WTF?: "Seinfeld"'s Michael 'Kramer' Richards in Weird-o-Rama Onstage Meltdown

With "Fifty years ago we'd have you upside down with a f***ing fork up your ass", I'd say controversy was headed Richards' way. In fact, I think in one way that's the more astonishing part of his rant, due to the ugliness of sentiment undergirding it.

thegoyim (11 hours ago)
This guy is one fucked up individual damn thats messed up if you pay attention he says thats what happens when u intterupt the white man. You can tell he really means it too that the most horrible thing and I used to like the character of Kramer not that much anymore. There will eventually be a giant race war In Los Angeles mark my words.

LOL "i now must reassess my love for this Kramer character"

http://www.blaxploitation.com/images/cover_gifs/cover_the_warriors.gif

--WARRIORS PIC--

More like:

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naw, if there's a saving grace to this mess, that's it. i mean, that's so not funny that ...

Recorded live at the Apollo Theatre in New York in 1966. Davy, from Arkansas, talks with a drawl thicker than molasses.... 7 routines including Opening, Greyhound Bus, Non-Violence, New York Blackout, Things is Getting Better, New York Signs and Times is Changing...liner notes by Merv Griffin, Produced by John Hammond

Merv Griffin?!

michael richards voice was shaking. whole thing is pretty sad i think

i didn't say that. just seemed really nervous, as he should

-- Ned Raggett (ne...)

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/a4/Seinfeld_s9e6.jpg

thought you were mocking the comment i made. my bad

Racism ain't as bad as it used to be anyway man.
I mean its fucked up but,
They don't call niggers, niggers no more and shit.
White people don't say it.
Especially when there's niggers around.
So I guess I wouldn't know.

It should have been Carrot-Top

*I apologize for ever aspect of this post

ihttp://youtube.com/watch?v=7mFyKNxXFGM&mode=related&search=

none of this thing had any artistic intent behind it. it was in no way a botched routine. yes, the rawness of the stage might have been a factor driving the reaction, but it was not the primary one. (though it's a notable irony that 'comedy' deals so often with race among other differences) no, the dude did something more elemental than that. he got called out and he felt seriously one-upped. so he flipped and did what lots of people in a position of serious weakness might do - he immorally went for a perceived comparative advantage. it could be i'm taller/bigger than you. it could be i'm richer than you. it could be i'm stronger than you. it could be i'm smarter than you. it could be i-know-how-to-reach-level-whatever-on-super-mario or i-know-more-klingon-than-you or whatever-the-fuck crazy thing some crazy dude comes up with. what could he tell about these people? he was whiter than them, and he went there. 'judgement' had nothing to do with it; it was a fight or flight reaction. maybe that's a revealing moment for which 'racist' is the only word. or maybe it demeans the concept to apply it to a sad dude who feels like a loser and says something in public that is not only hugely socially unacceptable/potentially career-killing but also something that he knows full well outside the moment is completely irrational, that in the moment means something to him emotionally indistinguishable from "you're short," and that he's obviously quite genuinely remorseful about. or at least to use the same word you would apply to someone who lucidly affirms/acts on support for racial violence and institutionalized prejudice. the fact that the impact was such a foregone conclusion should demonstrate how completely irrational he must have been at the time. not to mention the incredibly weird fork-torture-flipout, and his yearning for the good old civil rights era lynchings when he was, uh, a 7-year-old Angeleno. admittedly, it's harder to imagine he flipped out on that level for 2 whole minutes, but maybe being on stage and digging a big hole would do that to you.

again, this isn't to excuse or mitigate his behavior in any way. but i think if we just deem this a sudden outburst of long-suppressed secret racism, or even if we recognize that's not what it is but refuse to be concerned with the 'motivation' any further, we're failing to really address an issue that might be bigger than the dude who played Kramer. I actually think the Mel Gibson incident is similar in some respects, even despite the obvious differences there in his demonstrated history/associates/remorse level/personality. admittedly, also, Richards isn't much older than George Allen, and age/location were no bar to that dude's confederacy-fetish, but I don't really see Richards having spent his whole adult life using traditional racist (and misogynistic) trappings as outlets for his pronounced sadistic/antisocial tendencies (but maybe there are even lessons about the Allen thing here too).

the difficult question for me here is whether he 'believes' what he said, whatever that actually means. i think it's totally obvious that he doesn't hate black people or regard what he said as in any way appropriate. but i think this thing did reveal that he was willing to try to enjoy his white privilege, such as it is, however briefly/instantaneously, if made to feel worthless by someone who happened to be black. in simply stamping down that reaction as racist, though, are we also pushing the proposition of white privilege closer towards public secret territory?

i think he intuits some of these ideas, but doesn't entirely get all of them, and i think he's authentically at least somewhat confused about the meaning, both personal and public, of what he said. i give him at least some credit for assuming responsibility to confront both of those things.

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i saw michael richards in a grocery store in santa monica about a year ago. dude looked old, sort of benign but just enough creepiness to make you think twice about approaching him.