Chappelle said “fuck Bill Maher,” in his special, even though Maher defended the comedians who performed in Saudi Arabia as progress. Maher did joke that if Dave was really freer there than in America as he claimed, he should try doing his Muhammad material. Obviously, that touched a sore spot. Dave ended up swinging at the entire cloud of criticism surrounding the festival while using Maher who had defended his going as a punching bag. Marc Maron imagined Theo Von interviewing Hitler, a clear attack on Theo for humanizing Trump. But Trump had already been welcomed onto Saturday Night Live and Fallon. Don’t remember that part in his special. Theo also publicly said that he was willing to have Kamala on, so portraying the podcast as inherently fascist propaganda requires ignoring relevant context and believing Harris’ campaign lies that they weren’t offered to go on. The Hitler bit may work as comedy, but the moral indictment underneath it is swinging at a ghost. Chelsea Handler attacked Shane Gillis and Tony Hinchcliffe for supposedly going to Saudi Arabia, even though Shane publicly declined and Tony wasn’t there. That isn’t criticism, it’s condemnation based on a false premise. Comedians talking shit about other comedians is tradition. Comedians appointing themselves moral authorities over other comedians, claiming ownership of goodness, and distorting reality to make the prosecution work, is something different. They’ve become trapped in the same digital culture war they’re supposed to be able to see through: flattening people into symbols, omitting inconvenient facts and swinging at ghosts. Thats delusional troll shit. The joke is no longer exposing the distortion. The joke is serving it.