Saturday Night Live
Sky Comedy |

Last weekend, on Saturday Night Live, Dave Chappelle delivered what I consider possibly the most crowd-pleasing dollop of antisemitism in recent times. I say this as as a stand-up comedian of 20 years who has met and somewhat reveres Chappelle, but also as someone who spends a significant amount of time confronting antisemitism and as a Jew.

Discussion of any kind of meaning in comedy requires an understanding of context, but what’s so clever and somewhat unique here, is the way the comedy serves to build its surroundings out of itself.

Before getting bogged down in a few nitpicking examples, it might help then by stating the entire 15 minute monologue is a brilliant, nuanced, insidious construction, entirely set up to sell and reinforce the notion that Jews control the world.

Not one line is 100 per cent a gotcha, most have a disclaimer — the best disclaimer in the world, laughter — but taken together, expertly built on top of and woven together, the image reveals itself like in a stereogram.

Chappelle opens by solemnly reading a statement, “I denounce antisemitism in all its forms and I stand with my friends in the Jewish community… And that, Kanye, is how you buy yourself some time.”

It’s a pull back and reveal, it punctures sincerity, it’s funny. It gives Chappelle permission to talk about Jews like he’s our friend, even though it’s really just the set-up for a joke.

But it also lays out an understanding: if you cross the Jews, you better be ready to make penance. And why? Because otherwise Jews will use their power to destroy you. If Jews weren’t powerful, even vindictive, why would you have to read a statement?

“Early in my career I learnt that there are two words in the English language that you should never say together in sequence ‘The’ and ‘Jews’. Never heard someone do good after they learned not to do that.”

Shock value, “truth telling”, even punctuation work towards the laugh. Chappelle of course is doing precisely what he’d supposedly learned all those years ago, making him brave. This time rather than puncture the set-up, he instead reinforces it. Compare the eloquence of the first sentence, with the diction in the second. A servant giving a warning to the other servants.

This is all just minute one. And not even close to the most egregious brushstrokes. I appreciate this kind of textual deconstruction might seem ridiculous, but it seems like the only way to indicate what Chappelle’s doing, and how dangerous it is.

His every word is deliberate, and the reports that he switched this monologue in after rehearsal reveal his intent.

Just watch the entire thing and you’ll see the picture emerge. Other Jews, even other Jewish comedians, have come out to defend Chappelle, but they are wrong.

Let’s go wider with that context; the context of the antisemitism of Chappelle’s last Netflix show, which was not really called out, the context of his admiration of Farrakhan who describes Jews as evil figures who control the world. The context of each new celebrity espousing Jew-hate, as Jews get beaten up and murdered in New York. Chappelle’s words may elicit laughter. But they are absolutely no joke.