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Theres no fanfare or self-regard to be seen here.
Rock is as good a writer as its possible for a comedian to be without sounding written.
Ninety-seven people deserved to die.
He keeps things focused.
Ever since my kids were born, Ive been getting them ready for the white man, he says.
Everything in my house thats the color white is either hot, heavy, or sharp.
My kids know that when they deal with anything white, they gotta think about that shit.
They gotta contemplate this shit.
Ooh, this napkin, okay, should I wipe my mouth with it?
Or is that what whiteywantsme to do?
We got a rid of bullies.
A real bully showed up and we didnt know how to handle him.
If you subject that argument to real-world logic, it falls apart from the beginning.
But in the alternate universe of stand-up rhetoric, its architecture is unassailable.
Rock pulls off many similar examples, pushing Aristotle through the looking glass and transcribing his reports from Wonderland.
Malcolm X, Rosa Parks, George Bush.
They need to honor him at the Essence Festival.
It throws the wisdom ofTamborineinto sharper relief and keeps sanctimony at bay.
But here, too, Rock punctures the hot-air balloon: I havent been to church in ten years.
Now thats believing in God!
His material on relationships, sparked byhis own divorce, is also tough, and it rings true.
He doesnt spare himself in his discussions of lack of commitment, whether monogamous or emotional.
If youre gonna love, love hard or get the fuck out, he says.
Relationships, he explains, are only tough when one persons working on it.
Two people can move a couch real easy.
One person cant move it at all.
Stop competing, is one bit.
Her success is your success and your success is her success.
Hell, I ate pussy on 9/11, he says.
Then he pauses, looks out at the audience, and innocently asks, Where wereyou?
