Like most people, when I saw the tweet below, I was offended. This and many other low-brow “jokes” about Jews and women were found on up-and-coming comedian Trevor Noah’s Twitter account. The 31-year-old from South Africa is set to take over the Daily Show in late 2015 or early 2016. After seeing these cruel jokes online, I wanted to know why on earth Comedy Central chose this person to head one of their most popular shows and if I should still tune in when he steps in.
To decide, I started watching Trevor’s stand-up online. Expecting to find more cruel jokes and hate it, I was absolutely floored by how funny and worldly he is. Born in Apartheid South Africa of mixed race, his existence there was literally illegal. His childhood in this tumultuous environment has given him a natural interest in definitions of race that he often comes back to in his routines. Despite his difficult childhood, he learned to speak eight languages: six from South Africa, English, German, and also a little bit of Japanese. Since learning a language can be the best way to understand a culture, he occasionally incorporates ideas he’s heard from people in Europe and Asia. In short, his comedy style could very well be the most diverse racially and ethnically that has ever been on American television.
In a time when racial tensions have been high in America, this is a smart move on Comedy Central’s part. Trevor artfully comes at our issues with a fresh-non American perspective and genuine humor. For example, in his show African American that is currently on Netflix, he focuses on America’s obsession with categorizing people with prefixes by where they are from: Chinese-American, Syrian-American, and his personal favorite, African-American. His challenges towards the way we think about race and culture through personal anecdotes are hilarious and bring up an important subject right now: American minorities.
Minorities in America are growing at a rapid pace. It is predicted that non-Hispanic whites will become a minority by 2055 (the Guardian). Considering most everyone on TV is white, this means that these huge, growing minorities in America don’t see themselves being represented on screen. As a result, they don’t feel seen or heard in society. As the demographics change, as predicted in the chart below, we need to see the faces and discussions on TV change too.
You can see headlines like “Expect to Hear More About MultiRacial Americans” from news outlets like Vox.com. Thanks to Trevor, now we can expect this from the Daily Show.
His passion and dark humor, however, is probably what gets him into trouble. He will fly off the handle on issues, make bold statements, and refuse to apologize for them. For example, he talks in African American about how we see Africa as inherently poor and uneducated–which is wrong (and not a view held in other countries such as China, I might add). He is tired of hearing that his home country is a wasteland, but directs this frustration incorrectly, saying, “I hate those starving kids on those charity commercials. I know it’s wrong because they really are…that way…but I hate them. I really do.”
We know that he is trying to say he hates the image Americans have given Africa, but in his passionate speech, he loses this sentiment. Instead, he insists that he hates starving children, which takes away from his overall message.
Trevor has passion behind his dark humor in addition to sharp convictions and a sharper tongue. Since everything stupid thing we say is often saved on the internet, Trevor’s personal traits above have given us plenty of ammo to say he’s an anti-Semite, sexist, or racist. In reality, he’s just made mistakes on the internet like all of us (think Pitt-Makeouts). His darker sense of humor comes out in the tweet above, and is sure to stir up trouble for him in the future.
However, given that late night comedy has been dominated by older white males for decades, I think that Trevor Noah was a fresh choice that we should all appreciate. On top of that, he will be a non-American with worldly experience hosting a show that covers American politics. I think that brings a new-comedy style that we can all enjoy at a time of especial racial and international tension. Furthermore, Trevor Noah will be an experienced and cultured voice on the very important rising minorities in America. The tweet above is awful, but does the social media define a man, or the man the social media? #philosophy2k15
Answer: I think we all make mistakes and Trevor’s comedy and perspective is something no American should miss out on just because of a few misguided internet moments. I will absolutely be tuning in to the new Daily Show. Will you?