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The Shocking Reason That Antisemitism Is Funny
Recently, at the 2024 Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland, an American comedian named Reginald D. Hunter told an antisemitic joke.
The joke stated that having an abusive wife who complains about being abused is “like being married to Israel.”
The joke is no doubt offensive to many Israelis and Jews. I find it offensive. Yet the joke is also funny.
I say it is funny based upon the fact that, according to reports, the audience laughed. If people laugh at a joke, it is, by definition, funny.
I don’t like the fact that the joke “worked,” to use the parlance of comedians, but I also can’t change the fact that it did.
So, why was the joke funny?
As a comedy writer myself (scripted comedy, not stand-up, but the principles are the same) I’ve given some thought to the question of what makes something funny. Having answers to the question does not make me a funnier writer, but I find it interesting nonetheless.
I will begin answering that question with an episode of the old The Dick Van Dyke Show. In the episode, Dick Van Dyke’s character, Rob Petrie, attends his young son’s elementary school class to talk about his job as a comedy writer.
After floundering, comedically of course, Rob teaches the young kids that we laugh when we are surprised. He demonstrates by re-entering the classroom and doing a pratfall. The kids laugh. See, he explains, you don’t expect someone to enter a room and fall down like that. You are surprised, so you laugh.
There are other types of comedic surprise. There is verbal surprise. Most people have heard the old Henny Youngman joke, “Take my wife. Please!”
This joke was funny because people expected “Take my wife…” to be followed by something like “for example.” Instead he said “please,” changing the expected meaning, surprising the audience and getting a big laugh. The reason why it is not funny today is because the surprise is long since gone.
There is also the surprise of recognition. We hear something that makes us react with an unconscious, “Oh, my God, that is so true,” and that surprised recognition makes us laugh. Much of Jerry Seinfeld’s so-called observational comedy falls into this category. Seinfeld jokes about the safety instructions on airplanes: “They show you how to use the seatbelt, in case you haven’t been in a car since 1965. ‘Oh, you lift up on the buckle! Oh! I was trying to break the metal apart. I thought that’s how it works.’”
And the audience laughs because they are surprised by the recognition: “Oh, my God, that is so true.”
So, when Reginald D. Hunter said that having an abusive wife who complains about being abused is “like being married to Israel,” why was that funny? It wasn’t a pratfall or a verbal surprise. I would posit that the audience had the reaction of surprised recognition. And therefore, they laughed.
For me, as a Jew, it is not the fact that a possibly antisemitic comedian told an antisemitic joke that I find so horribly disturbing. It is the fact that a room full of people thought “Oh, my God, that is so true.”
Michael Kaplan is a TV writer-producer, playwright, and children’s book author. For his TV work, he has been nominated for four Emmy Awards, winning one.
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Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor: Terror Is Legal, But Only PLO Can Decide on ‘The Armed Option’
The bodies of people, some of them elderly, lie on a street after they were killed during a mass-infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Sderot, southern Israel, Oct. 7, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad
The Palestinian Authority (PA) is trying to have its cake and eat it too.
On the one hand, the PA is still angry that Hamas launched its terror war against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, without consulting it first, and that Hamas has been able to take all the credit for successfully massacring over 1,100 Israelis. As a result, Hamas has overwhelming support among Palestinians in the West Bank.
Accordingly, despite the animosity, the PA needs Hamas on board with the PLO, due to the vast support among Palestinians for Hamas. Despite the destruction Hamas has brought on the Gaza Strip, the terror movement is still 2.5-3 times more popular than its rival Fatah, the ruling party in the PA/PLO.
To balance those competing interests, PA leader Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations, Mahmoud Al-Habbash, made the following statement, sending two messages that stand somewhat at odds with each other:
- The PA/PLO endorses terror as “legal” and does not oppose “the armed option”
- Hamas or other terror organizations are not allowed to single-handedly decide and launch terror attacks. Such decisions must be made “together” and only “in the framework of the PA/PLO” — in other words: Hamas must subordinate to the PA/PLO
Mahmoud Al-Habbash: “It is unacceptable to say that the resistance [i.e., terror] is legal or illegal — it is legal. No one can cancel this fact or evade this fact. But the resistance needs to be a comprehensive national project. Not a project of one movement that drags all the Palestinians after its decision
. No, if we want to choose the armed option, we must all go together in a national decision. The national decision needs to be made in the framework of the PLO, the sole legal representative of the Palestinian people. No faction that feels like carrying out armed resistance can take the Palestinian people together with it without taking into account the considerations, results, and consequences.” [emphasis added]
[Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Facebook page, Nov. 1, 2024]
Palestinian Media Watch has documented that the PA, and Al-Habbash specifically, have criticized Hamas for not consulting with the PLO before it attacked Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, launching the 2023 Gaza war
. However, they have never criticized Hamas for the massacre itself, but rather applauded and celebrated it.
The author is a senior analyst at Palestinian Media Watch, where a version of this article was originally published.
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Paramount+ Announces New Docuseries About World’s First Israeli-Palestinian Boy Band As1one
A promotional photo for the new Paramount+ docuseries “”AS1One: The Israeli-Palestinian Pop Music Journey.” Photo: Paramount+
Parmount+ announced on Wednesday that it will premiere a four-part docuseries in December focusing on the world’s first mixed Israeli-Palestinian pop music group, As1one.
“As1one: The Israeli-Palestinian Pop Music Journey” will premiere Dec. 3. The coming-of-age docuseries, which will detail how six young men joined forced to form the global hit pop group, was produced by The As1One Production Company in association with Best Production Company for MTV Entertainment Studios. It was co-produced by the band’s founders, American music entrepreneurs Ken Levitan and James Diener, who developed bands such as Kings of Leon and Maroon 5.
The group is comprised of four Jewish Israelis and two Palestinians — Ohad Attia and Neat Rozenblat from Tel Aviv; Sadik Dogosh, a Palestinian Bedouin Muslim from Rahat; Aseel Farah, a Palestinian Christian from Haifa; Niv Lin from the southern Israeli town of Sapir; and Nadav Philips from Holon.
The docuseries will follow the band members over a five-year period and show how they founded the band, navigate the music industry, face challenges among themselves, and even cope with the deadly Hamas-led terrorist attacks that took place in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
“The band members share their ups and downs including the challenging audition process in 2020; their language barriers, intense rehearsals, emotional highs and lows as they found their footing; navigating the very unexpected world events that happened on October 7th, 2023 — the morning after they flew to LA to record their first album; and the monumental challenges they have faced each day since,” Paramount+ said in a press release. “With so much more at stake because of the war, the band finds greater purpose in their music now representing something much greater than the six of them.”
The docuseries “spotlights the work of platinum-selling artists and producers, stylists, choreographers, and industry leaders, all collaborating to create a group that embodies unity, with members agreeing to disagree on the war in their homeland as they focus on making music together,” Paramound+ added.
The docuseries will also feature original music from the group, including their debut single “All Eyes On Us” featuring Nile Rodgers, as well as their upcoming single “Stranger,” which the band will debut on Friday.
Watch the trailer for “AS1One: The Israeli-Palestinian Pop Music Journey” below.
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University of Michigan Student Government Impeaches Anti-Zionist President
University of Michigan PhD student, center, carries a sign that says ‘Free Speech! Free Palestine!’ at U-M’s Diag in Ann Arbor on April 4, 2024. Photo: Junfu Huan via Reuters Connect
The University of Michigan’s Central Student Government (CSG) has impeached President Alifa Chowdury, the anti-Zionist leader of the extremist Shut It Down (SID) Party that has, since taking office during the summer, attempted to withhold funding for campus clubs to pressure administrators into boycotting Israel.
Chowdury’s behavior has worsened in recent weeks, according to articles of impeachment filed by Rep. Margaret Peterman and passed overwhelmingly by legislators via secret ballot. Among the charges enumerated in the documents are “incitement of violence, cyber theft, and dereliction of duty,” The Michigan Daily reported on Wednesday.
“In all this, President Chowdury gravely endangered the security of students and the functioning of the Central Student Government,” a motion outlining the case for removing Chowdury from office says. “They threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful consideration of legislation, and imperiled a coequal branch of government. They thereby betrayed their trust as president, to the manifest injury of the students of the University of Michigan.”
The Daily added that the cyber theft charge is based on Chowdury’s changing, allegedly, the login credentials for CSG’s Instagram account in retaliation for losing a vote on a bill which aimed to hold hostage hundreds of thousands of dollars earmarked for distribution to student clubs unless the administration agreed to condemn Israel, sever institutional partnerships with its universities, and divest its holdings of Israeli companies and companies which do business with Israel. Chowdury has also allegedly failed to perform key functions of the presidency, including submitting reports, preparing committee members for their roles, and convening meetings with CSG’s executive council.
CSG representatives have fought tooth and nail to resist the president’s agenda and have had help from student club leaders, who insisted that Chowdury and SID were subordinating their interests to partisan politics. The fate of her term is now in the hands of the body’s Central Student Judiciary, which will soon rule on the merits of Peterman’s case against her.
SID’s capturing of the CSG has led to a historically dysfunctional administration, prompting the involvement of school officials at key moments when its brinksmanship threatened to derail core functions of the university. In August, the administration resolved to fund student clubs over Chowdury and SID’s objections, effectively stripping the new government of the power of the purse. Explaining the intervention to The Algemeiner on Tuesday, university spokesperson Colleen Mastony said it was prompted by Chowdury’s “senior” colleagues in the CSG Assembly.
SID’s rise to power on the University of Michigan’s campus has coincided with a surge of alleged anti-Black racism in the pro-Hamas community. Recently, the Black Student Union (BSU) resigned from the SID-collaborator Tahrir Coalition, citing “pervasive” anti-Black discrimination fostered by its mostly Arab and Middle Eastern leadership.
“Black identities, voices, and bodies are not valued in this coalition, and thus we must remove ourselves,” BSU said in a statement posted on Instagram. “The anti-Blackness within the coalition has been too pervasive to overcome, and we refuse to endure it.”
The university moved earlier this month to discipline another SID-affiliated group, Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (SAFE) — which endorsed SID and helped promote its campaign — for repeated violations of school rules. It may suspend the group for up to four years.
“The complaint was initiated through the Office of Student Organization Advancement and Recognition (SOAR), which is under the Center for Campus Involvement,” SAFE said in a statement published on Instagram. “Similarly to the academic disciplinary charges initiated through [the Office of Student Conflict Resolution] against protesters from the November 17th sit-in, the university acts as the judge, jury, and executioner in these disciplinary proceedings.”
SAFE has long been a source of anti-Israel activity on campus. In January, its members led an anti-government protest against the outgoing presidential administration, represented by US Vice President Kamala Harris, who appeared at the school to discuss climate change. They chanted “Kamala, Kamala, you can’t hide, you’re committing genocide” and called for mass casualty events inspired by Islamist terrorism, screaming “There is only one solution: Intifada revolution” while waving Palestinian flags.
Opposed by the student body and the administration, SID, which has accused the university of owning “blood money,” vowed on Tuesday not to surrender its power.
“Over the past three weeks, we’ve heard critiques about our work within CSG,” the party said in a statement. “We wanted to take the opportunity to clarify that Shut It Down was never intended to uphold ‘business as usual.’ The assumption that our party would operate like precious CSG administrations is simply ironic. CSG members calling for our resignations are weaponizing a manufactured narrative to paint Shut It Down as divisive … We see through these tactics and we stand with our comrades who feel forgotten and betrayed by a university that would rather protect its investments in violence than listen to the calls for divestment.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
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