Okay now that you've watched that, and hopefully have been swayed by this amazing revolutionary woman, here is what I think about Margaret Cho and how her humor and use of satire is a vehicle for social change. (I wrote the below entry for a Satire class I took last May...and it was glorious!)
When I think about satire in a person, I always think of stand up comedians. I love stand up... it takes guts and balls. I’d do it, but I have neither of those things…(…sometimes…) Anyway, comics rely on their humor to entertain, and their tact to make the material relevant. As we said in class, if the material does not ring true to an appropriated audience, it is not funny—it is actually performance suicide. For a satire and/or a parody to be successfully humorous, it must speak a certain truth that responds to something. [Discourse responding to discourse] It must be outlandish, it must be blunt, and it must be appropriated within spaces and audiences. For a stand up comedian to have this on their shoulders as a profession is quite intimidating. But there is one comedian who comes to my mind that combines the razor bluntness of satire and the outrageous exaggerations of parody: Margaret Cho.
For those of you who have not yet had the privilege to feverishly laugh at her stand up, Margaret Cho is an Asian-American, bi-sexual, gay culture loving, George W. Bush hating, liberal feminist activist….who coincidentally happens to be funny for a living. There really is no way to describe her…she’s on YouTube. [Duh.] Look her up…best fifteen minutes you’ll ever spend.
Her ability to make a mockery of herself as a minority speaks to a specific truth about empowering herself. We’ve discussed how satire is a strong tool for empowerment in our culture, especially in the entertainment world. But what Margaret does is awesome because she not only speaks the truth about self empowerment, but she gives voices to communities that need empowerment: the Asian-American community looks up to her because she is not afraid to make blunt comments on the responses to Asian stereotypes…the gay community worships her because she always cracks these vulgar jokes about gay people while still singing the praises of gay culture…(irony much?) She exaggerates many elements of these sub-cultures, sometimes out of proportion, but always knows her audience. Margaret makes a parody out of her own life on stage, with a voice that is drenched in satire. I see her more than a stand up comic, I see her as a performance activist, which is incredibly refreshing to have in mainstream entertainment. She is a loud, provocative, and satirical voice of counter culture in America.
Yes…I know this is only my opinion. Disagree with me please…I LOVE confrontation. But part of my passion is to speak to audiences about cultural issues while making them laugh. I feel like it is my art to speak out to certain issues. The function of art is to comment on culture (Margaret Cho said that and I whole heartedly agree!) That is why I am enrolled in this class, that is why I say the things that I say, and that is also why I am so honest with myself. I will yield my ramblings and conclude with this statement: I still do not understand satire, irony, or parody to the extent of which many people may. But I do understand that it is crucial to be critical of the hypocritical behaviors and actions that exist in our carbon copy society.
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