Gillis and a culture of controversy
Comedian Shane Gillis’ work is often crass, so please be warned. Gillis is also one of the most popular comedians in the U.S. Just two weeks ago, he performed a comedy routine in Notre Dame’s stadium as an opener for a concert by country artist Zach Bryan.
Gillis’ comedy is sometimes considered conservative because of its willingness or even eagerness to trample on social taboos. Applause at Gillis’ off-color jokes sends a message: prohibited topics, especially those labeled as off-limits by much of the American left, constitute the perfect subjects for a new sort of conservative ‘anti-woke’ humor. While Gillis himself does not adopt this branding, he was reportedly sought by Saturday Night Live to attract conservative audiences.
Frankly, I struggle to be honest about Gillis’s performance. One temptation is to claim that Gillis’ jokes just weren’t funny. But I laughed. Many of my friends laughed. As one audience member put it, “I laughed so much and felt so bad.” Gillis is vulgar. He’s also funny.
But while transgression is often integral to ‘good’ comedy, Gillis’ performance at Notre Dame crossed a line. It was disgusting to see a thirty-seven year old man make masturbatory gestures while joking about watching porn with his middle school friends. “Juvenile,” “I had to leave,” “I hate that my girlfriend and I had to see that”—such responses were common.
The conflicting responses to Gillis’ humor reflects a broader tension in our relationship with taboos, particularly among conservatives.
Gillis’ comedy taps into a desire for authenticity. America in the last decade is a nation profoundly tired of elitism. Jaded by experts and bureaucrats, we celebrate leaders and celebrities who dress down—who speak, joke, and act like the everyman. Here Trump is one notable, but hardly the only, example. These celebrities seem refreshing. They seem to wash away the cumulative stench of choreographed dishonesty. Dirty jokes seem, as it were, to drain the swamp.
Gillis does more than just display a studied ignorance of the faux pas; he roots his comedy in the fight for it. Nowhere is this more clear than his masturbation joke—the most authentic, most real joke he told. It is an open secret that most college-aged men use porn and masturbate. Because of their ubiquity and the shame they elicit, these are the perfect unspeakable truths. They should not have been funny.
There is little that should be funny about a pornography epidemic rooted in the exploitation of vulnerable women and corruption of young children. Gillis’ jokes about masturbation make light of something grave and make us callous to something to which we should be sensitive. That said, Gillis does not deserve the lion’s share of blame for representing a culture that has turned an evil into an embarrassing but acceptable public secret. He is a symptom, not source, of our sickness.
Too often, conservatives simply fight with no view to value. Back home in Pennsylvania, I see Confederate flags in front of houses, on belt buckles, and on knives. Why die on a hill defending a movement that protected the institution of slavery, a deeply disturbing chapter of our history, and tore our country in two, killing hundreds of thousands of Americans? Similarly, online, in private, and in Gillis’ performance, one is bombarded with gay jokes, trans jokes, and black jokes—all made, one feels, for the sake of transgression and aggression.
Like Gillis, the point is rarely content but rather the mere thrill of scandal—a cheap authenticity. We resist medicine out of disillusionment with the medical establishment. We reject liberal education as a means of indoctrination, cutting humanities departments in favor of ‘practical’ studies such as engineering or business. We have formed a culture of reactionary opposition.
The real need is not for reactionaries, but for those who follow a productive middle way; it is time for conservatives to construct a positive vision. We already do this in some respects. We champion the family. We defend the dignity of life. We uphold pride in our identity as Americans. But resisting the excesses of political correctness demands a new vision for discourse that is not vulgar, but rooted in humility, admits faults, and seeks truth.
Darius Colangelo is a junior majoring in mathematics and the Program of Liberal Studies. He loves coffee, misses mountains, and when he’s not dozing off in the Grand Reading Room, he can be reached at dcolange@nd.edu.
Photo Credit: South Bend Tribune
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