As discussed here yesterday, Stephen Colbert strung a gross, vulgar, precedent-shattering string of ugly ad hominem insults against the President of the United States this week, a volley that included the homophobic slur “cock holster,” insinuating, because such an image is so hilarious, that the leader of his country fellates Vladimir Putin. Last night he answered the collective criticism. Here is what he said, and said with the repulsively smug “aren’t I clever and amusing!” smirk that has always made this comic hard to watch for me (Samantha Bee does the same thing). As a professional director, I think it’s bad technique, and hackish. But I digress…back to Colbert:
“I’m your host, Stephen Colbert. Still? I am still the host? I’m still the host!!…Now, if you saw my monologue Monday, you know that I was a little upset at Donald Trump for insulting a friend of mine. So at the end of that monologue, I had a few choice insults for the president in return. I don’t regret that. He, I believe, can take care of himself. I have jokes; he has the launch codes. So, it’s a fair fight…While I would do it again, I would change a few words that were cruder than they needed to be.”
Then he pandered to the critics who condemned his “cock holster” joke as homophobic by blathering briefly about how anyone who expresses love for any human being is a “hero” [Translation: “I love you all, Gay Progressives! Don’t be mad at me! Remember when you got mad at Alec Baldwin for calling a photographer a cocksucker? You forgave him because he votes for the right party, and so do I! “], and introduced gay actor Jim Parsons, who plays the uber-nerd in “Big Bang Theory” to prove it.
What did this moment tell us about Stephen Colbert?
Stephen Colbert doubled down on using the phrase cock holder on the air in a high profile network show. He did not apologize or retract the worst vulgarity that has ever been allowed to go out to millions on a pre-taped network show, and that record-worst vulgarity was directed at the President of the United States, who, like it or not, is the representative of our democracy world-wide and who, like it or not, carries the mantle of all who preceded him.
Colbert’s justification for this is that the President insulted Colbert’s “friend,” “Face the Nation” host John Dickerson [if you believe that Colbert and Dickerson are any more real friends than Colbert and the CBS cafeteria ladies, I have a bridge to sell you], so this justified exporting obscenity, uninvited, into millions of American homes, and further polluting political discourse and civil society.
This is signature significance. Stephen Colbert is an irresponsible, hateful, fame-addled, unprofessional asshole without the decency or ethical awareness to know when he has crossed a big, bold, long-standing cultural ethics line, or the courage to accept responsibility for it. His ethics ignorance was on display in his scripted–scripted! Like “cock-holster,” somebody was paid to write this garbage—comments. He expressed or embraced the unethical logic of Rationalizations #2, 7, 13, 14, 19A, 52, and more.
Revealingly, Colbert, an alleged comedian, did not cite #54, The Joke Excuse, though as a holder of the Jester’s Privilege, that one was properly available to him. This signaled that Colbert was NOT joking, but being genuinely and intentionally hateful and insulting the President of the United States in as gross and demeaning a manner as he could, and that he meant it. Well, that’s an abuse of his position and the platform provided to him by CBS.
Meanwhile, Colbert stacked all of his chips on Rationalization #11. The King’s Pass, The Star Syndrome, or “What Will We Do Without Him?” He knows he can get away with conduct that would get lesser lights suspended or fired, so, like all organization high-performers who double as ethics corrupters, Colbert acted accordingly. Not only that, he gloated about it. “See? Can’t fire ME!”
There needs to be a special word for “contender for king of the assholes.”
On the plus side for Ethics Alarms, Colbert did give me a new Rationalization for the list, which I will add today: “The Pest’s Justification.” That’s when misconduct and abuse is justified because the abuser is less powerful than the abused. Abuse is abuse. “He can take care of himself” is not a justification.
Finally, the statement that he would change “a few words” is cowardly and slimy, displaying the character of a banana slug. Why would you change those words, Asshole? Because they got you in trouble? Why were they “cruder than they needed to be”? Needed to be for what purpose? If you won’t apologize for using those words, then say what the words are, again, right here, so we don’t think you meant “Pricktator.”
What did this moment tell us about CBS?
That Colbert faced no consequences for metaphorically urinating on his set, his show, his network, his audience, his profession, his society, his culture, his country, and the President of the United States demonstrates that CBS is a passive but complicit participant in “the resistance,’ and is willing to debase broadcast standards in the process.
This is one of the reasons why the President dissed John Dickerson. If a network signals a corporate policy of disrespecting the President of the United States before the world, the President of the United States and everyone else can reasonably conclude that that network’s news division is following that policy, and is incapable of delivering objective, non-partisan news to the public.
Trump was wrong to insult Dickerson; he just should have refused to talk with him at all. I see no ethical reason why biased journalists and declared foes of the President should be permitted to participate in news briefings, or accorded any courtesies whatsoever. If I were President, CBS would be required to apologize for Colbert’s disgusting insults and disavow them, or do its bashing of me without access to my office or members of the administration.
What did this moment tell us about the rest of the news media?
Only this: several outlets, such as HLN (CNN) this morning, reported only that “Supporters of President Trump” objected to the President of the United States being denigrated as a Cock holster. That tells me that they believe objecting to bottom-of-the swamp vulgarity is a partisan position, and thus approve of Colbert’s language as well as his choice of target for it.
What did this moment tell us about the anyone who will continue to follow, applaud, and laugh at someone as proudly defiant of basic standards of citizenship and decency as Stephen Colbert?
It tells us that these people—every single one of them-— are so marinated in the hate and fear cascading from the Left since November 8 that their ethics alarms are broken and their values are corrupted.
All of this is good to know.
Act accordingly.
Ethics Alarms 
Isn’t this how liberals apply the definition of racism? The idea being that only those in a position of power can be racist? Seems to be that this could be a subcategory of the same thing.
For some reason, I can’t get the quote to appear like a quote (like I have noticed others doing).
I can fix it!
Thanks
It requires the use of HTML tags.
Looks like this…
“ITALIC TEXT”
<i>ITALIC TEXT</i>
Or this…
<blockquote>ITALIC TEXT</blockquote>
I think I typed that correctly.
In general; TV is getting so bad that I don’t have much I can watch anymore without heavily applying the Julie Principle.
I think the most preposterous element of Colbert’s continued rant was “I have jokes, he has the launch codes.” Maybe this is a subset of “These are not normal times!” But it may be “The poet’s excuse.” “Gee, poor little me, all I have are words.” The funny thing is, does Colbert think he’s going to goad Trump into dropping a bomb on the CBS studios? Or, unless Colbert keeps insulting Trump, Trump will bomb Manhattan? What an ego Colbert has.
“The pest’s excuse,” often used to allow smaller kids to get away with giving bigger but unpopular kids grief back in school, could easily become “the terrorist’s excuse,” i.e. I just have a few people with small arms and improvised explosives, the other side has an army, so sniping, assassination, and bombings are ok. The poet’s excuse? Colbert is no Francois Villon, and no W.B. Yeats. His hate spew next to the words of Coleridge is no more poetry than a puddle of plastic vomit would be sculpture next to Rodin’s “Thinker.”
It’s classic passive-aggressive behavior. Which should be responded to the way Bluto deals with guitar playing folk singers on the stairs of the Delta House. I’d leave out the apology, though.
Yes…thanks, this helps me focus. It is the reason why Palestinian lobbing scuds into Israel is dismissed like they were spitballs.
I was thinking of calling it the Palestinian’s excuse, but it didn’t begin with them.
It shows you how corrupt and amoral the liberal media is in keeping this snotty, unfunny ‘comedian’ on their air to spew his hate. Any advertiser that buys airtime to support his show should be boycotted or at least get a flood of emails urging them to withdraw their sponsorship.
Wayne wrote, “Any advertiser that buys airtime to support his show should be boycotted or at least get a flood of emails urging them to withdraw their sponsorship.”
Shouldn’t the target of any boycott or emails be Colbert and the network he works for not the advertising sponsors?
Let me say that I really don;t have a problem with asking the advertising sponsors to withdraw their ads, but I’d be against a boycott of those advertisers.
I’d also rather not use the word “hate” to describe Colbert and his ilk’s shticks these days. The word has been rendered meaningless by the left. I prefer “inanity.”
Inanity? Inanity is Gallagher. This is hate. I do not consent in allowing the left to eliminate a crucial concept by misapplying it.
The left has often accused those of us on the right of misappropriating patriotism. In some cases they might be right – the pre-1948 Democratic party was no less patriotic than the GOP, but someone like Bernie Sanders is no more a “different kind of patriot” than a cannibal is a “different kind of vegetarian. ” We shouldn’t let them turn hate into a all-purpose tar to drown us in.
Exactly!
But can you really be capable of hate when you’ve become completely unhinged and lost touch with reality? We have the insanity defense in Crim Law. I’m beginning to think it should be broadened to be applicable to political punditry.
The insanity defense means you can’t tell right from wrong, not that you have a twisted idea of what right and wrong are. If someone is in fact so unhinged he can’t tell reality from fantasy, then he belongs in an institution.
“If someone is in fact so unhinged he (or she) can’t tell reality from fantasy, then he (or she) belongs in an institution.”
You don’t say?
I could make the argument that the HoR (SanFranNan, Maxine Waters) & the Senate (Chuckie Schumer & Harry Reid) are institutions.
Not so sure I could do the same with the DNC chair (Wasserman-Schultz & Perez) or a democrat campaign manager (the eminently punchable Robbie Mook)
Well you could send emails insinuating that you’re not going to buy their products until they quit buying ad time for his ‘comedy’ show.
I wonder how those defending Colbert would have reacted if, during the debate on the Iranian nuclear deal, Greg Gutfeld had said that Obama’s mouth was a you-know-what for the Ayatollah Khameni.
You don’t need to wonder, do you?
I’m a simple man who rarely comments but thoroughly enjoys the thoughtful and thoughtful-provoking dialogues this forum provides. So, I offer a bit more of an old school and less than cerebral reaction to this self-absorbed arriviste’s albatross session. “Lifebuoy'”
“Frah-GEE-lay! It must be from Italiy!”
Get off of your high horse. It’s wish washy, week kneed folks like yourself that want to make nice that cost this country so much. Remember Gary Heart? He would’ve been the president if not for folks like you.People that can’t handle adult words or even being a fucking adult. This is the time to be fucking outraged! Enough with tearing up one of our own. Just like the wanna be Democrat Sanders. He wasn’t happy throwing fire at the DNC for all of those years nooooooo, he had to attack the Democrat in such a way that drumpf and his team used his words to attack her. It’s time to fight and Colbert is a very effective weapon in this fight. As for cock holster being homophobic, I just don’t see it.Grow the fuck up and get on board. Call your senator, representative. Make sure that every townhall this recess is packed and most importantly VOTE!✌
Hey, everybody! Here is an example of the kind of jerk Colbert is choosing to pander to, and a late-stage resistance victim of hate-rot! True, it’s an illiterate partisan rant, which is forbidden here, but such a revealing one (how old do you think someone has to be to think it’s “Gary Heart”?) that I’m letting it through.
Then I’ll ban this guy next time.
It’s Gary HART, you uncomprehending fool. He was popular with the lefty intellectual crowd, but then his affair with Donna Rice was exposed at a time (1988) when both parties took a dim view of that sort of thing -i.e. before Bill Clinton started treating the White House intern pool as his personal harem. Colbert is not a very effective weapon in any fight, unless you consider throwing insults like a seventh grader effective tactics.
Colbert, Horus The Light, and Donald Drumpf are all using Animal House School of Thought.
Maybe so, if you emphasize that example given at the bottom, making the point that it sounds funny in a raunchy comedy movie, but in real life it just sounds dumb.
SO, it appears you suffer from the same affliction you accuse Colbert of. Because Colbert is a well known celebrity working for a major TV network and you’re some “400 pound loser” sitting in front of a computer, you get to repeatedly call Mr. Colbert an asshole? You’ve obviously got the same journalistic credibility as “Pricktator” Trump. (You probably have the same sized tax return, if you get my drift). Maybe you should realize that nothing Colbert said is half as insulting as the myriad of lies, insults and anti-American rhetoric that POTUS make every single day. Anyone who is stupid enough to praise Putin, Duterte and Kim Jung Un while continually insulting our allies deserves not only to be instilled in return, but impeached and evicted from the job.
I was wondering who would make this lame complaint. I was a more genteel word for those I have designated here as assholes, which is a step down from jerk, but there just isn’t, and I find that the very few individuals who warrent the label—including Trump, in the past, as when he pursued birther accusations against President Obama–are not adequately described with lesser epithets. Asshole is a vulgarity, is not obscene, has, along with “suck”, been given a pass by popular culture (it’s a punchline in Back to the Future 3 and Blazing Saddles, among other classic films that are decades old), and is a useful descriptor; a diagnosis. “Cock-holster” is just a non-sequitur insult, unless it is homo-phobic, in which case it is intended as descriptive. (You don’t see how using a description of a homosexual act is homophobic when it is used in a series to show how horrible someone is? Got it: you’re an idiot.)Colbert could have qualified for the special Ethics Alarms designation of Fick, an individual who engages in unethical conduct, knows it and boasts about it, but I don’t think Colbert knows his conduct was unethical.
Because he’s an asshole.
My responsibilities to the culture are not even vaguely related to Colbert’s. I have a self-selected, sophisticated (well, except for you) readership that seeks ethical analysis and information, not entertainment. I do not have sponsors or an employer. Moreover, written discourse is very different from oral rhetoric, and subject to different standards.
But thanks, because this post would not be complete, sadly, without an explanation of why this desperate deflection by Colbert’s fans is the self-defining absurdity that it is.
Jack, it’s happened. Someone has managed to design bots specifically tailored to commit every one of the rationalizations on your list.
As I have always feared…
This isn’t Huffpo and it isn’t youtube, and these sophomoric responses are neither needed nor wanted.
Special honorary note to our new friends Horus The Light & Donald Drumpf.
Receive this Gotch Academy Participation Certificate as evidence of your valued participation in this conversation.
“Nothing shows a man’s character more than what he laughs at.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Not only one, but TWO, “Gotchies” have been bestowed, and on the same thread???
Whoa Nellie! That they are well-earned is beside the point; THIS is a Red Letter Day!
Jack; if someone, or sometwo, holds their hands back and begs to get smacked, would it be unethical not to oblige?