Dick Gregory's devastating, and funny, attack on racism
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Comedian, activist Dick Gregory dies at 84
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Comedian, activist Dick Gregory dies at 84 00:49
Story highlights
- Dean Obeidallah: Dick Gregory did far more than tell pointed political jokes
- He introduced the cruel reality of being black in America to white audiences across the country, writes Obeidallah
Dean Obeidallah, a former attorney, is the host of SiriusXM radio's daily program "The Dean Obeidallah Show" and a columnist for The Daily Beast. Follow him @deanofcomedy. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his.
(CNN)"You know the definition of a Southern moderate? That's a cat that'll lynch you from a low tree." That joke,
delivered in the 1960s by trailblazing comedian and civil rights
activist Dick Gregory, who passed away Saturday, seems unsettlingly
relevant in today's America. Though we aren't in the midst of the
struggle for civil rights, that joke was about the evils of white
supremacy -- something we are clearly still grappling with today.
Gregory
has been credited by most as the first African-American comedian to
reach fame by challenging racism through comedy. Richard Pryor may have
put it best in a 2004 interview: "Dick Gregory was the greatest, and he was the first. Somebody had to break down that door."
He made people laugh while educating them about the most volatile issue of the time: Race.
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But what might surprise some is that Gregory was famously quoted
in the early 1960s undercutting the power of comedy as an instrument of
social change: "Humor can no more find the solution to race problems
than it can cure cancer."
Over
the years that quote -- or slight variations of it -- has been put to
political comedians, including myself, when asked if our comedy can have
an impact on hot button political issues. While I believe comedy can
move the needle by, at the very least, raising awareness of issues, I
also believe Gregory did far more than simply tell jokes. He risked his
liberty and his life fighting for equality for African-Americans.
In
a 1963 protest in which Gregory participated in Birmingham, Alabama, he
was arrested and beaten by the police for championing the right of
blacks to vote. After that incident, Gregory wrote,
"It was just body pain, though. The Negro has a callus growing on his
soul, and it's getting harder and harder to hurt him there."
But
even Gregory would likely be hard pressed to deny that his comedy was
introducing many white audiences -- be it by way of his live performance
or comedy albums -- to the reality of being African-American in the
1960s.
Gregory
was able to effectively use comedy to highlight the injustice of
segregation for white Americans while also being playfully defiant. One
of his classic jokes on this topic was about him sitting down at a
restaurant in the segregated South and being told by the waitress, "We
don't serve colored people here." Gregory replied: "That's all right, I don't eat colored people. Just bring me a whole fried chicken."
Another daring joke
raised the issue of violence against African-Americans by white
supremacists, "Baseball is a great sport for my people ... it's the only
sport in the world where a Negro can shake a stick at a white man and
it won't start no riot."
Again,
this was Gregory highlighting something that was truly horrific but in a
manner that made it both entertaining and palatable to white audiences.
One
of Gregory's most clever and effective jokes addressed how local
governments condemned black neighborhoods with the goal of
disenfranchising and driving them out. Gregory said,
"When Negros in Chicago move into one large area and they might control
the vote, they don't say anything to us ... They have a slum
clearance." Adding, "We do the same thing on the West Coast, but we
call it a freeway."
While today that joke might not resonate, at the time it was very common for local governments to use terms like "urban renewal" and the building of freeways as a device to drive African-Americans out of an area.
Gregory,
after taking a break from stand-up for almost 20 years, returned in
1993 and continued using comedy to tackle issues of the day. For
example, after Donald Trump's victory, he was asked by an interviewer
what activists should do to resist the President. Gregory responded,
"You don't have to do nothing ... this country is not going to make
four years, it's over." As is often the case with great political
comedy, that line is as funny as it is frightening.
Gregory
was right that comedy alone can't end racism, nor can it transform
political issues. But it can certainly play a role. And more than that,
Gregory's life stands as a challenge to every person to use his or her
skill set to fight for equality and against the notion that there are
"two sides" to hate.
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