It was a long trip. This gig was five hours away, meaning a ten-hour drive to perform. That’s a lot of true crime podcasts. About ten hours more than I like, actually. There would be a point where I couldn’t take another fucking true crime podcast, and I suspected that might be more likely to happen sooner than later. Some conversation was going to have to happen.

I didn’t know this guy well, so I asked a bit about his route into comedy. What got him into it? Was he an introvert or extrovert? Was he a class clown at school? Who were his comedic role models, and why?

You could accuse me of being inordinately interested in what other people think, what other people are really like. You wouldn’t be the first. I’ve also invested a significant amount of time speculating about what other comedians are like.

Are we all as broken, dysfunctional, or narcissistic as some people say? We acknowledge that the skill of writing jokes comes from thinking differently, looking at stuff in a way that most people would consider counterintuitive. The data about comedian substance abuse, depression, and even suicide suggests that we’re wired a little different. If that’s the case, is it chemical or emotional?

There’s an idea that comedians are attention-seekers and extroverts. I’ll acknowledge I was an attention-seeker in my youth, and that does include earning the “class clown” title. It originated from insecurity, for reasons that might be discussed in a future post someday. Or, more likely, not. But even though I’ve been an extrovert for most of my life. I’m the opposite these days, and it’s been like that for a long time now.

I challenge some of the assumptions. I know plenty of comedians who identify as introverts. I don’t think we’re all attention-seekers, at least not in the same way people assume. I’ve seen some comedians who want to be seen, but I think most of us would rather be heard. We’re not all holding the mic because we want you to look at us but because we feel we have something to say.

It’s an unwritten rule that every comic has a formulation or variance on the “If I were well adjusted/had good mental health/had a supportive environment growing up, I wouldn’t be a comedian” joke. Is that true? Are comedians disproportionately troubled in these areas? I suspect everyone is troubled, and some of us become comics, but I’ve seen exceptions in my endless quest for data on this topic.

What is a comedian like? Comedians love to tell the world what we’re like, what makes us different from the rest of society. I can see where the idea comes from and can see the utility in propagating it, but I’m not sure I or most comedians I know fit the mold.

For example, I listened to a bunch of interviews from comedians, mostly from Boston, and all of them were as arrogant and obnoxious as possible. They put shit on everything without ever giving a reason for it, such as “Look at you and your silly microphone. Sitting on that stupid sofa.” What is actually wrong with the mic and furniture? It’s never explained. All you get is that everything is inferior to them. And the thesis that follows is that they’re real comedians because they’re thick-skinned and tough, that they like to “bust each other’s balls” all the time, and that most wannabe comedians wouldn’t last two minutes in their environment without crying about it.

I’ve never been there, but if I didn’t acknowledge that Boston is the comedy birthplace of brilliant comics like Gary Gulman and Bill Burr, I might be inclined to take the accounts of these unfunny blowhards and assume that the place is a city of cunts. I’m pretty sure it’s not. More importantly, I completely disagree with the idea that a comedian is some kind of tough guy who willingly gives and receives frequent verbal attacks. Hey, Bobbie (that doesn’t narrow it much – I think about 16 of these guys are named Bobby), how about you invest some of that ball-busting time into writing some actual fucking jokes? Most of us snowflakes think a comedian is a funny guy, not a tough guy.

Maybe my scene is different, because we don’t all talk to each other like that. We generally talk to each other like normal human beings. If anyone entered the chat with arrogant posturing, spraying insults and trying to make us all cry, they’d get shut down pretty quickly. Actually, that has happened – enough to confirm my suspicion that the people who think and act like that are generally shitty comedians and lack the situational awareness to know it. I sure don’t see those types sticking around and building any kind of respect of fan base.

So back to my car conversation. He tells me he sure as hell was a class clown and believes every comedian was. That’s mostly what I get from him. He’s not particularly a “ball-buster” but conversations with him are punctuated with “zingers” and smartass jabs. I don’t know if that’s why, but nobody seems to feel they actually know him. He’s a cypher to me. All I really know about him is that he likes true crime podcasts.

That way people imagine comedians interacting – non-stop roasts and jabs – isn’t really the defining characteristics of green-room conversations in my life. That shit seems artificially performative, and I don’t ever feel like I have the emotional energy to engage with it. But that’s not to say we’re all nice guys. I’ve been attacked by a few peers, most of whom seem to justify the nasty because they took offense at an opinion I stated on this site or somewhere similar.

If you’d read by book or any of my blog entries, you’ll know that I’m not afraid of stating a preference or opinion here. I feel obligated to be transparent. I could do a post about puns or crowdwork without letting you know what I feel about them, but I don’t think it would be honest.

I don’t think my disdain for puns is particularly egregious. I don’t like them. I don’t think that’s a controversial hot take. I hope you’ve got more to say than “some words sound like other words,” and I really hope that’s not the punchline of all of your jokes.

But to some people, those are fighting words. An opinion like that apparently grants a license to every pun-slinging comic in NQ to be super mean to me. Whatever. I’m not precious. I’ve never cried myself to sleep over it, but I do find two aspects peculiar.

The first is their subsequent claim that I should “take it” without protest because being a comedian means having thick skin and no sensitivity, that being a comedian means never being offended and never respecting anyone who is offended.

The second is the unspoken but obvious feature, which is that they’re the ones being hyper-sensitive and getting offended. OK.

So here’s an opinion that many of them will definitely find egregious: Most of these “you should take it, snowflake” comedians are extremely thin-skinned, hyper-sensitive and easily offended. Also, in my experience, not-very-good comedians.

I wonder what both of those aspects say about what comedians are like. Are we all extroverts? Class clowns? I don’t think so. Are we all insensitive thick-skinned violators of other people’s feelings? I really don’t think so. In my experience, most comics seem to be more sensitive than others – which is where the high depression, addiction and suicide rates come in.

I think that thick skin is a myth we tell people about ourselves, and we do it to feel better about being in the violation business. Remember Benign Violation Theory? It’s what we do. We violate, and then we demonstrate that the violation is benign. We trample over sacred cows. We regularly ask ourselves whether our free speech is more important than other people’s feelings. We view it as a zero-sum game. It’s not, of course, but being reductive about nuanced issues is a legitimate comedy technique.

And of course, there’s the claim made by Joe Rogan and Bert Kreischer, that comedian is a form of physical mutation, that real comedians have special “comedy brains” that make them genetically funnier and superior to mere civilians. I doubt it because nobody’s shown me a genetically superior comedy brain, and neither Rogan nor Kreischer has shown me any comedy that would come from a superior comedy brain. I don’t think it’s a thing.

So what’s the deal with comedians? Are we clowns? Extroverts? Are we blessed with unusually thick skin? Are comedians just people who like to “bust people’s balls”? Are we all suicidal depressives with addiction issues? Do we have to be insensitive, crass pricks to be funny?

My guess is that most of us are just people. At least the ones I like to spend time with are. All the comics I like and respect seem closer to real people than ball-busting rhinoceroses.

In other news, I rewatched Blade Runner on the weekend. It’s maybe the 40th time I’ve seen it, and it always reminds me that life is an empathy test.

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The Self Made Stand Up is available as a paperback or e-book from Amazon, Barnes and Noble and lots of other places.

More than a how-to book, The Self-Made Stand-Up is an essential resource for developing yourself as an effective comedian. If you’re a comedian, or looking to become one, The Self-Made Stand-Up is the emotional support animal you need.

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