Big Tech Is Crushing Conservative Comedy
Right-leaning comics already face industry discrimination. It's getting worse
Suggest women aren’t funny and you’ll be quickly attacked, if not outright canceled.
Podcast giant Adam Carolla found that out the hard way.
Say that conservatives lack a sense of humor, though, and there’s little to no outrage. After all, the comedian class is overwhelmingly left of center. There’s no current late night show that leans remotely to the right on broadcast TV, even after Fox News’ “Gutfeld!” showed an obvious hunger for that approach.
There’s another reason so few conservatives make us laugh. They face industry-wide condemnation for telling right-leaning jokes.
RELATED: Joe Rogan Makes Total Sense (Again) on Big Tech Censorship
Just ask Michael Loftus, who shared a chilling story about his scotched plan for a fair and balanced talk show. Or check in with Steve McGrew, who lost a critical gig for supporting President Donald Trump.
The Deplorables have a few more stories to tell you about industry blacklisting.
It’s why the best conservative comedy today is found at the digital margins. Think podcasting (“Louder with Crowder,” “The Andrew Klavan Show,” “The Anthony Cumia Show”), YouTube (Adam Yenser’s “The Cancelled News” and Ryan Long’s comedy shorts) and Twitter (@hale_razor, @iowahawkblog).
“I, for one, welcome our benevolent list-creating, dissent-crushing Socialist overlords.”
— Razor (@hale_razor) November 7, 2020
Big Tech doesn’t want conservative comedy on its turf, either.
The social media giants already censor right-leaning views, a trend which went nuclear in the weeks leading up to the 2020 presidential election. Now, they’re ramping up their efforts to make sure liberal targets aren’t exposed to satire.
The Babylon Bee, a faith-friendly parody site, delivers consistently hilarious “news” that mostly mocks the Left.
TheBabylonBee parleyed.
— The Babylon Bee TheBabylonBee Tuesday, December 8, 2020
It’s also constantly under assault by both Facebook and the mainstream media. The former routinely lashes out at the Bee’s Facebook page, threatening to throttle its reach, demonitize it or simply crush it.
Facebook once suggested Bee humor could “incite violence.” It’s not funny to The Babylon Bee, which receives a sizable portion of its web traffic from Facebook. The social media giant’s repeated attacks on the Bee represent an existential threat to its business model.
RELATED: How Josh Denny (Barely) Survived a Cancel Culture Attack
Sites like Snopes.com also fact-check The Bee’s parodies, a practice they rarely, if ever, deploy on fellow news parody site The Onion. USA Today similarly fact-checked The Bee, an absurdity too outrageous to even satirize.
The Bee also faces opposition from Twitter, which temporarily suspended the site’s account in 2020.
That’s just the beginning.
Comedian Nick Di Paolo’s robust YouTube page took a knee recently after the platform gave him a week-long time out for cracking wise about COVID-19.
Apolitical comic Ryan Long, who skewers woke culture, has gotten pummeled by both Instagram and TikTok. The social media giants removed a Long comedy short mocking those who attack “white males,” an obviously bigoted position that’s ripe for parody.
The sketch in no way violated the platforms’ community standards.
- No nudity
- No violence
- No calling out anyone by name in a defamatory fashion
You can find far more mature material flourishing on both Big Tech sites via a quick site search. Long’s satirical video got yanked anyway.
Comedian JP Sears announced Facebook threatened to boot him from the platform for violating “community standards.” That’s the generic phrase Big Tech companies deploy to let them avoid specific details.
Sears’ crime? It’s likely Facebook wanted to ban him for mocking COVID-19 restrictions.
Sears, whose comic persona is a New Age-style hippie, increasingly taunts woke culture and the Left. He currently has more than 3 million Facebook followers, a sizable group which allows him to carve out a comedy career by reaching fans with a few simple clicks.
He might not have that luxury for long.
RELATED: Woke Broke Movies … What Happens Next?
In real life, Sears understands he poses a threat to both Big Tech and the censorial Left. It’s why he joined Parler, a Twitter-like portal that vows to let free speech reign supreme.
Because there is massive censorship happening on the major platforms, I have just joined Parler. Please follow me there as it’s censorship free and I’ll be speaking my mind 100% freely!https://t.co/qEZu263TXM pic.twitter.com/12IA35Cpyu
— JP Sears (@AwakenWithJP) November 15, 2020
I will not back down from Tyrrany Facebook. I will without question risk losing what I have in the name of freedom. And I know many others are doing the same. I will keep going 💪🏽 #FreedomFromFear
— JP Sears AwakenWithJP Tuesday, December 8, 2020
Rising right-leaning stars also feel Big Tech’s wrath for telling the “wrong” jokes. Elsa Kurt’s killer impression of Vice President Kamala Harris is earning her some serious attention of late.
Conservative like Michael Knowles and former Gov. Mike Huckabee, along with NotTheBee.com sang her praises this year. Kurt told HiT TikTok didn’t agree, censoring her video poking fun at Bill Gates, the progressive billionaire.
“That Show Tonight,” an alternative to the far-Left “Saturday Night Live,” also stared down digital censors. TikTok took down the show’s fledgling account without reason.
Tyler Fischer rose to fame on his killer impressions (Donald Trump, Owen Wilson and more). He’s not openly political, but he’s willing to mock the woke Left and sacred cows like Dr. Anthony Fauci. And he, too, has found some of his work erased from social media platforms as a result.
Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon shared why Big Tech censorship is so devastating to American culture during an interview with Fox News.
Censorship takes many forms today, but big tech censorship is particularly concerning because these companies control so much of the flow of information. Platforms like Facebook and Twitter are where most people get their news, and it’s where they go to engage in debate. By controlling what can be said, and what you see, they’re able to shape public opinion and silence voices that have a right to be heard. That’s bad for everyone.
Dillon noted yet another a Bee story triggered another blast of censorship.
My days on Instagram are numbered. They just flagged another one of my posts as hate speech. This time it was satire.
The story in question: In ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ Remake, Angel Tells George Bailey To Kill Himself Because He’s White
View this post on Instagram
The Babylon Bee no longer shares its faux news on Twitter. The platform banned the Bee following its shared article calling Rachel Levine, a trans woman who serves as the Biden administration’s Assistant Secretary for health, its Man of the Year.
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was updated July 14, 2022.
UPDATE (Sept. 8 2022): The Biden administration has a direct hand in censoring comedy.
Instagram immediately complied with a Biden White House request to remove a fake account that parodied Dr. Anthony Fauci, according to emails obtained by Republican-run states that have sued the federal government for allegedly colluding with top social media sites.
I’m a singer and, as one who’s gone to open-mics(and seen stand-up comics on TV), I can say that even before the recent silencing of conservative comics, there was a little-known(and still in effect) double standard that, for all the talk about females getting a raw deal in stand-up comedy, has BENEFITED females and been a detriment for males. Stand-up comedy is a medium where looks are a career KILLER(or, at the very least, not a career booster), but while males who look like girl magnets cannot try to make themselves look repellant or even tailor make their routines to not appeal to females(they’ll KNOW that beneath the ugly-duckling facade is a swan), but a female can try to frump herself up and/or tailor make her routine to not appeal to male audiences, and still have a shot(in fact, a looker can make herself look butch and/or frumpy and nobody would know there was a swan beneath the ugly-duckling facade).