‘Those who laugh as a body today, will march as a body tomorrow’: Critical comedy and the politics of community

Abstract

Comedians are often celebrated for critically confronting their audiences, thereby upsetting deep-held beliefs of spectators and contributing to progressive change. In this article, I will use Dutch comedy as my case study to demonstrate that comedians’ playful opposition to the audience has serious political implications and reveals a deep suspicion towards political community. By analysing this fear of the community, this article contributes to a better understanding of the politics of comedy and challenges the dominant idea that critical comedy is inherently progressive and emancipatory. I point to the separate ways in which two Dutch comedians from different generations – Freek de Jonge and Micha Wertheim – use humour to unmask the audience as proto-fascist mass.