The Rise and Fall of Stand-up Comedy

A few years back, in 2005, there came on television an interesting show called "The Great Indian Laughter Challenge" on a channel called star one. It was an interesting new concept for Indians. In a country where most people work throughout the day in a tiring atmosphere, look up to the television for some light-hearted entertainment after returning home. This was a refreshing new take, stand up comedians giving you moments of laughter after an entire day of traffic jam, office screens, public transport, and whatnot. Thus, this new format gained immediate popularity. Those comedians actually worked hard on their scripts. Each one of them had their own style, some were mimics while others used the poetry form of comedy. The first two seasons were very successful and received the highest audience ratings. The only names I remember are Sunil Pal, Raju Srivastava, and Kapil Sharma from that show. Later they became quite famous and even got to appear in movies. Later this form of standup comedy was picked up by almost all entertainment channels and frequently appeared on television. Slowly the pattern of their jokes became so monotonous that regular audience could figure out which joke came next. Most of their jokes were based on body shaming the judges mostly Archana Puran Singh, making fun of Siddhu's Shayari, etc. In one of the shows, Rohit Shetty was the judge and the entire acts revolved around people asking him for a role in his movies. Completely forgetting the audience that they were supposed to entertain. Some of it was a little bit entertaining. Then Kapil Sharma started his own show which had nothing but some celebrities coming over for the promotion of their movies. They had a few comic characters some men dressed as women and repeatedly made the guests uncomfortable in an act of comedy. All of it appeared artificial to me and not that funny. So apparently this comedy in Hindi was supposed to be for the common Indian audience while for the elite ones there was one in English.

After the increase in popularity of youtube, basically, every person with a smartphone became a potential standup comedian or an audience for the same. All kinds of groups making comedy surfaced on youtube with strangest of names like "All India Bakchod", "East India Comedy", "The Viral fever" etc. For me, they lost the battle then and there. Nothing that makes words like "Bakchod" mainstream is not going to last long. They did gain popularity but, in 2018 they shut down due to sexual assault allegations on one of their members. Their audiences merely consisted of unsuspecting 17-18 yr olds who loved watching elite English comedy to learn new slangs that were apparently "cool".To me, they were relatable but not so funny. I never actually "laughed out Loud" at any of their acts. Individual comedians like Kenny Sebastian were also quite popular with their classy "Hinglish" jokes which were again, relatable as a 90s kid but not funny to me. I only watched them because the people around me were talking about them. So, apparently, everyone was trying hard to be funny on youtube.

Post-2014, all the so-called comedians have gone berserk in their acts featuring Modi in every single one of them. One guy called Kamra whose entire fan base is based on negativity and trolling. I only came to know about him when I read in the news that he harassed a popular journalist in a flight. He was banned from flying. He tries all sorts of monkey antics in order to gain popularity. He demeans people who are actually doing great work towards society. When we praised and thanked our Corona warriors for their duty, he posted a picture showing the middle finger. He used vulgar and totally unacceptable words towards Sadhguru, a man who has dedicated his entire life to humanity and kindness. Apparently criticizing or making fun of Modi has several advantages for these people: (1) Nobody will give you death threats or behead you in the middle of the road (2) You will get pageviews from Modi haters who will praise you as well as Admirers who will view the act just to see what comment you made (I heard youtube gives some 100 rs per 1000 views) (3) You get instant popularity and validation from the opposite party. This guy even went for promoting the anti-national Kanhaiya Kumar in elections. These things might have gotten you a lot of attention Mr. Kamra but you have totally lost respect. There are several who followed his lead. Most of their acts can be described as:

Chapri Comedian: "Gaumutra", "Bhakt", "Sanghi" hahahahahah
Audience: hahahahaha
Me: But where is the joke?
Chapri comedian: You didn't laugh, you must be a bhakt.

Don't even get me started on female standup comedians who are anything but funny. They only say a few things like tatti, chaddi, bra, periods, ex-boyfriend, etc and the audience goes hahahahahaha. Even the jokes made on them are much funnier than them. Here is an example:

99.99% of Indian girls have a good sense of humor. Rest become stand up comedians.

— THE SKIN DOCTOR (@theskindoctor13) July 9, 2020

Currently, they are on a mission to offend the majority of the population by making casteist slurs, by making fun of Hindu gods, by making fun of ISCKON, by making fun of Shri Chattrapati Shivaji Maharaj in their acts to gain instant fame. A girl named Agrima Joshua made unnecessary comments on the statue that is going to be made in the memory of the great Maratha King. This had caused a stir on social media few days ago. Such was her entitlement that she tweeted "she won't apologize for this". A few hours later few people vandalized their sets. She immediately apologized and removed the video from youtube. This new trend is dangerous for the peace and well- being of our society. These people feed on attention, so they must not be given any. I cannot even imagine that some people actually pay money to visit their shows. These comedians can't even take any constructive criticism on the content on the content of their shows. They accuse you of being a "BJP IT CELL" when you criticize them and act like all scared schoolgirls in their pinafores and how social media has become "so toxic" and get give a mental health lecture (which actually they need), freedom of speech lecture and whatnot. They do not speak a word for freedom of expression when Charlie Hebdo incidences occur. They instantly retract statements after making fun of other religions and issue an unconditional apology. Such is the hypocrisy.

Meet @Agrimonious, who's a "standup comedian" thinking that she can crack jokes on Indian army and get away with it. pic.twitter.com/udvAEAZZD8

— Krish Kshatriya (@KrishKshatriya_) July 9, 2020

Once when Vir Das was criticised here's what he said :

If you liked a joke or didn't...that's valuable feedback.
But I'm pretty sure I speak for many comics when I say: If you've never written a joke, stood on a stage, or made a career out of this...spare us your long sanctimonious thesis on what comedy should or shouldn't be about.

— Vir Das (@thevirdas) June 2, 2020

Vir das who has not even ever stood for gram panchayat elections can teach Modi how to run the nation but cannot tolerate people criticizing his comedy from the audience who have no experience of "stage". The stand-up comedy industry is towards a great fall for sure. It is simply full of upper-class elite urban criticizing the country, its prime minister, Hindu gods, teachings of Gurus and spreading nonsense in the garb of comedy. The comedy which makes you uncomfortable, angry is not a comedy. Comedy is supposed to relieve you out of your worries which is precisely what they have forgotten.