November 1, 2018 • 24 mins
In the second part of this two-part series, special guest Wayne Federman explores the strange, curse-word-riddled stand-up bit that resulted in George Carlin setting a legal precedent with the Supreme Court. Listen in to learn how curse words changed the world and sparked a debate that continues today.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Before we get started, folks, it's important to know that
this episode contained some strong and explicit language that may
not be suitable for all the listeners. So if you've
got your kiddos in the crowd, this might not be
the episode for them. We thought about censoring it, but
we decided we couldn't, not in good faith because this
(00:20):
episode is fundamentally about free speech and language. We hope
you enjoy. Yeah, welcome back to the show Ridiculous Historians.
(00:52):
Thank you for tuning in. If you check the headlines
or the title of your podcast before you listen to them,
you will know that this episode two of a two
part series. If you have not heard episode one, please
don't delay, click pause, go listen to episode one. You'll
want to catch up. Hi, I'm Ben. Hey, it's me
(01:13):
No and all my microphonic glory. You sound wonderful. Its
tones dulcet tones. Yeah, so we had, as we said,
a little bit of a technical difficulty in the first episode. Yeah,
hopefully you can hear me bleeding into another mic, but
it's just not as high fidelity as this is. Listen
to me leaning into the mic. Well. So we are,
(01:34):
of course always accompanied by a super producer to help
us save the show today. That is our guest super producer,
Paul Decant. However, we still hold a very special place
in our hearts for our super producer Casey Peck and
a glint in our eye and uh swinging our steps.
(01:56):
And we are also joined today by our incredible guest
Wayne Fetterman, who had some incredible things to say about
the history of stand up the storied careers of Lenny
Bruce and today specifically George Carlin. And without further ado,
let's get the show on the road. This is this
is incredible. I am still like, it's amazing. This all
(02:18):
happened when I was a kid, so it's just it
was just great. George Carlin again, who was you know,
a beneficiary of Lenny Bruce's expanding expansion of language, and
there was a number of comedians like it allowed Red
Fox and Richard Pryor to speak in their street vernacular
without getting arrested. You know. It was just like, I
(02:40):
don't know, this is the way I talked on the
corner when I'm making people laugh. I think I can
bring this on stage. But Carlin was like, I don't
know what indecent or uh means exactly. So I'm going
to come up with a list of words you can
never say on television, and those words I'm going the
same right now. Please, this is in order. It's ship, piss, fuck, hunt, cocksucker, motherfucker,
(03:06):
and tits. So that is that was the original bit
of his. And he later was like, it's weird that
I put motherfucker in there because I already said funk earlier,
which is a version of it. But he just liked
the rhythm of it. And I just need to say
this because it's very important to the whole story. George
Carlin didn't want to be a comedian. George Carlin wanted
(03:27):
to be a famous actor, movie star, and his idol
was a guy named Danny Kay and Danny Kay was
known for these very twisty songs and speeches where he
would have high level of verbal acuity. Yeah, yeah, just
inject real quick. I'm so glad you mentioned Danny Kay, Wayne,
because he's he is one of the actors I loved
(03:51):
growing up, especially in the original version of Walter Middie.
So it's totally familiar with that turn in Freeze. So
that that was Carl's sort of north star for a while.
It was his north star until he realized that he
hated acting for kind of the reasons that we spoke
about earlier. That he was just he didn't like authority,
(04:13):
you know, so like, if there's a director on the
SAT tell him to stand here and say this, he's
not gonna like that. He didn't realize it at the time.
He was like, Oh, I'd rather just write and say
my own stuff, you know, and be completely free of
Even when he hosted Saturday Night Live, he said to
Laura Michaels, I don't want to be in these sketches.
I don't want to rehearse these things. Can I just
do my comedy and you know, and bring my brain
(04:35):
and my mouth and that'll be good. That'll be good.
And he's the first host of the first Saturday Night
Live in you know what I believe. So anyway, so
that's that ended his Danny cadream. But this bit, the
ship piss fuckunt, cocksucker, motherfucker and tits has a certain
(04:56):
Gilbert and Sullivan rhythm to it that he loved, and
that was part of the bit. That's what made that
as well as these words. So anyway, he did this
bit on an album called Class Clown, came out in
nineteen seventy two. The next year he does another album
called Occupation Fool, and he expands on it and he
calls it the Filthy Words. This is what happens. There's
(05:18):
a public radio station or excuse me, not public radio
at PACIFICA and what is that? How would you describe
Pacific that network? College? Yeah, yeah, they're certainly not like
a top forty, right, They're kind of alternative for their day,
you know, right, progre I would say, progressive radio station
in New York. Again in New York, you know, the
(05:39):
vanguard of progressive ism w b AI. And they're doing
a whole thing about just language and the hypocrisy of
language and where is this thing? And so they play
Filthy Words, which is kind of an expanse. He talks
about ship a lot, ship face, the thing, what is
a you know, shit kicker and all of that. Some
guy named I John Douglas. I just I don't remember that,
(06:02):
but I wrote it down. He hears it in his
car with his fifteen year old son. Again, we're gonna
go back to youth, remember that statute youth and others,
And he calls the fc This is in the middle
of day afternoon. They play it and w b A
I says, look, this might be offensive, but I just
he's just talking about words. He's just using words to
(06:23):
talk about words and our language. So he caused the
f c C lodges a complaint. The f c C says,
you're gonna get a mark on your record. I think
some people said it was a hundred dollar fine. Other
people said no, I'm not sure. And basically w b
AI Pacific A Radio says I'm gonna sue the f
(06:43):
c C and and say this is unconstitutional because of
the First Amendment. Before playing this, George Carlin bit on
the air at two o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon in
nineteen any questions, I think we're with you so far,
but this sounds like sounds like it's about to get
quickly out of control. Right. Guess what the US Court
of Appeals in Washington, d C. You may be familiar
(07:05):
with that court. Brett Kavanaugh was just on that court.
Marrick Garland is on that court. That's considered that the
highest up to the right below the Supreme Court, the
penultimate court. Right. They agree with Pacifica They were like, Yeah,
this is this is too broader definition of what's in
indecent or obscene, and we're going to strike down this
(07:28):
fine or this mark on your record. So guess what.
They bring it to the Supreme Court, And in the
five to four decision, this is George Carlin, a ninth
grade dropout, having his words read in the Supreme Court
about whether they think these words are indecent or obscene
or what the difference between indecent or obscene is. And uh,
(07:51):
guess what. The Court, in a very narrow fighter four decisions,
says that during the daytime hours, the fcc US have
the right to say you can't play anything that would
be considered obscene or indecent, but after ten o'clock you can't. Yeah.
I think that the term is a safe harbor. I
believe is the term they that is right. I love
(08:12):
the research you guys are doing, So that's kind of
what happened. I just Carlin to the day he died.
He said he always had a perverse pride in the
fact that somewhere in Supreme Court like case law as
a precedent that his stupid routine he did on an
album called you Know class. Excuse me, occupation full is
(08:35):
uh is part of the history, the legal history of
the United States. Well, let's hear a quick moment of
Carlin himself talking about how he feels about words and
some of this love it. There is absolutely nothing wrong
with any of those words in and of themselves. They're
only words. It's the context, ac counts, It's the user.
(09:00):
It's the intention behind the words that makes them good
are bad. The words are completely neutral, The words are innocent.
I get tired of people talking about bad words and
bad language. Bullshit. It's the context that makes them going
our bad, the context that nice them good to bad.
We do also want to mention we would be remiss
if we skipped this part. Not only not only is
(09:23):
Carlin's are excerpts of Carlin's performance and his writing part
of Supreme Court case law. But he was quoted alongside
Shakespeare and passages from the Bible. They think of the
Bible and the Bible they mentioned the line. They were like, oh,
is is this uh motherfucker stuff so bad? Because the
Bible says he who pisteth against the wall, So where's
(09:46):
the line? And then they also mentioned Shakespeare saying pissing conduits.
So this became an argument, um, and started as this
again sort of hypocritical argument about decency and the hearts
and mind minds of the innocent and unspoiled, but it
quickly became a much more I think, a much more
intelligent argument about the role of language and literature. And
(10:11):
you know what, good on Carlin. Yeah, he earned it,
no doubt. And I'm still deciding whether or not we
can even release this episode fully uncensored. There is a
family show technically way just f y I but I
think this is valuable to the point of, like, you
can't censor it, uh, and it it almost does. It
would be hypocritical of us. It would be hilariously hypocritical. Um,
(10:33):
this is like we're caught in a loop here. We
are get a lot of talk about these words. Now
we're gonna be censored. Um. No, it's true because Carlin
couldn't say these words when he did The Tonight Shoe
or talk about it that way. But when he did
Chris Rocks hbo Joe, he was able to say the words.
(10:57):
So it is interesting. I mean, it's still you wouldn't
want to say these words in front of a kid.
I guess right. It depends on the kid. Yeah, some
kids have really tough, tough constitutions. My nine year old,
who's actually here right now, has been like giving us
the devil horns this whole time. Dan. Yeah, yeah, but man,
I don't even know where do we go from here?
So yeah, what's next? Well, the Supreme Court case was
(11:19):
in nineteen seventy eight, but really what happened in nineteen
seventy five changed everything, And that's when HBO started doing
these our specials. They were called eventually called on location
and the first one was done by Robert Klein at
a school in the Northeast, and he's a very clean comedian,
but even in that specially goes, all right, I have
total freedom to say anything. Uh shit, you know, he
(11:42):
just said, just to say the words and uh. But
then the next in nineteen seventy seven, Carlin does and
if you can find this this would be amazing, his
first of fourteen HBO specials. And before the special begins,
they have a newscaster talking about that this there's gonna
be some language on here that you're not used to
(12:03):
hearing on television. And then this it gets even crazier.
In the middle of an HBO special, they stopped the
special and run a disclaimer over the screen saying, the
next portion of this comedy act will contain language that
might be unsuitable for children, please, and then cuts back
to Carlin at usc just to bring it all full
(12:25):
circle at Bovard Auditorium and uh and then talks about
you know, these this language and these words, and he
sort of became famous for this in a way where
the language and the the arrest of Lenny Bruce sort
of destroyed Lenny Bruce. In a way, it did make
him famous, but he became so consumed with it, and
(12:46):
if you really listen to his act at the end,
a lot of times he would just read court transcripts.
Was his act. He was obsessed. Huh, yes, yes, very
much so. And you know, I don't know how much
of the drugs will make a paranoid or whatever, but
it's like, it's very it's it's really sad to listen
to him just go on and on about it. And
(13:07):
in a way it elevated Carlin's career. So in a
short period of time from let's say sixty five till
I guess seventy five, like in those ten years have
started to change. And then once we got those HBO specials,
suddenly there's Red Fox to win an HBO special where
you know, he's like, I don't want to repeat the language,
but it's you know, it is graphic adult entertainment. So
(13:31):
and that continues to this day. Although I will say this,
I do feel like there's a different kind of censorship
going on now in in comedy a little bit, and
Carlin talked about it at the end that he wouldn't
play colleges, and I know Seinfeld won't, and I know
Chris Rock because people are so sensitive about hearing something
that might be offensive, like offensive is the new anddecent
(13:55):
in our society. Again, no one's gonna get arrested, which
you might get shamed or lose a job because of it.
So what would be an example of that? What do
you mean like like like like or like somebody being
you know, I mean, I can think of one off
the top, And this is a really extreme example. That
guy Milo Unapolis, who is a alt right kind of
looting tune. Like you can you can disagree with what
(14:16):
he has to say, but technically, you know, you would
like to have him have the right to say it.
But he's also not doing comedy. No, he's not doing comedy,
but he's comedy. But he was he was banned from
all these college campuses. And this is not me saying
good on Milo. I'm just saying we're talking about the
First Amendment, and there are lines between like, you know,
being indecent and and uh, you know, being a supporter
(14:41):
of violence. So the whole deal with like indecency is
like or freedom of speeches, like you can say what
you want as long as you're not actively hurting something.
Freedom of speech is also not freedom from consequences. That's
also true. But I'm just wondering, like this whole PC
police thing. I think that's why I brought up this
extreme example, because he is an extreme example of not
being PC. And I don't think this exclusively a discussion
about comedy. This is about speech, so yes it is,
(15:05):
and I look, I agree. Look, I'm listening very carefully
to what you're saying, and I agree with you, and
I don't. I'm not that from me with my low
stuff other than being in his fan club, but I
know I'll no I but I I do think it's
interesting that Carlin and Seinfeld and Chris Rock won't play
colleges because of how offensive much some people might find
(15:29):
what they're saying, which is strange. It's not strange because
you can really get I don't want to use the
word bullied, but you can really get publicly shamed online
in a big way if you know, if people think
what you're saying is offensive. And again, I'm you know,
this doesn't affect me personally, but as a hiss somebody
(15:49):
who's like interested in the history of comedy, I feel
like the walls are narrowing, as opposed to for so
long in my life they just kept broadening. And it
used to be like if you made fund of Catholics
or something like that and they get upset, you're like, well,
f of them if they can't take a joke. But
that doesn't exist anymore for sudden people who feel like
you can't make kind of a marginalized community. That's a euphemism.
(16:13):
I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. So it's
like any any of that. So it's I know, this
is off the track a little bit. I don't even
know if you want to not at all, not at all,
but I do think it's it is interesting that we've
become we've sort of shrunk back to a much more
like be careful, walking on eggshells comedy around certain subjects
(16:35):
that didn't exist when I was a kid. And I
know Carlin said something phenomenal about it. He said that
political correctness is and I'm paraphrasing here, insipid because it
comes under the guys of tolerance. It's like, that's you're
under the guys of hey, we're just trying to make
it all better for everyone. But basically what you're doing,
(16:55):
you're saying. You can't say that. He hated that. It's
the opposite of comedy, right, it's the opposite of what
stand up comedy, the opposite of free speech. Yeah, more importantly, Yeah,
but but he knew. You know, it was interesting that
he had that that side. He saw it coming and
he really railed against it in a big way. Do
(17:16):
you see this trend? You know, we've we've walked through
some of the history, so let's let's walk towards the future.
Do you see this trend escalating or do you think
it's just another cyclical thing that will fall away. I
guess what I'm asking is, do we have some more
Supreme Court cases in the future. If we had to
guess that would I don't think so, because I don't
(17:36):
think it's about the guy. I don't think any government
is is going in And I don't to tell you
the truth, I don't know. It all depends on hate speech,
is basically. What it comes down to is whether you
think hate speech is something that should exist or that
it's completely protected by the First Amendment. So and you know,
(17:57):
I know you're not allowed to incite somebody. These words
are so you know, a morphous I know you're not
allowed to do that. So so I don't think this
is This is more about you know, vigilante vigilanteism in
speech control, you know, in the same way Catholics used
to do it in the you know, in the forties.
(18:24):
It's such a slippery slope too, because what about like
things like dog whistle politics, where you have these uh,
potentially racist speakers that aren't outright saying kill kill this
group of people or hurt this group of people, but
they're using these kind of coded words that speak to
their base or what have you, and then that's interpreted.
But you know, from a legal standpoint, you can't say, oh,
(18:46):
he said to do this because it's all in the subtexteah,
and it's it's you know, it's that's the whole thought
police thing where it's like, once you start banning words
like Carlin's words, you potentially could ban any words. So
it's a dangerous territory. But it's also like where does
that leave us? I strongly feel like we should not
bleep this episode. Yeah, we just gonna have to put
(19:07):
a really strongly worded sorry. I didn't know why did
you make me say those? Because we thought it'd be
funny if you bleep them, and then in staid like
do your homework. But now we were pretty much from
the start not gonna And also, you nailed the cadence,
so you gotta have the cadence. You can't just read
the seven words in some sort of like you have
to Danny kay it up a little bit. That's true. Well,
(19:29):
this this has been illuminating, and I like that we're
ending on a question where And the thing about this
story is that it's not over now. This conversation, this conflict,
this controversy continues of far past the fifties and the
late forties into the future into the new millennium. But
(19:50):
that's kind of what I was saying at the top
of the show, where it's like, you know, comedy and
and this kind of thing that you that you know
has this the guys of like, oh, this is entertained, man,
this is light. Stuff is just to kind of pass
the time. Yet we're talking about it in terms of
like race riots and the use of language to like
physically hurt people and incite, you know, these kind of
(20:10):
crazy events that can happen and that we're seeing happen
in the news. And we're talking about the freedom of
thought in a very real way. And the interesting thing
is this is the first Amendment to the Constitution, like
thinking they would have no idea back then, But how
powerful an idea that the government shall make no laws
infringing on freedom of speech? Like that is insane that
(20:34):
that's still I just I love those guys, crazy white
slave owners. Okay, can I do a little button for
the whole episode please? You might find interesting or it's not,
who knows. But when I was on Curb Your Enthusiasm,
I played a character named Dean Weinstock, and the name
(20:56):
Weinstock was named after a comedian name Lotus Winstock who
has since passed away. But Lotus wine Stock, and you
can look her up, was Lenny Bruce's last girlfriend. Full
Circle fal Sir, I knew Lotus too, I knew her,
I knew I did chose with her. Holy smokes, I know,
(21:17):
I know, you know what this is a This is
a rare moment, I think for my co host and
I because we stopped for a second and just stared
at each other. Because that that is a perfect ending.
We've got to say that, I think ridiculous historians listening now,
if you enjoyed this episode a fraction as much as
(21:37):
we enjoyed this interview, then by god, we've we've done
something right. Yeah, seriously, I think if you want more
of this, you should check out Wayne's new podcast, which
goes even deeper into the history of stand up. It's
really really good and it's out there. Now. What are
you guys about two episodes deep? It's it's it's like
a mini series, right, it's six episodes and we're five
in so we're just about done just about the first season,
(21:59):
and then we might do deep dives in the second season.
But you know, we'll see that's awesome. We'd love to hear.
I'm also envious of a show that has a clock
on it. We just have to do this show forever
until we die. It's sort of a sisyphia and endeavor.
But thank you, by the way, this is gonna be
a two parter because this has been so much fun
and we already had like a nice even divide down
the middle between Lenny and UH and George UM, and
(22:22):
this has just been a delight. Man. Thank you so
much for coming on, and we really appreciate you diving
deep with us, Noel and Ben. I gotta say it
was a delight on this on this end as well.
And I'm just glad that the Danny Kay that we
gave Danny Kay is due. It's quite quite a comedian
and a big, big influence on George Garland. And maybe,
you know, maybe we can just throw a Danny Kay
(22:45):
clip somewhere in this episode so you can get the
word I mean, he's loaded, loaded with patter songs in there,
you know, I mean, yeah, everything you take taboo, take taboo,
take taboo, breathing his ticket typoo once up should meet me, David,
you did could be snaket tippoo snaket tippoo snaket tippoo.
(23:07):
With the sky so blinketty blue, it causes one to
say bless mankind, including my attackers. I'm incline. The feeling
is as a jolly wello. It's absolutely so. There you
have it, folks. Thank you so much for tuning in.
Thanks to our super producer Paul, Thanks for our super
producer Casey, and thanks to Alex Williams who composed our theme.
(23:29):
Thanks to our research folk who we love dearly Eve's
Jeff Cote and Christopher Hasiotis, and most importantly, thank you
Ben and thank you Wayne. It has been the best.
Thank you Noel, and thank you very much. Wayne. We
are not blowing smoke about the history of stand up
Go check out the show. I mean you will look
I I think I said it earlier. I'm officially going
(23:51):
to be insufferable at house parties are already pretty insufferable
at house party has been. That's what you know. That's
why only party in the yard you can say you
the next level. I'm gonna go inside. We'll see you
next time, folks. Chow
Before we get started, folks, it's important to know that
this episode contained some strong and explicit language that may
not be suitable for all the listeners. So if you've
got your kiddos in the crowd, this might not be
the episode for them. We thought about censoring it, but
we decided we couldn't, not in good faith because this
(00:20):
episode is fundamentally about free speech and language. We hope
you enjoy. Yeah, welcome back to the show Ridiculous Historians.
(00:52):
Thank you for tuning in. If you check the headlines
or the title of your podcast before you listen to them,
you will know that this episode two of a two
part series. If you have not heard episode one, please
don't delay, click pause, go listen to episode one. You'll
want to catch up. Hi, I'm Ben. Hey, it's me
(01:13):
No and all my microphonic glory. You sound wonderful. Its
tones dulcet tones. Yeah, so we had, as we said,
a little bit of a technical difficulty in the first episode. Yeah,
hopefully you can hear me bleeding into another mic, but
it's just not as high fidelity as this is. Listen
to me leaning into the mic. Well. So we are,
(01:34):
of course always accompanied by a super producer to help
us save the show today. That is our guest super producer,
Paul Decant. However, we still hold a very special place
in our hearts for our super producer Casey Peck and
a glint in our eye and uh swinging our steps.
(01:56):
And we are also joined today by our incredible guest
Wayne Fetterman, who had some incredible things to say about
the history of stand up the storied careers of Lenny
Bruce and today specifically George Carlin. And without further ado,
let's get the show on the road. This is this
is incredible. I am still like, it's amazing. This all
(02:18):
happened when I was a kid, so it's just it
was just great. George Carlin again, who was you know,
a beneficiary of Lenny Bruce's expanding expansion of language, and
there was a number of comedians like it allowed Red
Fox and Richard Pryor to speak in their street vernacular
without getting arrested. You know. It was just like, I
(02:40):
don't know, this is the way I talked on the
corner when I'm making people laugh. I think I can
bring this on stage. But Carlin was like, I don't
know what indecent or uh means exactly. So I'm going
to come up with a list of words you can
never say on television, and those words I'm going the
same right now. Please, this is in order. It's ship, piss, fuck, hunt, cocksucker, motherfucker,
(03:06):
and tits. So that is that was the original bit
of his. And he later was like, it's weird that
I put motherfucker in there because I already said funk earlier,
which is a version of it. But he just liked
the rhythm of it. And I just need to say
this because it's very important to the whole story. George
Carlin didn't want to be a comedian. George Carlin wanted
(03:27):
to be a famous actor, movie star, and his idol
was a guy named Danny Kay and Danny Kay was
known for these very twisty songs and speeches where he
would have high level of verbal acuity. Yeah, yeah, just
inject real quick. I'm so glad you mentioned Danny Kay, Wayne,
because he's he is one of the actors I loved
(03:51):
growing up, especially in the original version of Walter Middie.
So it's totally familiar with that turn in Freeze. So
that that was Carl's sort of north star for a while.
It was his north star until he realized that he
hated acting for kind of the reasons that we spoke
about earlier. That he was just he didn't like authority,
(04:13):
you know, so like, if there's a director on the
SAT tell him to stand here and say this, he's
not gonna like that. He didn't realize it at the time.
He was like, Oh, I'd rather just write and say
my own stuff, you know, and be completely free of
Even when he hosted Saturday Night Live, he said to
Laura Michaels, I don't want to be in these sketches.
I don't want to rehearse these things. Can I just
do my comedy and you know, and bring my brain
(04:35):
and my mouth and that'll be good. That'll be good.
And he's the first host of the first Saturday Night
Live in you know what I believe. So anyway, so
that's that ended his Danny cadream. But this bit, the
ship piss fuckunt, cocksucker, motherfucker and tits has a certain
(04:56):
Gilbert and Sullivan rhythm to it that he loved, and
that was part of the bit. That's what made that
as well as these words. So anyway, he did this
bit on an album called Class Clown, came out in
nineteen seventy two. The next year he does another album
called Occupation Fool, and he expands on it and he
calls it the Filthy Words. This is what happens. There's
(05:18):
a public radio station or excuse me, not public radio
at PACIFICA and what is that? How would you describe
Pacific that network? College? Yeah, yeah, they're certainly not like
a top forty, right, They're kind of alternative for their day,
you know, right, progre I would say, progressive radio station
in New York. Again in New York, you know, the
(05:39):
vanguard of progressive ism w b AI. And they're doing
a whole thing about just language and the hypocrisy of
language and where is this thing? And so they play
Filthy Words, which is kind of an expanse. He talks
about ship a lot, ship face, the thing, what is
a you know, shit kicker and all of that. Some
guy named I John Douglas. I just I don't remember that,
(06:02):
but I wrote it down. He hears it in his
car with his fifteen year old son. Again, we're gonna
go back to youth, remember that statute youth and others,
And he calls the fc This is in the middle
of day afternoon. They play it and w b A
I says, look, this might be offensive, but I just
he's just talking about words. He's just using words to
(06:23):
talk about words and our language. So he caused the
f c C lodges a complaint. The f c C says,
you're gonna get a mark on your record. I think
some people said it was a hundred dollar fine. Other
people said no, I'm not sure. And basically w b
AI Pacific A Radio says I'm gonna sue the f
(06:43):
c C and and say this is unconstitutional because of
the First Amendment. Before playing this, George Carlin bit on
the air at two o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon in
nineteen any questions, I think we're with you so far,
but this sounds like sounds like it's about to get
quickly out of control. Right. Guess what the US Court
of Appeals in Washington, d C. You may be familiar
(07:05):
with that court. Brett Kavanaugh was just on that court.
Marrick Garland is on that court. That's considered that the
highest up to the right below the Supreme Court, the
penultimate court. Right. They agree with Pacifica They were like, Yeah,
this is this is too broader definition of what's in
indecent or obscene, and we're going to strike down this
(07:28):
fine or this mark on your record. So guess what.
They bring it to the Supreme Court, And in the
five to four decision, this is George Carlin, a ninth
grade dropout, having his words read in the Supreme Court
about whether they think these words are indecent or obscene
or what the difference between indecent or obscene is. And uh,
(07:51):
guess what. The Court, in a very narrow fighter four decisions,
says that during the daytime hours, the fcc US have
the right to say you can't play anything that would
be considered obscene or indecent, but after ten o'clock you can't. Yeah.
I think that the term is a safe harbor. I
believe is the term they that is right. I love
(08:12):
the research you guys are doing, So that's kind of
what happened. I just Carlin to the day he died.
He said he always had a perverse pride in the
fact that somewhere in Supreme Court like case law as
a precedent that his stupid routine he did on an
album called you Know class. Excuse me, occupation full is
(08:35):
uh is part of the history, the legal history of
the United States. Well, let's hear a quick moment of
Carlin himself talking about how he feels about words and
some of this love it. There is absolutely nothing wrong
with any of those words in and of themselves. They're
only words. It's the context, ac counts, It's the user.
(09:00):
It's the intention behind the words that makes them good
are bad. The words are completely neutral, The words are innocent.
I get tired of people talking about bad words and
bad language. Bullshit. It's the context that makes them going
our bad, the context that nice them good to bad.
We do also want to mention we would be remiss
if we skipped this part. Not only not only is
(09:23):
Carlin's are excerpts of Carlin's performance and his writing part
of Supreme Court case law. But he was quoted alongside
Shakespeare and passages from the Bible. They think of the
Bible and the Bible they mentioned the line. They were like, oh,
is is this uh motherfucker stuff so bad? Because the
Bible says he who pisteth against the wall, So where's
(09:46):
the line? And then they also mentioned Shakespeare saying pissing conduits.
So this became an argument, um, and started as this
again sort of hypocritical argument about decency and the hearts
and mind minds of the innocent and unspoiled, but it
quickly became a much more I think, a much more
intelligent argument about the role of language and literature. And
(10:11):
you know what, good on Carlin. Yeah, he earned it,
no doubt. And I'm still deciding whether or not we
can even release this episode fully uncensored. There is a
family show technically way just f y I but I
think this is valuable to the point of, like, you
can't censor it, uh, and it it almost does. It
would be hypocritical of us. It would be hilariously hypocritical. Um,
(10:33):
this is like we're caught in a loop here. We
are get a lot of talk about these words. Now
we're gonna be censored. Um. No, it's true because Carlin
couldn't say these words when he did The Tonight Shoe
or talk about it that way. But when he did
Chris Rocks hbo Joe, he was able to say the words.
(10:57):
So it is interesting. I mean, it's still you wouldn't
want to say these words in front of a kid.
I guess right. It depends on the kid. Yeah, some
kids have really tough, tough constitutions. My nine year old,
who's actually here right now, has been like giving us
the devil horns this whole time. Dan. Yeah, yeah, but man,
I don't even know where do we go from here?
So yeah, what's next? Well, the Supreme Court case was
(11:19):
in nineteen seventy eight, but really what happened in nineteen
seventy five changed everything, And that's when HBO started doing
these our specials. They were called eventually called on location
and the first one was done by Robert Klein at
a school in the Northeast, and he's a very clean comedian,
but even in that specially goes, all right, I have
total freedom to say anything. Uh shit, you know, he
(11:42):
just said, just to say the words and uh. But
then the next in nineteen seventy seven, Carlin does and
if you can find this this would be amazing, his
first of fourteen HBO specials. And before the special begins,
they have a newscaster talking about that this there's gonna
be some language on here that you're not used to
(12:03):
hearing on television. And then this it gets even crazier.
In the middle of an HBO special, they stopped the
special and run a disclaimer over the screen saying, the
next portion of this comedy act will contain language that
might be unsuitable for children, please, and then cuts back
to Carlin at usc just to bring it all full
(12:25):
circle at Bovard Auditorium and uh and then talks about
you know, these this language and these words, and he
sort of became famous for this in a way where
the language and the the arrest of Lenny Bruce sort
of destroyed Lenny Bruce. In a way, it did make
him famous, but he became so consumed with it, and
(12:46):
if you really listen to his act at the end,
a lot of times he would just read court transcripts.
Was his act. He was obsessed. Huh, yes, yes, very
much so. And you know, I don't know how much
of the drugs will make a paranoid or whatever, but
it's like, it's very it's it's really sad to listen
to him just go on and on about it. And
(13:07):
in a way it elevated Carlin's career. So in a
short period of time from let's say sixty five till
I guess seventy five, like in those ten years have
started to change. And then once we got those HBO specials,
suddenly there's Red Fox to win an HBO special where
you know, he's like, I don't want to repeat the language,
but it's you know, it is graphic adult entertainment. So
(13:31):
and that continues to this day. Although I will say this,
I do feel like there's a different kind of censorship
going on now in in comedy a little bit, and
Carlin talked about it at the end that he wouldn't
play colleges, and I know Seinfeld won't, and I know
Chris Rock because people are so sensitive about hearing something
that might be offensive, like offensive is the new anddecent
(13:55):
in our society. Again, no one's gonna get arrested, which
you might get shamed or lose a job because of it.
So what would be an example of that? What do
you mean like like like like or like somebody being
you know, I mean, I can think of one off
the top, And this is a really extreme example. That
guy Milo Unapolis, who is a alt right kind of
looting tune. Like you can you can disagree with what
(14:16):
he has to say, but technically, you know, you would
like to have him have the right to say it.
But he's also not doing comedy. No, he's not doing comedy,
but he's comedy. But he was he was banned from
all these college campuses. And this is not me saying
good on Milo. I'm just saying we're talking about the
First Amendment, and there are lines between like, you know,
being indecent and and uh, you know, being a supporter
(14:41):
of violence. So the whole deal with like indecency is
like or freedom of speeches, like you can say what
you want as long as you're not actively hurting something.
Freedom of speech is also not freedom from consequences. That's
also true. But I'm just wondering, like this whole PC
police thing. I think that's why I brought up this
extreme example, because he is an extreme example of not
being PC. And I don't think this exclusively a discussion
about comedy. This is about speech, so yes it is,
(15:05):
and I look, I agree. Look, I'm listening very carefully
to what you're saying, and I agree with you, and
I don't. I'm not that from me with my low
stuff other than being in his fan club, but I
know I'll no I but I I do think it's
interesting that Carlin and Seinfeld and Chris Rock won't play
colleges because of how offensive much some people might find
(15:29):
what they're saying, which is strange. It's not strange because
you can really get I don't want to use the
word bullied, but you can really get publicly shamed online
in a big way if you know, if people think
what you're saying is offensive. And again, I'm you know,
this doesn't affect me personally, but as a hiss somebody
(15:49):
who's like interested in the history of comedy, I feel
like the walls are narrowing, as opposed to for so
long in my life they just kept broadening. And it
used to be like if you made fund of Catholics
or something like that and they get upset, you're like, well,
f of them if they can't take a joke. But
that doesn't exist anymore for sudden people who feel like
you can't make kind of a marginalized community. That's a euphemism.
(16:13):
I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. So it's
like any any of that. So it's I know, this
is off the track a little bit. I don't even
know if you want to not at all, not at all,
but I do think it's it is interesting that we've
become we've sort of shrunk back to a much more
like be careful, walking on eggshells comedy around certain subjects
(16:35):
that didn't exist when I was a kid. And I
know Carlin said something phenomenal about it. He said that
political correctness is and I'm paraphrasing here, insipid because it
comes under the guys of tolerance. It's like, that's you're
under the guys of hey, we're just trying to make
it all better for everyone. But basically what you're doing,
(16:55):
you're saying. You can't say that. He hated that. It's
the opposite of comedy, right, it's the opposite of what
stand up comedy, the opposite of free speech. Yeah, more importantly, Yeah,
but but he knew. You know, it was interesting that
he had that that side. He saw it coming and
he really railed against it in a big way. Do
(17:16):
you see this trend? You know, we've we've walked through
some of the history, so let's let's walk towards the future.
Do you see this trend escalating or do you think
it's just another cyclical thing that will fall away. I
guess what I'm asking is, do we have some more
Supreme Court cases in the future. If we had to
guess that would I don't think so, because I don't
(17:36):
think it's about the guy. I don't think any government
is is going in And I don't to tell you
the truth, I don't know. It all depends on hate speech,
is basically. What it comes down to is whether you
think hate speech is something that should exist or that
it's completely protected by the First Amendment. So and you know,
(17:57):
I know you're not allowed to incite somebody. These words
are so you know, a morphous I know you're not
allowed to do that. So so I don't think this
is This is more about you know, vigilante vigilanteism in
speech control, you know, in the same way Catholics used
to do it in the you know, in the forties.
(18:24):
It's such a slippery slope too, because what about like
things like dog whistle politics, where you have these uh,
potentially racist speakers that aren't outright saying kill kill this
group of people or hurt this group of people, but
they're using these kind of coded words that speak to
their base or what have you, and then that's interpreted.
But you know, from a legal standpoint, you can't say, oh,
(18:46):
he said to do this because it's all in the subtexteah,
and it's it's you know, it's that's the whole thought
police thing where it's like, once you start banning words
like Carlin's words, you potentially could ban any words. So
it's a dangerous territory. But it's also like where does
that leave us? I strongly feel like we should not
bleep this episode. Yeah, we just gonna have to put
(19:07):
a really strongly worded sorry. I didn't know why did
you make me say those? Because we thought it'd be
funny if you bleep them, and then in staid like
do your homework. But now we were pretty much from
the start not gonna And also, you nailed the cadence,
so you gotta have the cadence. You can't just read
the seven words in some sort of like you have
to Danny kay it up a little bit. That's true. Well,
(19:29):
this this has been illuminating, and I like that we're
ending on a question where And the thing about this
story is that it's not over now. This conversation, this conflict,
this controversy continues of far past the fifties and the
late forties into the future into the new millennium. But
(19:50):
that's kind of what I was saying at the top
of the show, where it's like, you know, comedy and
and this kind of thing that you that you know
has this the guys of like, oh, this is entertained, man,
this is light. Stuff is just to kind of pass
the time. Yet we're talking about it in terms of
like race riots and the use of language to like
physically hurt people and incite, you know, these kind of
(20:10):
crazy events that can happen and that we're seeing happen
in the news. And we're talking about the freedom of
thought in a very real way. And the interesting thing
is this is the first Amendment to the Constitution, like
thinking they would have no idea back then, But how
powerful an idea that the government shall make no laws
infringing on freedom of speech? Like that is insane that
(20:34):
that's still I just I love those guys, crazy white
slave owners. Okay, can I do a little button for
the whole episode please? You might find interesting or it's not,
who knows. But when I was on Curb Your Enthusiasm,
I played a character named Dean Weinstock, and the name
(20:56):
Weinstock was named after a comedian name Lotus Winstock who
has since passed away. But Lotus wine Stock, and you
can look her up, was Lenny Bruce's last girlfriend. Full
Circle fal Sir, I knew Lotus too, I knew her,
I knew I did chose with her. Holy smokes, I know,
(21:17):
I know, you know what this is a This is
a rare moment, I think for my co host and
I because we stopped for a second and just stared
at each other. Because that that is a perfect ending.
We've got to say that, I think ridiculous historians listening now,
if you enjoyed this episode a fraction as much as
(21:37):
we enjoyed this interview, then by god, we've we've done
something right. Yeah, seriously, I think if you want more
of this, you should check out Wayne's new podcast, which
goes even deeper into the history of stand up. It's
really really good and it's out there. Now. What are
you guys about two episodes deep? It's it's it's like
a mini series, right, it's six episodes and we're five
in so we're just about done just about the first season,
(21:59):
and then we might do deep dives in the second season.
But you know, we'll see that's awesome. We'd love to hear.
I'm also envious of a show that has a clock
on it. We just have to do this show forever
until we die. It's sort of a sisyphia and endeavor.
But thank you, by the way, this is gonna be
a two parter because this has been so much fun
and we already had like a nice even divide down
the middle between Lenny and UH and George UM, and
(22:22):
this has just been a delight. Man. Thank you so
much for coming on, and we really appreciate you diving
deep with us, Noel and Ben. I gotta say it
was a delight on this on this end as well.
And I'm just glad that the Danny Kay that we
gave Danny Kay is due. It's quite quite a comedian
and a big, big influence on George Garland. And maybe,
you know, maybe we can just throw a Danny Kay
(22:45):
clip somewhere in this episode so you can get the
word I mean, he's loaded, loaded with patter songs in there,
you know, I mean, yeah, everything you take taboo, take taboo,
take taboo, breathing his ticket typoo once up should meet me, David,
you did could be snaket tippoo snaket tippoo snaket tippoo.
(23:07):
With the sky so blinketty blue, it causes one to
say bless mankind, including my attackers. I'm incline. The feeling
is as a jolly wello. It's absolutely so. There you
have it, folks. Thank you so much for tuning in.
Thanks to our super producer Paul, Thanks for our super
producer Casey, and thanks to Alex Williams who composed our theme.
(23:29):
Thanks to our research folk who we love dearly Eve's
Jeff Cote and Christopher Hasiotis, and most importantly, thank you
Ben and thank you Wayne. It has been the best.
Thank you Noel, and thank you very much. Wayne. We
are not blowing smoke about the history of stand up
Go check out the show. I mean you will look
I I think I said it earlier. I'm officially going
(23:51):
to be insufferable at house parties are already pretty insufferable
at house party has been. That's what you know. That's
why only party in the yard you can say you
the next level. I'm gonna go inside. We'll see you
next time, folks. Chow
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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