A lengthy, two-part New York magazine interview with the comedian Chris Rock, published this weekend, has lit up the Internet, thanks in part to Rock's humor and eloquence and more in part to his candor discussing American society's approach to race, comedy and much more.
"When we talk about race relations in America or racial progress, it's all nonsense," Rock told writer Frank Rich. "There are no race relations. White people were crazy. Now they're not as crazy. To say that black people have made progress would be to say they deserve what happened to them before. ...
"So, to say Obama is progress is saying that he's the first black person that is qualified to be president. That's not black progress," he continued. "That's white progress. There's been black people qualified to be president for hundreds of years."
The piece has earned a raft of rave reviews. Sample headlines include "Chris Rock gives better interviews than anyone" (the Washington Post), "Read Chris Rock's Brilliant Remarks About Race in America" (Slate) and the AJC's own Jay Bookman's piece here.
As Post editor David Malitz tweeted, "Shout out to the dude who printed out the Chris Rock NYMag interview to read on Metro. If that's not print-out worthy I don't know what is."
More highlights from the talk, which by popular consensus is also worth your full attention:
On Barack Obama: "Everybody wanted Michael Jordan, right? We got Shaq. That's not a disappointment. You know what I mean? We got Charles Barkley. It's still a Hall of Fame career. The president should be graded on jobs and peace, and the other stuff is debatable. Do more people have jobs, and is there more peace? I guess there's a little more peace. Not as much peace as we'd like, but I mean, that's kind of the gig. I don't recall anybody leaving on an up."
On George W. Bush: "And the thing about George Bush is that the kid revolutionized the presidency. How? He was the first president who only served the people who voted for him. He literally operated like a cable network. You know what I mean?"
On his kids' future: "There have been smart, educated, beautiful, polite black children for hundreds of years. The advantage that my children have is that my children are encountering the nicest white people that America has ever produced. Let's hope America keeps producing nicer white people."
On the rapid progression of the gay rights movement: "I always call Ellen DeGeneres the gay Rosa Parks. If Rosa Parks had one of the most popular daytime TV shows, I'm sure the civil-rights movement would've moved a little bit faster too."
On the meritocracy of comedy: "In this sense, comedy's really fair. It's not like music, where you can hire Timbaland and he gives you a beat and a song, and even though you can't sing it's a hit. Comedy, especially stand-up comedy, it's like: Who's funny? ... It's the only thing that smacks Hollywood out of its inherent racism, sexism, anti-Semitism. It makes people hire people that they would never hire otherwise. Do they really want to do a show with Roseanne Barr? No, they want a thin blonde girl."
