It’s not that Jay Leno’s gay jokes are offensive. It’s that they’re not funny.
If Only Jay Leno Understood Homo Humor
Help make sure LGBTQ+ stories are being told...
We can't rely on mainstream media to tell our stories. That's why we don't lock Queerty articles behind a paywall. Will you support our mission with a contribution today?
Cancel anytime · Proudly LGBTQ+ owned and operated
IDoWhatICan
ba. zing.
eric m.
I think the real question here is, when IS Jay’s monologue funny? gay jokes or not… ?
Jon B
The first joke was just stupid. The second one was kind of funny. Overall, not a big deal at all. I hope that these jokes don’t warrant the karmic retribution of prostate cancer.
dfrw
Who even watches Jay Leno?
Alexa
I thought Conan had his job now? Meh, I don’t like either of them anyway. Why would anyone watch Leno when Stephen Colbert is on at the same time?
scott
yeah, really. who watches Leno or late night comics anymore?
BillyBob Thornton
Quit watching years ago.
Jock
Leno is as funny as a rectal exam.
ggreen
Part of Jay’s problem is he plays only to his studio audience. Which is usually filled to the brim with social dunces and ass hats from fly over country (come to California to see the freaks). Or worse yet California Hillbillies from Bakersfield Fresno and Modesto. Conan O’Brien has a much hipper audience.
Jason in WV
Yeah those jokes suck.
I quit watching Leno during the writer’s strike, when he was being such an ass.
Niles
Letterman’s humor is darker and more attuned to the nihilistic self-absorbed “new generation” that is no longer even ashamed to think that they are “better than” people how are not like them.
Leno’s humor is much more honest and less condescending and less gratuitously cruel (for being cruel’s sake).
What, pray tell, is a “social dunce”?
This new generation is worse than the already-selfish Boomers and that is a nasty proposition for the future.
Michael W.
@dfrw: On September 22, 2006, Variety reported that The Tonight Show led in ratings for the 11th consecutive season, with a nightly average of 5.7 million viewers – 31% of the total audience in that time slot – compared to 4.2 million viewers for The Late Show with David Letterman, 3.4 million for Nightline and 1.6 million for Jimmy Kimmel Live. When the Leno show initially directly faced Letterman’s show, Letterman initially led in ratings, however the turning episode is generally marked when Hugh Grant appeared on Leno (July 10, 1995). Leno famously asked Grant “What the hell were you thinking?” referring to Grant’s arrest for seeing a prostitute.
At 11:35 p.m. ET during the fourth quarter 2008, “Tonight” won the time period over CBS’s “Late Show with David Letterman” by a 19 percent margin in adult 18-49 viewers and 25 percent in total viewers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tonight_Show_with_Jay_Leno#Ratings
I’d also imagine a lot will watch this Thursday when Barack Obama makes an appearance, the first time ever for a sitting President.
Nobody is fucking with Jay Leno.
BradK
@Niles: This new generation is worse than the already-selfish Boomers and that is a nasty proposition for the future.
Where, pray tell, do you think they learned it from? Narcissism only breeds more narcissism. And each successive generation always tries to outdo the previous. While mom and dad (if there is one) are watching Leno on the tube, the kids are watching Stewart and Colbert on Hulu.
As for Leno’s attempt at humor, I didn’t find it offensive as much as just not funny. Sad, really. Is it just me or is he beginning to resemble Newt Gingrich?
Wang
Speaking of Chelsea Clinton:
There is bad news about her father.
It is opined that Bill Clinton committed racist hate crimes, and I am not free to say anything further about it.
Respectfully Submitted by Andrew Y. Wang, J.D. Candidate
B.S., Summa Cum Laude, 1996
Messiah College, Grantham, PA
Lower Merion High School, Ardmore, PA, 1993
(I can type 90 words per minute, and there are probably thousands of copies on the Internet indicating the content of this post. Moreover, there are innumerable copies in very many countries around the world.)
_________________
“If only it were possible to ban invention that bottled up memories so they never got stale and faded.” Off the top of my head—it came from my Lower Merion High School yearbook.