worship the glitch

kateoplis:

No, Jon Stewart, You’re Not Just a Comedian

”[…] outside of “The Daily Show,” in interviews like the one he gave to Chris Wallace and even his famous 2004 confrontation that may or may not have killed CNN’s “Crossfire,” I find that Stewart (and it pains me to say this, as such a fan) can come across as kind of lame, his “media criticism” beyond trite. In interviews, his complaints against the media tend to be an unsophisticated “pox on all of your houses.” I thought his largely pointless D.C. mall rally in late October repeated the mistake he makes in these interviews — trying to argue that our discourse is too loud while ignoring the real point that he hammers home on “The Daily Show,” that our politics is irrational.

But the lamest thing of all, frankly, is Stewart trying to absolve responsibility from the gravitas of what he does — and make no mistake, the gravitas is there — by claiming that merely, “I am a comedian.” That’s true, but he fails to see what many others realize, which is that he is also much more than a comedian. In a world where far too much of highly paid professional journalism, especially inside the Beltway, has become a joke, it has fallen on the comedians — Stewart, Stephen Colbert and Bill Maher perhaps the most prominent — to say what on-one-hand, on-the-other hand journalists are too tied up in knots to tell you, that much of America’s discourse in 2011 is bat-guano insane.

Actually, Jon Stewart, you are an activist, and the cause you fight for is most worthy because — as you do correctly note — it is not a purely ideological one, but the cause of reason. And the fight against illogic is not a “fair and balanced” one, that the most dangerous bogus ideas may be concentrated in the spots where global warming doesn’t exist and the way to balance a budget deficit is more cutting taxes for rich people. For whatever reason, in the past your friend and colleague Colbert — who coined “truthiness” and said that reality has a known liberal bias — has gotten it a lot better than you do.

Maybe Stewart is starting to get it, too, He did say on Sunday that he has an ideology that “is non-partisan and focuses on ‘absurdity,’ ‘anti-corruption’ and ‘anti lack-of-authenticity.’” That sounds exactly right, so now it’s time to drop the “just a comedian” schtick, which comes off like a giant cop-out, exactly the kind of thing that you normally expose so very well, night after night.”

I still don’t understand this criticism of Stewart.  I suppose I can take issue with the “just” in “just a comedian”, but he is just a comedian. He’s doing what contemporary comedians do. He’s finding truth, either his truth or The Truth. What Jon Stewart has to offer America is Jon Stewart, not Journalist or Pundit or some other predefined roll.

The Daily Show existed before Jon Stewart. Weekend Update existed before The Daily Show. They never had this sort of impact. Stewart isn’t performing the role of Funny News Show Correspondent. He’s being himself. That’s what the best comedians do. That’s why Louis CK is the other great TV truth teller of 2011, not Colbert or Maher. The reason CK’s show is so great is that he’s being a comedian rather than a show runner or an actor or a writer. Colbert is fantastic, but he’s playing a role that’s been played before. He’s insanely great at it, but he’s not the only person doing it. Alec Baldwin plays a somewhat similar role on 30 Rock, for example. 

Why are people so obsessed with cramming Stewart into a very specific, tired, traditional, failed role when he’s so successful in the one he’s built for himself? Perhaps the problem is not that they don’t understand tv punditry, but rather that they don’t understand comedians.