{"id":38357,"date":"2024-12-17T13:30:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-17T13:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=38357"},"modified":"2024-12-18T17:20:54","modified_gmt":"2024-12-18T17:20:54","slug":"how-liberals-lost-comedy-%e2%88%92-and-helped-trump-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/how-liberals-lost-comedy-%e2%88%92-and-helped-trump-win\/","title":{"rendered":"How liberals lost comedy \u2212 and helped Trump win"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nick Marx<\/a>, Colorado State University<\/a><\/em> and Matt Sienkiewicz<\/a>, Boston College<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Throughout the 2024 election cycle, reproductive rights were an electoral vulnerability for Donald Trump. Though popular with the Republican base, his appointment of antiabortion judges gave serious pause to many key voting blocs, including undecided young men<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In pursuit of these voters, Trump\u2019s strategy wasn\u2019t demagoguery but comedy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s October appearance<\/a> on comedian Andrew Schulz\u2019s podcast, \u201cFlagrant,\u201d demonstrated his approach to the touchy issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Schulz playfully invoked Trump\u2019s youngest son, who\u2019s a student at New York University \u2013 \u201cBarron is 18. He\u2019s unleashed in New York City. Are you sure you want to reverse Roe vs. Wade now?\u201d After a beat, Trump laughed, Schulz laughed, and then, presumably, thousands of young male listeners joined in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump continued with boilerplate answers about states rights, but this substance \u2013 as is so often the case \u2013 was divorced from the strategy. Schulz had helped Trump turn an unpopular position into a frat boy punchline, something to be discarded along with last night\u2019s empties. Trump won that media cycle and, ultimately, a majority of the votes of young men on his way to a second White House win<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vice President Kamala Harris, by contrast, appeared on mainstream comedy shows with aging, liberal audiences<\/a> like \u201cThe Late Show with Stephen Colbert.\u201d Pundits criticized her failure to engage young voters in online comedy platforms<\/a>. They also urged liberals to develop a new crop of political comedians<\/a> to match the influence of Schulz and podcaster Joe Rogan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, these criticisms of Harris\u2019 strategy miss the failure of liberal comedians to evolve with media and political trends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Jimmy Kimmel cries<\/a> and Jon Stewart rants<\/a>, the right wing in the U.S. has successfully depicted itself as the new home for free speech and cutting edge comedy. We explored this development in our book, \u201cThat\u2019s Not Funny: How the Right Makes Comedy Work for Them<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The right has become a home for comedians not by making political arguments through jokes, but by positing that there are funnier things to do than to argue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A formula goes stale<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Liberal comedy and political satire have stuck to the same formula of Stewart\u2019s \u201cThe Daily Show\u201d for much of the 21st century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It goes something like this: A sarcastic, eloquent host uses meticulously researched data to describe a pressing social issue, and then delivers a punchline directed at right-wing hypocrisy. The resultant pairing of righteous laughter and anger has been repeated by \u201cThe Colbert Report,\u201d \u201cFull Frontal with Samantha Bee\u201d and \u201cPatriot Act with Hasan Minhaj,\u201d among other comedy programs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These satirical shows filled the void left by an increasingly profit-driven news media. However, they have come to prioritize political preaching at the expense of laughs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps Stewart\u2019s most successful successor<\/a> \u2013 and the best example of liberal satire\u2019s patronizing tone \u2013 is HBO\u2019s \u201cLast Week Tonight with John Oliver.\u201d Because the show appears on prestige cable, Oliver has a bigger budget to tackle controversial topics in depth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Indeed, journalists<\/a> and academics<\/a> alike have celebrated the \u201cJohn Oliver effect,\u201d in which viewers mobilize behind a cause shortly after the host devotes an episode to it, whether it\u2019s vaccines or internet regulation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oliver\u2019s long-form lectures can be compelling. However, his appeal is not to young undecided voters who can\u2019t afford HBO, but to college-educated liberals predisposed to support progressive reforms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Twice in a recent election postmortem episode<\/a>, he reminded viewers of topics his show has covered in depth, like a professor chiding students for not remembering recent lessons. In one segment about Trump\u2019s disingenuous economic message, Oliver pleaded that his show had already \u201cexplained inflation for 24 human minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Oliver\u2019s exasperation can be amusing, he\u2019s clearly more upset at \u2013 even disdainful of \u2013 the American electorate, chastising them for failing the final exam of election night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For liberals to reconnect with young voters \u2013 especially young men \u2013 we think they have to reinvent political comedy. Doing so will mean moving beyond the haranguing that has long been its primary delivery style. This will be a challenge, however, as the right fortifies the relationship between its own comedians and political power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Two
Comedians like John Oliver and Jon Stewart tend to appeal to college-educated liberals predisposed to support progressive reforms. Brad Barket\/Getty Images for Comedy Central<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Rise of the right-wing comedy complex<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s success with comedy is a result of the new relationship between digital media and the business of joking. For decades, liberals were thought to hold a monopoly on comedy<\/a>. Moreover, there was little money to be made in comedy acts devoted to right-wing politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since 2016, however, a new crop of right-wing comedians has taken to digital platforms and algorithmically driven audience targeting in order to change this reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Libertarian podcasters like Rogan<\/a> have long danced around the political spectrum, finding diverse positions that intrigue his primary target of young male listeners. He routinely platforms right-leaning cultural and comedic voices, features them as guests, and promotes their shows and products. In doing so, he has helped create a de facto right-wing comedy network.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although each comedian or show in this network doesn\u2019t have the audience and impact of, say, \u201cThe Daily Show\u201d in its prime, their aggregate strength is precisely targeted at coveted young consumers and potential voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is no coincidence that the most heralded stops on Trump\u2019s October podcast tour were shows hosted by three regulars on \u201cThe Joe Rogan Experience\u201d: Schulz, comedian Theo Von<\/a> and libertarian scientist Lex Fridman<\/a>. Trump also appeared on Rogan\u2019s show for a three-hour episode<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Changing styles and platforms<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Importantly, the type of political comedy featured on these programs is distinct from that of liberal satire of the past two decades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Daily Show,\u201d \u201cLast Week\u201d and their ilk dazzle viewers in 30-minute episodes using intricate arguments and sardonic punchlines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rogan and his affiliates hang out for hours, and audiences can listen as they go about their daily routines. In the process, podcast hosts shape their audience\u2019s taste in culture, technology and recreation in what\u2019s known as parasocial bonding<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump\u2019s appearance on Von\u2019s podcast \u201cThis Past Weekend,\u201d for example, featured little in the way of biting jokes and rollicking laughter. Instead, Von and Trump held a meandering conversation full of funny, personal anecdotes about drug use<\/a> interspersed with gestures to political topics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Comedy styles are cyclical. In the 1950s, stand-up comedian Mort Sahl would read a newspaper on stage<\/a>, peppering in sarcastic observations about the day\u2019s headlines. The Smothers Brothers played with yo-yos before they introduced protest songs. The apolitical observational humor of Jerry Seinfeld<\/a> reigned supreme in the 1980s and \u201990s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 2000s liberal satire of Stewart and Oliver was driven by cable television industry mandates to court young men<\/a>. The tastes and media habits of this audience have moved on, but liberal comedy has failed to follow them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nick Marx<\/a>, Associate Professor of Film and Media Studies, Colorado State University<\/a><\/em> and Matt Sienkiewicz<\/a>, Associate Professor of Communication and International Studies, Boston College<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nick Marx, Colorado State University and Matt Sienkiewicz, Boston College Throughout the 2024 election cycle, reproductive rights were an electoral vulnerability for Donald Trump. Though popular with the Republican base, his appointment of antiabortion judges gave serious pause to many key voting blocs, including undecided young men. In pursuit of these voters, Trump\u2019s strategy wasn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56,"featured_media":38358,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[279,7,46,10,296,4,38,41],"tags":[13922,479,7010,15856,15854,885,891,886,860,1418,15855],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38357"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/56"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38359,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38357\/revisions\/38359"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}