"Brett Gelman's Dinner in America" Rant

[_reneeloves]

[This is going to be a TL;DR, I will post cliff notes at the end for readers who simply don't want to read this long post.]

 

So, I woke up around 6AM this morning to see a show playing vividly on my television and I decided to watch the remaining of that show before it ended. The show was "Brett Gelman's Dinner in America" and it was about 15-20 minutes left in the show. And trust me, I didn't need to watch the entire special to figure out what was going on.

 

The special was a third installment of a series called Dinner with co-creator Jason Woliner and focuses on racism in America while explaining it in a tragicomedy/weird sort of way. The host of the special is Brett Gelman and a few well known black actors and actresses are in the special such as Loretta Devine, Shareeka Epps, Mack Wilds, and Joe Morton. I had seen this show being advertised late at night, and it had always caught my attention but I never had the motivation to watch it. After viewing the special, I felt a mixture of confusion, anger and somewhat offended by all of this. 

 

Why?

 

As a person of color, serious subjects such as police brutality, racial stereotypes and oppression towards African American isn't really a joking matter. And It confuses me how notifiable black actors and actresses are in this special supporting and contributing in this. Maybe I'm honestly overreacting, but do I have the right to?

 

There was a scene in the special where the actors were attempting to leave the dinner and were all approached by a white police officer. The police officer was quickly jumping to conclusions and making threats toward all the actors. The actors try to explain themselves but were quickly interrupted by the police officer pulling out his gun and yelling, aiming it at Mack Wilds telling him to get his hands out of his pockets when they clearly weren't and to put his hands up when they were already up. Brett Gelman then comes in the scene, stabs the police officer in the stomach and says "You're welcome" to the actors. Then it later comes out that the police officer was fake and Gelman only does this to catch the actor's attention.

 

Bret Gelman states, "As I've become more and more successful I've noticed that racism has also become more and more successful." He points to the songs on his iPod as proof that black lives matter to him. "I stand with you guys before I stand with my guys so you're in good hands, which unfortunately are white hands – but I wish they were black hands along with the rest of me, so give yourselves a round of black applause."

 

According to LA Times, it says, ""I don't see how I ever could have thought that having an all-white crew for a special about race would be OK," Gelman says, self-accusingly. "I just thought hiring a couple of white women made it diverse enough."They are not comedies to laugh at/with, exactly. That they're comedies is clear enough, but it's a comedy of brokenness and pain, deception and self-deception; they satirize certain sorts of seriousness, but with a grim deadpan. The jokes never break the tension. It's the Adult Swim way."

 

I just feel offended mainly because I feel like Adult Swim is making mock of our struggle as African Americans and the problems we have to go through. I feel as if they are making a profit off of our oppression and they even included black actors who agreed on it to make sure "everything is okay". I don't know if this was supposed to be strictly comedy or serious with sarcastic points, but if they were trying to point out issues, I don't think Adult Swim was the right platform. Most people don't take it seriously, but hell, I guess that means I shouldn't either?

 

[TL;DR]

• Watched this show called "Brett Gelman's Dinner in America"
• Tragicomedy about racism in America
• Gelman basically is a hyperbole(exaggeration) of a closet racist
• Felt offended, blah, blah

 

Mods, if this is in the wrong place I apologize. Discuss?

[Ziggyly]

I don't get it? So the highlight of the special is that the white dude saves the day from racism? 

[Anri Sonohara]

Too many blacks do remain oppressed.

 

But not by white Americans.

 

Rather, it is by blacks who relish a perverse sub-culture of low standards and perpetual victimization.

 

That show seems awesome.

[_reneeloves]

I don't get it? So the highlight of the special is that the white dude saves the day from racism? 

 

No, its this guy who brings all these black people together and basically talks about racism and he's (I guess) doing satire and acting like person who isn't racist, when he actually is. But he's doing it in a joking way. It's supposed to be a comedy.