I Want You to Shut the F#ck Up Read online

  Well, I could. I not only believed it, but I’d predicted it. Maybe I didn’t predict the exact circumstance, but I knew some shit was going to go down at some point for my boy. It was inevitable.

  When Kyle got home, his mother took time to cry with him and tell him how insulted and hurt she was. After they were done with that spectacle, I called him up to my room. “It’s a shame,” I told my son, “that you got a gun pulled on you. But most motherfuckers I know have had guns pulled on them. You lived through it. I feel bad that it happened to you, but now you know that I don’t just tell you shit for my health.”

  “I’m a good kid!” Kyle insisted.

  “The world don’t know that. The only people that know you’re a good kid is me and your mother. That’s it! That’s all you’ve got. When you look back on this day, realize that you should listen to your dad. I’m not trying to stop you from living. I’m trying to get you to live. I want you to be where you want to be. It’s my gig to help you get there in spite of how fucking stupid you are!”

  I want to raise my son to face the world as it is, not the world he wants it to be. My son didn’t fall off a bed or hurt himself physically. But I’m sure he’ll remember that lesson just like I remember why I got that scar above my eye. My son actually learned from it, and that felt great to me. There is nothing that makes a parent angrier than when your kids make the wrong choices, after you told them it’s a mistake. And there’s nothing that makes a parent prouder than those extremely rare occurrences when your children do actually listen to you.

  I’d always told my son that if he got pulled over by the police and asked questions, to be as respectful as possible. I reminded him about what every black man knows, to keep his hands at 10 and 2 on the steering wheel. That way, the cops know immediately that you’re housebroken. You get the rules and know how things are supposed to be. “But if the police ask you anything that you think is beyond your capacity,” I explained to Kyle, “you say two things. First, ‘Sir, I know you’ve got a job to do and I respect you.’ Second, ‘I’m not going to say one other thing. Call my father.’ I don’t care what they say to you after that, you don’t say one other thing. I don’t give a fuck if you’re forty years old when this happens. I don’t care. Because boy, you didn’t have these experiences. You don’t know this shit. You live in a world where you think everything is great. But that world doesn’t exist. It’s cute, it’s a great notion. The brochure is a motherfucker—but I ain’t ever been there.”

  Sure enough, at one a.m. one night Kyle got pulled over coming home from a club. “Have you been drinking?” the policeman said.

  “No,” my son told him. “I don’t drink.”

  “Where are you coming from?”

  “The club.”

  “Well, where have you been tonight? Because we had this report …” That’s what the cops always say. There’s always some mysterious motherfucking report.

  To his great credit, my son said, “Sir, I know you’ve got a job to do and I respect you. I answered every question I could. I’m not going to answer another question. I want you to call my father.”

  Society will tell you that the more you talk to the police, the better shit will be. That’s not true. That’s the kind of shit they tell you on Ironside: “If you don’t have anything to hide, why hide anything?” That ain’t real. Motherfuckers get in legal trouble for talking too much, not talking too little. Don’t most people in life get in trouble for talking too much? When has shutting the fuck up and minding your own business not worked for anyone? In marriage, in school, in church, in the library, at the restaurant: Shut the fuck up! Your dumb ass might even learn something.

  “I don’t feel comfortable,” my son repeated. “You can call my father.”

  After twenty minutes of this, the police let him go. They didn’t even bother calling me. My son raced to our house at precisely the speed limit. When he found me, he told me how elated he was that what I said worked.

  “See?” I said. “I’m not telling you shit that’s going to fuck you up.”

  That doesn’t just apply to my son. It applies to everything I say. When I go through life, I ask, “Why?” just like Mr. Boston taught me to. When I see something that’s fucked up, I can’t remain silent because of the sacrifices that Ron Wolf made for me. I’ve worn a lot of hats in my life. I’ve been wealthy and I’ve been poor. I’ve been a King of Comedy, playing to an all-black crowd, and I’ve been a pariah for daring to defend Don Imus. I’ve been a comedian, a commentator, and an actor. I’ve been a “nigger,” an “African-American,” and an “Uncle Tom.” As a stand-up I’ve traveled this country for decades, seeing it at its best and at its worst. And what I’m seeing is terrifying to me. Our culture is at a point where we can ignore one another, where people don’t ever have to engage with others who don’t think the same way that they do. The tools for us to come together are themselves falling apart—and the biggest tool for people to come together is communication.

  We are failing to communicate in this nation on a fundamental level. It’s not even political correctness. I am obviously not a PC person, but it’s much worse than being extra-careful about how you say things. We are at a point where people can say things that are nakedly untrue, and everyone around them will smile and nod—and then repeat it, and on, and on. Well, just because a song is popular don’t make it factual.

  Communication is a relationship between two parties—and half of communication is listening. I can’t remember the last time I watched a news program or interview show where one party stopped and considered what someone else is saying. It almost never happens. Everyone comes in with their talking points, waits patiently for their turn to spout their perspective, and then the people watching at home parrot what they have just seen. That’s not communication. That’s repetition.

  One of the harshest criticisms of old-fashioned education was that it only got students to memorize and repeat names, dates, and numbers. They didn’t get the perspective to know what these things meant. Well, our culture doesn’t even get that far. We’re not repeating names, dates, and numbers, which are facts. We’re repeating talking points, aspersions, and allegations, which are opinions—and dubious ones at that. Shut the fuck up!

  We live in the information age, but we’re less informed than ever. The Internet is the most powerful repository of human knowledge that has ever existed, yet we’re too fucking self-absorbed and stupid to actually go out and learn things for free. Why learn something when you can just look it up, right? That lazy mindset is pervasive. People genuinely believe America is the greatest, smartest, and strongest country in the world—and that they are therefore great, smart, and strong. Let me tell you something: Intelligence is not contagious. Shut the fuck up!

  It used to be that people would grieve when one of their loved ones passed. I’m not that old to remember that this was the universal reaction. When you got that phone call, your heart skipped a bit and you paused. You remembered, and you reflected. Maybe you cried a little bit. Now people’s immediate reaction is to Tweet or update their status. A human being has died and people run to express as publicly as possible how they feel. The right to bear arms doesn’t mean you need to go out and shoot guns; the right to free speech doesn’t mean you need to go out and shoot your motherfucking mouth. SHUT THE FUCK UP!

  I hope this book will make people reflect, and possibly learn something. I’d be very glad if it makes people laugh. But if readers are to take one thing away from it, just one thing, it’s this: If you’re ever at a point where you’re not sure what to do, stop for a minute and think. Examine the issue from the opposite point of view, no matter how uncomfortable it makes you feel. And if you’re ever tempted to repeat one of the absurdities I discuss, I want you to shut the fuck up.

  THE American dream is in dire need of a wake-up call.

  The only national consensus that exists is that we are fucked. We’re fucked today, and we’re going to be fucked in the future. No one
seems to know the way out of this mess, and I can see why. That’s because the first step to getting better is doing something no one is willing to do: identify the nature of the problem.

  Healing and getting better works the same way with people as it does with countries. If you are in denial, if you think everything is fine, then things are simply going to keep getting worse and worse until you hit bottom. When it’s a person that hits bottom, it’s somewhat of a positive: He can turn his life around. He can get the help he needs. But when it’s a nation that hits bottom, there might not be any going back. That means a country breaking up, or political repression, or economic collapse. No matter what form it takes, it means a great deal of suffering on a huge scale.

  But our leaders don’t tell us that we have a problem. They encourage us to maintain our delusions. They flatter us so we can stay fat, ignorant, and lazy. Every political leader anywhere on the political spectrum proclaims loudly and openly that America is the greatest country in the world. They’re lying—and they know it. It’s Chicken Little, but in reverse. The sky is falling, but we’re supposed to act like everything’s fine.

  It may sound alarmist, but that’s only because the facts are alarming. There is no standard of living by which America is the best country in the world. In terms of life expectancy, we’re 36th—tied with Cuba, and behind Israel. We trail every Western European country in terms of life expectancy, with one exception. In terms of literacy, we’re 20th—behind Poland and Kazakhstan. We sit here making Polish jokes and laughing at Borat while the Kazakhs sit in their homes reading. In terms of murders per capita, we’re worse than such allegedly violent nations as Iran and Libya. We boast about being the world’s one superpower and winning the Cold War. Yet our national debt is at a record $14 trillion, and the creditors are the Chinese. Russia’s national debt, on the other hand, is $150 billion (dollars). We laughed when the Russians invaded Afghanistan and failed to remake the country—and now are repeating their mistakes.

  Things are bad now and they’re only going to get worse. Half of U.S. students who begin college never finish. Whether that’s due to financial reasons or they just can’t handle it, that remains a terrifying statistic for our future as a nation. Let’s add to that high school dropout rates and kids who don’t go to college to begin with.

  There is a standard by which we’re #1 in the world. We have more of our citizens locked up in prison than every other country. Every other nation, from dictatorship to democracy, has fewer of its people locked up. How is that the Land of the Free? How can we claim any moral high ground when we have so many of our own people behind bars? You can look at that as a gross misapplication of justice, which is evil, or you can look at it as a consequence of a nation rife with criminals. But how can a nation rife with criminals be considered moral?

  I am not claiming for a second that telling people hard truths is an easy thing to do. It’s very difficult. A person can’t hear you if they refuse to even listen. I’m as guilty of this as anyone, and the person I lied to is myself. Five days a week, I go for a five-mile run. I used to pride myself on being able to jump on a treadmill and start going with no warm-up necessary. Today I have Achilles tendinitis and it’s very painful. I’ve got to stretch, coax, and pray that my tendinitis won’t flare up if I go for a run. I’ve been running for a very long time, since before I ran from the Crips in high school. It took a lot of physical pain and many bullshit explanations before I could admit to myself that that’s not me no more. I’m not that young dude I liked to think of myself as.

  When I looked up the causes for Achilles tendinitis, I found that one of them was being a middle-aged athlete. As athletes get older, they can’t run as fast or as far as they used to. It’s understandable why a record-breaking athlete believes that the rules don’t apply to him. He made his career by overcoming insurmountable obstacles. After his glory days are behind him, he’s too respected to have someone sit him down and tell him that his time has passed. The athlete goes on believing that he can keep running forever, that he’s the one guy who can beat time. That’s what America is like. We’re that fat, middle-aged athlete who thinks he can do what he used to do.

  Our recent history is full of examples of us thinking that the rules don’t apply to America. We’re the one guy that can cut taxes in a time of war. We’re the one country that can beat Afghanistan—even though nobody else has. We’re the one nation that can gut school spending and somehow produce an educated workforce. That’s what I see when I see appeals to blind patriotism. It’s saying that we are somehow so inherently different as a nation that we can violate socioeconomic principles without any consequences.

  There’s no country in the world that can sit America the middle-aged athlete down and tell him, “You’re too old for this. Why do you keep embarrassing yourself? At a certain point, you’ve got to hang up the cleats. Stop! That’s why people play golf! It’s not disrespectful and it’s not embarrassing. Golfers live longer, anyway.”

  We’ve all heard the expression “Put your money where your mouth is.” Our money is in our mouth, and that’s the military. Besides prison population per capita, the other standard we lead the world in is military strength. But are the most militaristic nations the best societies to live in? Nations that spend a lot of money on their militaries are not exactly happy utopias where the general population thrives. At the rate we’re going, what’s going to be left for the military to protect? Burger King?

  Every empire that has ever existed has been brought down by circumstances similar to the ones we are experiencing now: overreaching, doing more than they should, and ignoring the signs of their own demise. Everyone thought it wouldn’t happen to them. But when it did, it wasn’t some twist ending. It was inevitable. We need to remember that we’re not the only power in the world. There are seven other countries in the G8 summit, and by and large they’re doing just fine. They’re doing better than fine, because they don’t have to carry around the burden of being the “world’s only superpower.” Being a superpower simply means we can kick everybody’s ass—but that’s all it means. It’s not like being a supercomputer, solving problems with finesse, ease, and efficiency. It simply speaks to our great strength. And who relies on their great strength to solve problems? Assholes. That’s what makes them such assholes!

  What does that look like to all the other countries? No one ever dares to raise that question. When you’re a teenager, being able to kick everybody’s ass made you the baddest dude in the neighborhood. But as you outgrow that juvenile mentality, being able to whup everybody doesn’t make you any cooler. The baddest dude in the neighborhood generally becomes the brokest, and it’s the nerds that eventually run shit. That bad asshole never gets it. He thinks his skill set, being able to outfight everyone, is the most redeeming one. Well, it’s not. No one thinks it is, except for him.

  To most people around the world, America is a bully that throws its weight around. We’re the dude who gets drunk all the time and starts bar fights, knowing he’ll win. No one wants to be friends with that guy, yet they pretend to like him because they fear him. The instant that motherfucker gets it, they’re all happy that it happened.

  “Did you see what happened to Earl? Earl got his ass whupped.”

  “Well, it’s about time!”

  The vast majority of the world is happy to see us get it. We’re the asshole who finally got what he deserved. We don’t get that, but that’s just how it works. We would rather be feared than respected. We can’t brag about being the world’s superpower—and then complain about having our nose in everyone’s business. We’re the muscle, not the brains. We’ve declared it explicitly and implicitly, constantly and repeatedly. Barack Obama wasn’t regarded as a strong leader until he killed a man, namely Osama bin Laden—a man “on the run” who still managed to have a better housing situation than most Americans. Every American leader is determined to show that we’re strong and that we’re going to whup some ass. In the Middle East, for ex
ample, it’s always, “We have to show our strength.”

  But if you keep looking for a fight, eventually you’re going to get one.

  Other countries have been down this road before, and we can learn from their mistakes. At different points, Germany and Japan were the nations who wanted to be the baddest people in the world. The Germans were so certain that they could beat the world that they tried it twice. The Japanese genuinely thought that they were a superior race. They believed America was soft and that we could be taken. They hit us first.

  But now Germany and Japan are part of the G8, aren’t they? They let go of the idea of having to be a military power, and instead they became economic and intellectual powers. They do a lot of things we don’t, like having universal health care and investing heavily in education. I don’t need to explain how well that’s worked out for them. We all know where Japan lies on the curve. Germany outranks us in virtually every reliable skill except for the military. Those nations own a great deal of America. As does Russia. As does China. All these nations that are supposedly “worse” than us are doing all right. Would it be so bad to take a page from their book? Let’s be Europe for a while. Let’s act like Japan.

  Damn, I think I’m turning Japanese. I really think so.

  It will be very hard for us to change our ways for the better. The only way we can change is if we admit that what has worked for us in the past isn’t working for us in the present. The last vestige, the last thing to die, is the idea people have of themselves. It’s true when it comes to athletes, and it’s true when it comes to nations. As hard as checking ourselves may sound, the alternative is much harder.

  Germany and Japan didn’t wake up one day and decide to stop their military ambitions and educate their people. Far from it! A country couldn’t have been more violent than Japan and Germany. Japan is a nation only about the size of California. How bad do you have to be to come from a country that small and then try to run the world? They were not big dudes, but they had some big ideas. Yet they weren’t beaten by bigger ideas. What fixed Germany and Japan’s perspectives was some good old-fashioned ass-whuppings. A bunch of people died, they were humiliated, and they said, “You know what? Fuck this shit! It ain’t working for us!” Violence ain’t so great when it’s being done to you. When you get your ass whupped, you start to change your perspective. So do we have to go to that level before we get it? I sure hope not.