I saw Matt Rife perform at the Great Outdoors Comedy Festival in Vancouver, and I was honestly disgusted and deeply disappointed by his entire set.
I had tickets for the whole weekend and decided it would be good to see him live and judge for myself instead of basing my opinion on the few clips I had seen online. My 21-year-old daughter had warned me about him, but now I have seen it for myself.
He seems completely obsessed with talking about sex in the most vulgar ways possible. I understand that sex is sometimes part of comedy, but this was beyond extreme. He argued that the United States is behind the rest of the world and needs more legalized prostitution, encouraged people to start using drugs if they aren’t already, and told a disgusting story about attending a live sex show in Amsterdam with his best friend.
I’m not going to repeat everything he said because it was that revolting. He spent what felt like half the routine acting out masturbation. At another point, they put a close-up of his face on the big screen while he described a man climaxing with a soft penis, and then he spit out of his mouth to demonstrate what it supposedly looked like. Nobody needed to see that. It wasn’t clever. It wasn’t edgy. It was just disgusting.
I understand that some people think he is sexy, and maybe if I had only seen a picture of him, I might have thought so too. But after watching him perform, he became incredibly unattractive to me. His constant need to turn everything into something graphic and sexual felt unhealthy and honestly made me wonder what his issue is.
There was also a woman who approached from the audience and said something none of us could hear. It clearly bothered him, and he retaliated by going on and on about how her shorts were too short and how much cellulite she was showing. This was not even an overweight woman, although that shouldn’t matter. I don’t care how rude she may have been. Publicly humiliating a woman and attacking her body in front of thousands of people is not appropriate. Calling it “comedy” does not make it funny.
There were also two people with severe physical disabilities in wheelchairs near the stage. One had a sign saying “Roast me,” so yes, that person knowingly opened the door to being included. But the way Rife roasted both of them made me deeply uncomfortable. Maybe those two individuals were completely fine with it because they are fans of his, but I imagine many other people living with similar disabilities would feel very differently if they came across those clips.
Overall, Matt Rife came across as someone completely addicted to talking about sex in the crudest and most degrading way possible. There was nothing insightful or intelligent underneath it. It was vulgarity, humiliation and shock value passed off as comedy.
I will never pay to see him again, and I genuinely regret going. I hope more people start taking a stand with their dollars against this type of behavior. At some point, we have to stop shrugging and accepting this as normal simply because someone calls it comedy.

I honestly just find the anti trans tirade from about a billion comedians these days so tiring and unfunny

Making one or two jokes about it to tease is fine, making them the constant subject of every special, podcast and show is just sad, if anyone knows the stats for suicide and depression in the trans community, it just seems so much meaner and cruel when you listen to these rich fucks berating this vulnerable group of people over and over

Chappelle is the GOAT of stand up to me, but his endless war with trans people isn’t just sad, it’s not funny, and I just don’t get why, as a man famous for using comedy for fighting back against the powers that be, he’s decided that the best use of his time is to target trans people, it’s genuinely been the main part of like his last 4 specials

Ricky Gervais is even worse, I saw him live about 2 tours back and he is literally now just an unfunny pub man from the UK now, repeating the same “edgy” jokes again and again, or talking about how rich he is etc . And I’m saying this as someone who loves Ricky’s work generally (Office, Extras, early Stand Ups etc)

Am I alone in this? Do others really find the endless trans stuff funny?

If it's not about discussing standup comedy, it doesn't need to be here.

We don't need to make a ton of posts anytime a comedian gets arrested, anytime a comedian gets a divorce, anytime a comedian dodges taxes. It also brings in the weirdest people here.

This isn't standup TMZ

Thanks

Yes, this is of course in light of Tony Hinchcliffe’s big time fuck up at the Trump rally yesterday. I just remember getting into standup comedy because of people like Carlin, Stanhope, Hicks, Maron, Mooney; all people who were challenging the system rather than being a part of it. The conservatives were more the exception, of course the more glaring and explicit one being Nick DiPaolo. Now it seems like there’s a huge conservative presence in comedy. Articles have come out accusing comedians of being alt-right, podcasts constantly flirt with conservative figures (Jordan Peterson, Alex Jones, Sam Hyde, Steven Crowder, Gavin McInnes, etc, etc….) I know political correctness might have something to do with this, but I can’t understand why comedy has turned so significantly.

I recently signed up for Bkuesky. Trying to get away from some of the toxicity. Does anyone have suggestions on stand ups and just generally funny people to follow on Bkuesky? I've found Patton Oswalt and Greg Proops so far.

His standup is like an 8th graders. He's a dick because he's just a dick. Not for comedy, he's really just an asshole. Like everyone, I'm sure he can get a laugh out of some people. I'm sure Dahmer could crack a funny one every once in a while, too.

I like "adult" comedy, but his is what Mtn Dew hyped, Xbox middle schoolers make at two in the morning.

EDIT: Specials aren't the only way to watch a comedian's work. I've seen his old ones and plenty of his stuff on youtube. I've seen his stuff, and I don't like it lol. I HAVE seen it. I don't think it's funny.

Yeah I said it. I'm happy for his success because everybody deserves to make a living. But he actually has done an amazing magic trick as a comedian/cultural figure and there's irony everywhere.

Nobody cries tears from Joe Rogan bit. like tears when u laughs too much and start crying. yeah never.

First off, the Carlos Mencia situation shows Joe's first documented foray into charlatan/water well poisioning behavior. Just like in hip-hop and term snitching, stealing jokes has been used wayyyy too loosely. All thanks to Joe Rogan. It almost feels like he became the hall monitor for all creatives and decided to single out Carlos. Carlos way funnier then Joe in standup. And I don't like either style to be clear.

I would argue Joe Rogan does bits that are almost identical to Joey Diaz but Joey such a gangster he will never bitch about it. but I think there's clear evidence Joey's appearance in Joe Rogan bubble went down dramatically. he keeps his distance from these fake comedian tough guys imo.

he just has a cult leader vibe nobody wants to admit and now that he's the big $ guy in comedy nobody going to say anything cause most comedians are careerist self preserving weasels.

I put his standup on par with Bill Maher. He might get booked but nobody knows his fucking shit and has no cultural significance. Nobody repeating a Joe Rogan joke to themselves. ever. in life.

I think he's final form going to be a know it all political talk show host showing bias to jerk off MMA libertarian ranch living billionaires.

rant done.

I just can’t think of anyone who even comes close. Bill Burr, George Carlin, older Chapelle. All great but distant seconds.

Sorry but not every person with a mouth deserves a platform, especially when that mouth has spent years calling for violence and hate.

Surely Theo could have paid his bills just fine without giving this asshole the time of day. Theo’s IG comments are full of 21yo people saying “Tucker is so cool! New fan here”

Podcasting has turned so many comics into halftime right wing newscasters and it’s just fucking gross. If Ben Shapiro and Andrew Tate haven’t been on I assume they’re next.

No one else comes close, dead or alive. The guy is on a league all his own.

Edit: Wow! I freaking love science: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/s/uoGrQRzKSH

To preface: I do not think men are funnier than women. Some of my favorite comedians are women, they are just as capable of being funny on stage as men are. But they need to expand their subject matter.

All the men in my scene definitely have a good amount of plethora of hacky sex bits in their acts. It’s rarely funny, it’s often been done before. But I honestly don’t hear dudes telling dick jokes and sex jokes very much. Yet every single woman in my scene has sex/dating/period material as like over 50% of her set.

I love edgy comedy, but personally find most sex jokes to be hack, easy, and vulgar, regardless of it’s a man or woman making them. Cool, some guy wanted to do anal and then your butthole hurt, that’s really cutting edge stuff. Definitely not making the crowd uncomfortable at all. Please, tell me more.

Women comics have done this so much that it’s their single most common criticism, it’s so prevalent it’s a stereotype of ALL women comedians. And even many of the professional ones do it! Then they complain about how men in the scene don’t take them seriously.

If you want more respect from your fellow comics, I would start by abandoning the vulgar sex shit. (Men, this goes for you too). No, I don’t care about the time you sucked a guy’s dick in the Denny’s parking lot. I also don’t care about your period. You have nothing original to say about the subject matter because it’s been done TO DEATH by both genders.

People have been fucking for millions of years, you do not have anything original to say on the subject matter (I promise you). It is hack. It is not funny. It is gross.

Find another angle.

I frequent my local comedy club often, and I have to say I’ve never seen someone murder like ms.pat I was awe struck. It was so good it made me want to quit comedy.

So I’m a big “Kill Tony” fan and I recently became a fan of one of their regulars “Hans Kim”. I mentioned Hans to a friend of mine and he told me that while working security for “Skankfest South” last year they were told to remove Hans from the festival due to complaints from a female volunteer working the festival that he had physically assaulted her. My friend isn’t a liar, and I know he did work that festival, and Kill Tony was on that festival as well so it would have made sense that Hans was there. Anyway, I just want this information out there, if he is a dangerous guy I think it’s important for people to know that.

He is indisputably the greatest standup in history, yet people won’t even whisper this now in our cancel culture cesspool.

How long before people get sick of the bullshit and return to giving him his rightly earned dues?

I’ve been on Reddit for just over a month (trying to engage more in online conversations about comedy, promoting the work of people I like).

Whenever someone asks for recommendations of need-to-know comics, or a list of favorites, commenters here are going off 99% of the time about exclusively straight male comedians (Maria Bamford being potentially the one exception). It is remarkable, upsetting, and goes beyond the blatant sexism of “women aren’t funny” — you aren’t necessarily a misogynist if you think the best comedians out there are male. You’re just being narrow minded (whether or not you mean to be). I’m begging you to educate yourself.

Now it’s fair to point out that I am a woman, but I find this trend so extremely ignorant of “comedy fans” and anyone who says they love the art of standup and comedy at large. Isn’t this meant to be a medium that platforms eclectic experiences, and by making people laugh, open audiences minds up a little to empathize with someone of a different demographic? One of the biggest problems we have right now in this country is that a lot of white guys are only engaging with art that reflects the white guy experience back to them.

Ending this on a constructive note by sharing an arguably too long list of female stand ups that need to start being part of the conversation when we talk about “the best ones doing it right now”

Laurie Kilmartin Laura Peek Janelle James Ali Wong Sophie Buddle Natasha Leggero Aparna Nancherla Steph Tolev Jo Firestone Rosebud Baker Taylor Tomlinson Cat Cohen Sarah Sherman Jordan Jenson Hannah Einbinder Megan Gailey Beth Stelling Jacqueline Novak

(Omissions here are inevitable but reading over that list I feel great about it. Would be thrilled if people yell about who I missed in the comments.)

Felt lazy. Very lazy. Anti-woke comedy without a new angle to make it interesting. Let's run through some of the jokes..

-"Kevin Hart is small and black, his ancestors thought cotton was heavy".. Cool, my unfunny racists uncles make jokes about black people picking cotton, not that creative.

-"Tom Brady looks like a gay Confederate".. Makes no sense, Tom Brady has never looked like he is from the South, but hey, through in the F slur to make it pop more.

-"Sam Jay is her because she checks the black, fat, and lesbian boxes for Netflix".. I believe he was the 4th or 5th person to make that same joke.

-"Kim Kardashian has a whales vagina"... Probably would have killed 15 years ago when people started making that joke.

I thought the only good joke was "Jeff Ross is so Jewish he only watches football for the coin toss". Everything else was just something that gets repeated in comment sections. Wouldn't surprise me if he found that one on Reddit too.

Just curious as I had found out the hard way that in certain subreddits, mentioning his name summons an angry mob, but I wanted to get a better understanding of why that comic was so infamous in the stand up comedy scene.

Kill Tony is a heavily listened to podcast on my YouTube feed. I enjoy the show a lot!

However there is a lot of misleading and artificial hype that seems to follow it—claiming especially to be the #1 live podcast in the world (which I’ve always thought was stated in jest).

12 years is a long time to run, and without ever missing a Monday! Awesome!

But 12 years is also a long time to see a comedian grow into a legit comedic role. This hasn’t happened, not truly. Finding more than a poorly filmed 10 minutes from someone on Kill Tony is nigh impossible.

Kill Tony is hosted on YouTube with a small follower base of around 1.8m subs. Videos garner around the same view count (sometimes lower). These numbers are pretty astonishing considering the potential of the show and length of air time it’s seen.

Coincidentally, even the regulars (who take a lot of air time from the astonishingly great comics the show could rotate out) have little presence on YouTube that isn’t just KT clips and mashups.

My take: KT is great! But I think we should reimagine what we mean when we say “fostering talent.” There seems to be a lack of this beyond the ~1% chance a funny person gets a minute or two.

Putting people in growing positions to eventually release their own specials is much better than just having 3 unrotated regulars doing forced weekly minutes with little punchups.

Focus less on bloating the show out of proportion, focus more on expanding what the show’s main goal has always been.

If you want to discuss it, do it in this thread, all others will be deleted.

What’s up with this phenomenon: Whenever women joke about men I see a lot of hate in the comments which I don’t see as much on men joking about women.

For example, two commedians I enjoy about equally, are Ryan Long and Jenny Zigrino. They are both decent comedians IMO and both joke about the opposite sex. 

I rarely if ever see hate on Ryan’s videos in the way that people criticize female comedians like Jenny.

People will make fun of her looks and say she’s not funny (which I already find strange to comment that something isn’t funny instead of just scrolling). She seems to only get hate on clips where she is making fun of men.

I’m sure many people don’t find Ryan funny or attractive and are triggered by him, but he gets like no hate even though he makes fun of women a lot.

Here’s an example of each where you can look in the comments. Neither of these are their best work, but they also are both clearly decent, professional, and not comedy newbies:
 https://www.facebook.com/reel/2688410158280122/

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1910842103221995

Are these just bots? If it’s people, why don’t we see an equal distribution of hate on male and female comedians? I feel like men and women are both equally hateful online, maybe I’m wrong. But I’d expect to see equal amounts of hate. I know Jenny is also overweight so I’m not sure if that is adding fuel to the fire, but I see this kind of hate on stereotypically attractive female commedians too and people rarely hate on fat male comedian’s weight.

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