January 24, 2018
Page 15
Comedy in Age of Trump
C ontinueD from p age 9
“My analogy was that if you walk into a pet
store, they don’t have all the hamsters separat-
ed,” he said. “They all have different colors,
some have spots and all that stuff, yet they’re
getting along just fine. And I thought, how is
it possible that these little creatures with these
tiny brains are able to look past each others’
outward appearances and get along and live
together in peace.”
His guests are folks from all over the
country, and have included Jennifer Noble, a
professor who has talked about the rise of in-
terracial families in America; Preacher Law-
son, a comedian and former America’s Got
Talent contestant who is in an interracial re-
lationship; and a same-sex interracial couple
who’ve been together for 35 years.
Brannon’s next comedy show in Portland
comes Monday, Jan. 29 when the Minority
Retort, a premier stand-up comedy show-
case featuring comedians of color, is held at
the nonprofit Hollywood Theater in northeast
Portland from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.
During the show, he plans to recount a
disturbing racist encounter he had while per-
forming in Sand Point, Idaho. It happened af-
ter a white supremacist group was passing out
fliers, saying “Negroes aren’t people, and you
know, things like that, white genocide, all that
stuff,” he said.
When a reporter told him about the fliers
before the show, he was not deterred. Bran-
non still performed and even videotaped the
reactions at the end of the show, which was
sold out. Audiences were chanting his name
photo by J ulie a Dams -p erson
Nathan Brannon, pictured with his wife and
young son, hosts a podcast about being in
an interracial relationship.
in approval and cheering. All seemed normal.
“I was prepared to put the show online to
kind of say, ‘Hey look, there are great peo-
ple here. Just because there are a few idiots
doesn’t mean the whole town is terrible,’”
Brannon said.
But when he reviewed the video, he saw
something odd. One table near the front was
cheering like the others, but they all held up
what seemed like an innocuous hand symbol,
in unison.
“You connect your index finger and your
thumb and then your other three fingers are
kind of extended, like a ‘W’ I guess,” he said.
“I found out it’s a white pride or white pow-
er sign. it used to mean “OK.” That’s what I
thought they were saying, at first. Like, yeah
that’s all right. But I guess it’s kind of treat-
ed more as a dog whistle [for white suprema-
cists] these days, since the election,” Brannon
said. “It’s going around, I think, a lot. Like,
that’s one of the newer symbols.”
The Outline, a news website dedicated to
stories about racism in today’s culture con-
firmed that prominent members of the alt-
right like Milo Yiannopoulos, ex-Breitbart
writer Mike Ma, and others have been adopt-
ing the gesture since the election as a symbol
of solidarity with President Trump, who also
frequently uses the gesture in his speeches.
It’s also a frequent pose of alt-right adopted
meme Pepe the Frog.
Brannon appreciates the many other mem-
bers of the audience who were extremely sup-
portive.
“They were really troubled by it and stuff
like that so I did my best to bridge the gap or
try to use comedy to try and diffuse that whole
situation,” he said. “I think right now, the way
our society is, if we’re not willing to go and talk
to people at the ground level, and meet people
face to face, then we’re going to let all these
hateful groups get a hold of the narrative and I
don’t think we can afford for that to happen.”
Copies of Nathan Brannon’s comedy al-
bums ‘I Black Out’ and ‘Because’ are cur-
rently available on iTunes and Bandcamp. His
podcast, The Hamster Village, is available on
iTunes, GooglePlay, and Podbean.
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R
January 2018
MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY
22
23
24
25
Measure Your Feet
Day
National Handwriting
Day
National Pie Day
Brian Wildsmith
born, 1930
National Blonde
Brownie Day
29
Baseball Hall of
Fame established
(1936)
National Puzzle Day
30
Franklin D.
Roosevelt born,
1882 (23rd
President)
Eskimo Pie Patent-
ed, 1922, Christian
Nelson
Gold Discovered in
California At Sut-
ter’s Mill, 1848
Opposite Day
First Winter Olym-
pics held, 1924
FRIDAY SATURDAY
26
27
Australia Day (first
settled, 1788)
Lewis Carroll
National Geographic
Society Founded
(1888)
SUNDAY
28
Jackson Pollock
born, 1912 (Artist)
National Kazoo Day
31
Backwards Day
Jackie Robinson
born, 1919 (Base-
ball Great)
C alendar