Outside The Line

It Just Is... And So Was He, For A Little While

I have to admit, I feel a little bad not mentioning the death of Jane McGrath yesterday -- given that it's (somewhat) cricket-related -- to then come back today and write about another death, this one not even remotely cricket-related. 

George Carlin died of heart failure earlier today, at age 71.

He was a comedy legend, an icon of free speech, and an incalculable influence on my own -- and Outside the Line's -- voice and sensibility.

Carlin came in many incarnations -- all of them different, all of them memorable. To boomers, he was the countercultural hero of the Seven Dirty Words; to Gen Xers, he was Rufus from Bill & Ted's; and to the rest of us, he was just that really funny old guy with the HBO specials and the cameos in Kevin Smith movies.

We've already posted some of his material on the site before, and now I'm not sure what clip to choose to commemorate him. Since this is supposed to be a sports blog of sorts, I guess we could go for his take on sports. Or we could go for his most culturally relevant piece, the infamous Seven Words routine. (Or, because I bet he would've liked us to, any one of his many attacks on religion.)

But I think we'll go with my favourite bit of all: his extended riff on the planet, at the end of his 1992 special, Jammin' In New York.

I think I like it because it's really not that funny, as far as laughs-per-minute go. It's strange to see that in a standup special. Standup comedians, for those who don't know, are spectacularly insecure and needy creatures, constantly demanding approval of some sort; and if they don't receive any applause or laughs every few seconds in their shows, they start getting antsy, pandering to the crowd, leaning on old standards just to get their fix.

Carlin had the patience to go without laugh line for a couple of minutes here, building up his argument slowly, letting it flow organically, and ultimately leading it to a cathartic (and, to my mind, enlightened) conclusion. It just doesn't get any better. RIFP, George.

Good Thing Cricket Writers Don't Listen To Shock Comics

Earlier tonight, as I waited for my porn to load, I was glancing through the who's who page on cricinfo, and I was surprised to see how many of their staff settled on cricket writing after starting out in marketing, of all things. Is that common? Personally, I couldn't think of a worse fate in life than a career in marketing... but I'm also in serious, crippling debt, so what do I know?

(And if you didn't think that last paragraph was just an excuse for me to post a Bill Hicks clip, well then... you obviously don't know me well enough.)

Regular Programming Will Resume Shortly

Apologies for the lack of coverage recently. We've been experiencing some technical, logistical and dispositional difficulties lately (i.e. my internet is capped out, assignments are due, and I'm a lazy procrastinator), plus the NBA Conference Finals have just been way too riveting to look away. I'm sure the world can wait a few more days for our round-up of the IPL, or our opinion on who should be in the Ashes squads in 2009 (seriously, does no else find it disturbing how much Ashes talk is going around right now? Is that the only way most of us can get it up for Test cricket now... by fantasizing about series more than a year away?).

In the meantime, some keys to life, from the funniest guy you've probably never heard of:

Australians... If You Lick Them, You Hallucinate!

Comedian Louis CK used to have a bit in his stand-up about racism, in which he wondered:

"Why can’t we have racism that’s ignorant but nice? You could have stereotypes that are positive about race. You could say, 'Those Chinese people, they can fly!,' or 'You know about the Puerto Ricans… they’re made of candy!'"

I've thought of that while following the recent 'monkey chant' controversy regarding Andrew Symonds. It's not so much that the people in the crowd who did it are bigoted, it's that they're hacks. C'mon, it's 2007... and monkey chants are the best you have? They were doing that in the '50s, for godssake. If you're going to be the designated Angry Player-Abuser in the crowd, at least get yourself some fresh material.

It's like Michael 'Kramer' Richards' yelling "nigger" at a pair of hecklers in one of his shows last year. It was sad more than anything -- proof of a tragic dearth of spark and originality in his work, rather than actual bigotry. The taboo language comes out because it's the only thing left to reach for; the only way to keep the spotlight on you; because there's no comeback left, no witty put-down to lean back on. You're out of shit, and you know it.

So the monkey chant comes out. Just like it did in the second Test between South Africa and Pakistan,  and in South Africa's tour of Australia last year. And just like it will come out in the future, when some pandering assclown in the crowd gets sloppy-drunk too quickly and uses up his quota of effective Ya wanker, and You're a cunt! too early in the match, so he's forced to reach into the pantomime bag for the monkey material to top himself. If the media treated it like they do streakers and just ignored it, it would go away in a few weeks. Now all they're doing is building up the issue and fueling the copycat effect in future series.

(We'll ignore the underlying irony, which I'm sure was lost on the offending crowd members, of a bunch of stadium rubes -- who usually tend to have a very unevolved look about them, all hairy-backed and scraped-knuckled -- taunting Andrew Symonds, about as close to an athletic Übermensch as the cricket world has ever seen.)

Also, since it's a bit of a slow day in cricket, some more Louis: