Insanity Wrap: Did Steve Martin Just Kill Cancel Culture?

Dave Allocca

Welcome to Insanity Wrap, your weekly dose of the best of the worst. “The Steve Martin Cancel Culture Murder Mystery” is the new big crazy.

Plus:

  • Is Hunter Biden HIV-positive?
  • A Utah college is teaching pr0n because otherwise nobody would know how to do that stuff
  • “Not Sure” for President!
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Before we get to today’s big story, here’s a short video to make you lose whatever little faith you might still have in humanity.


This Is Not a Sane World, Exhibit #1,000,006

As a dad, I just love it when overgrown children who don’t fully comprehend the contents of their own underwear try to explain parenthood to me.


Steve Martin: Another Damn Thing We (DON’T!) Have to Be Concerned About

On the 44th anniversary of its debut, I come to praise King Tut, not to entomb it.

Two quick thoughts before I tell you about the laughably lame and failed attempt at canceling Steve Martin.

The first is the sublime genius beneath the superficial goofiness of King Tut.

Martin — an art collector — skewered the art world’s commercialization of the Tutankhamen tour with a parody song.

King Tut is typical of Martin: A seamless blend of highbrow and lowbrow.

Even though the song is mostly silly when it isn’t downright nonsensical, there are gems like “He gave his life for tourism” and “Now, if I’d known they’d line up just to see him, I’d have taken all my money and bought me a museum.”

Then there’s the meta-layer: Martin made fun of commercialism with a bit that — by design — instantly became his most commercial. He performed the song to sold-out crowds in stadiums.

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So what does a bit that came out when Jimmy Carter was president have to do with 21st-century cancel culture?

Here’s where we get to that second thought, courtesy of Mark Dice. Dice explained how the Twitter Outrage Machine functions:

“They do it,” Dice explained, “to create a self-fulfilling prophesy. Twitter manually inserts a topic on the list. People see the topic and think everyone is tweeting about which “caused” it to trend, so people *start* tweeting about it, and *then* the issue goes viral.”

“Steve Martin” briefly trended on Monday after Silver Age Television tweeted the anniversary of King Tut’s debut on SNL. It trended because some zero-humor wokester forced it to trend.

But only briefly.

Mediaite did its best to generate heat with this headline yesterday:

Steven Martin’s ‘King Tut’ Sketch from 1978 Sparks Twitter Debate on Cultural Appropriation.

Steven Martin?

Anyway, as the story made clear, there wasn’t even so little as a “Twitter debate.”

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The worst Mediaite could find was two barely-critical tweets by a couple of low-follower Blue Checks.

The Twitter Outrage Machine was cranked to life, then almost immediately ran out of gas.

Maybe it’s because Twitter spent Monday outraged about the Elon Musk buyout and didn’t have time to worry about Martin.

Maybe it’s because the gentle genius of King Tut makes it bulletproof.

Maybe it’s because Cancel Culture has, like every other leftist revolutionary movement eventually does, finally choked to death on the blood it spilled.

Or maybe there’s more to come…

Steve Martin Was Born a Poor Black Child


Recommended: New York Times, FX Team Up for Elon Musk Exposé


Before We Continue, a Brief Palate Cleanser…

My Golden would have eaten the bigger part so fast he’d barely be aware that he’d done anything before it was gone.


Your Weekly Dose of Mostly Peaceful Protest

Joe Biden
AP Photo/Charlie Riedel
2024 Democratic choice: ‘Not Sure’ beats Biden, 28%-19%

Tell me even Democrats are done with this guy without telling me that even Democrats are done with this guy:

In a new I&I/TIPP poll, just 29% of Democrats picked President Joe Biden. And tied for second at 12% were Vice President Kamala Harris and “Not Sure.”

And that’s Biden’s base. Throw in Republicans and independents, and the president in the national survey drops to 19%, beat handily by “Not Sure” at 28%.

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Biden can’t be at the top of the ticket in ’24.

The question is: What’s to stop him?

Will he resign or be 25th’d out for health reasons? Will he pull a Johnson (heh) and decline to run again? Will he get primary’d out?

Or are the Dems stuck with him?

Discuss in the comments, gentle readers.


You Paid for WHAT?

(Image by Michal Jarmoluk from Pixabay.)
College stands behind controversial ‘hard core pornography’ class

OK, groomer:

A screenshot of the course description was shared widely on Twitter last week, promoting a Change.org petition to cancel the class, calling it obscene and arguing it does not have any educational value. As of Sunday evening, the petition had more than 1,500 signatures.

“The Supreme Court has defined obscenity as ‘completely devoid of scientific, political, educational, or social value.’ We agree. Pornography is devoid of educational value and has no place in the classroom,” the petition states.

“In these classes, young students and teachers watch pornography together in a classroom. This creates an unsafe environment for students and faculty and normalizes pornography in culture. These are not Utah values and these classes have no part in the Utah education system.”

Westminster College declined to comment to The College Fix about the content of the course.

There’s so much pr0n for free online that it’s nearly killed the traditional industry.

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A year at Westminster costs $49,890 including room and board.

These two facts go a long way toward proving my long-held assumption that college kids are idiots.

The clincher? Everything I did my sophomore year.


Is Hunter Biden HIV-Positive?

Hunter Biden
AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais, File
‘You need to get tested for HIV Hallie’: Hunter’s urgent plea to his brother Beau’s widow toward end of their torrid affair

It’s been more than 20 years since my wild single days — although to be fair, even then it would never have occurred to me to nail my brother’s widow — so maybe I’m out of date on these things.

So other than being pretty sure you’ve got it, is there any reason to tell the woman you’ve been sleeping with that she needs to get rapid-tested for HIV?

Many more sordid details at the link, if you can stomach them.


Previously On Insanity Wrap: Everyone Is Going Nuts Over Tucker’s Testicle Tanning


One More Thing…

Insanity Wrap Still Loves Chocolate
(From deep within the VodkaPundit archives.)

So this guy turned 53 today, which if you’d have known me in my 20s is pretty much a miracle. I mean, real dollars changed hands when I made it to 30 still breathing.

But, hey, unlike that Steve Martin fellow, at least I still have some brown left in my hair.

Some.


That’s a Wrap for this week.

Come back next week for another Insanity Wrap…

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…assuming we make it that long.


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