Jerry Seinfeld Says ‘Extreme Left’ Did Not Actually Ruin Comedy

Jerry Seinfeld walked back his comments about the “extreme left and PC crap” suppressing comedy, admitting in a new interview with fellow comedian Tom Papa, “It’s not true.”

Seinfeld made the remark on an episode of the New Yorker Radio Hour, arguing that the dearth of sitcoms like Cheers, All in the Family, and M.A.S.H. on TV was the result of overly sensitive PC culture run amok. “This is the result of the extreme left and PC crap and people worrying so much about offending other people,” Seinfeld said. “When you write a script and it goes into four or five different hands, committees, groups — ‘Here’s our thought about this joke’ — well, that’s the end of your comedy.”

In walking that back, Seinfeld said, “I don’t think the extreme left has done anything to inhibit the art of comedy. I’m taking that back now officially. They have not. Do you like it? Maybe, maybe not. It’s not my business to like or not like where the culture is at. It’s my business to make the gate.”

Seinfeld’s “making the gate metaphor” was part of a larger comparison he made between comedy and competitive skiing: Just as the best skiers are able to get through gates wherever they’re placed on a mountain, the best comedians are able to navigate any cultural landscape.

“You don’t make the gate, you’re out of the game,” Seinfeld said. “The game is: Where is the gate? How do I make the gate and get down the hill the way I want to?”

He continued: “Does culture change, and are there things I used to say that I can’t say, that everybody’s always moving? Yeah, but that’s the biggest, easiest target… So what? The accuracy of your observation has to be 100 times finer than that to just be a comedian.”