more.