Are you ready for the Louis C.K. comeback tour?
I can practically write the opening to Louis C.K.’s first time back on stage, which I’m predicting will happen around September of 2019.
“So, as it turns out, I’m a real f ****** a ****** ,” he’ll start to nervous laughter.
And due to his comic timing, brilliant writing, and brutal honesty, by the time the credits roll on his all-proceeds-go-to-charity, Internet-only show, he will have made a successful return to the world of comedy.
Don’t believe me? Well know this: Mike Tyson currently has his own cartoon. He also had a successful one-man show on Broadway. He wrote a New York Times bestselling book. He portrayed himself in “The Hangover.”
Please note Tyson did all of these things after serving three years for rape. Actual, honest-to-goodness, rape.
My point here? We have a tendency as Americans to forgive and forget. I’m not judging this part of the American psyche, but it is certainly present. And for someone like Louis C.K., I’m pretty sure we’re going to go that route.
I know it’s raw, I know it’s still early in the game, but I’m telling you: Louis C.K., along with other high-profile Hollywood scumbags like Kevin Spacey, are going to get another chance if we’re sufficiently entertained by them.
It’s always been this way. Michael Jackson was accused of some pretty horrible things, and he’s practically a deity in death. John Lennon beat the crap out of women. Woody Allen is still making movies. The list goes on.
Heck, and if we let the list seep into our other form of entertainment — politics — the list keeps going. But because we actually vote on these people, the “forgive and forget” thing happens a lot quicker and more decisively. In fact, we’re living through it as we speak. Roy Moore, the U.S. Senate candidate from Alabama, will almost certainly win his December election despite being accused of sexually assaulting teenage girls. And while we in New Jersey can smugly say that wouldn’t fly here, allow me to present to you President Donald J. Trump, the man who has been accused by over 20 women of sexual assault, the man who is recorded on tape admitting to sexual assault, saying things like, “I better use some Tic Tacs just in case I start kissing her. You know, I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.”
Trump’s accusers and the tape came out before the election. Didn’t matter. Nearly half of America voted for him.
And today? Even the most fervent Trump haters have moved on from this. (But let’s be real for a moment: If Trump didn’t run for president and continued with “The Apprentice,” the show would be over right now and Trump would be in the same position as Louis C.K. and the rest of the gang. Just another powerful man brought down by his insistence that he could treat women like they were part of his personal porno stash.) (And let’s be even more real: Perhaps this moment in time, with all these victims coming forward, is more a proxy war on the Trump presidency than anything else. Discuss.)
Now here’s the thing: These guys didn’t invent sexually mistreating women, and they won’t be the last idiots to do so.
But we will forgive them, eventually, if they rehabilitate themselves. Or if they’re sufficiently talented. Listen: I don’t want to be on the wrong side of history here, but if we forgave Mike Tyson for forcible rape, we’re going to forgive Louis C.K. for whipping out his giggle stick in front of women who would’ve preferred he didn’t.
Times change, and we change with them. Hopefully, this current round of sexual misconduct, sexual assault, and outright rape allegations among the rich and famous will force a change. I don’t want any woman — or man — to be made to feel “less than” by those in power.
But to sit in judgement of all these people is short-sighted, if history is any guide. Yes, what they did was wrong. But we forgive and forget if we so desire, and for the life of me, I can’t figure out if this is a great or terrible American trait.
We will make the decision if these people work again, and I’m not betting against it.