subjects of his performances, given his target that he wanted to educate his audience through his jokes.
3. What is Stand-Up Comedy to you?
When asked this question, Samuel had one brief, but sharp, answer. He responded to this question by answering that Stand-Up Comedy to him was a
media which has shaped himself as a fighter of freedom of speech. Later he went on stating that Stand-
Up Comedy was the media the „next level‟ of public speaking because in Stand-Up Comedy performances, he was forced to
inspire his audience, rather than only to entertain them. This statement of his agreed with what Lewis wrote about the potential powers of comedy as Lewis
dared saying that comedy was one way to prove somebody‟s existence as well as an evidence that somebody mattered 35.
D. PANDJI PRAGIWAKSONO
„Mesakke Bangsaku‟ was the label of Pandji‟s show which was held in Teater Besar Jakarta. The show which attracted around 1,200 live audience was sponsored by a TV
station, Kompas TV, which was actually a new player in Indonesia‟s terrestrial TV
constellation. However, the writer found relevance in Kompas TV‟s continuous support to Stand Up Comedy shows in Indonesia, given its slogan of „Inspirasi Indonesia‟
Inspiration for Indonesia, which helped the writer make a conclusion the show, beside meant to give light entertainment, was also directed to promote the TV station‟s value of
change and humanity. Plus, the show was entitled „Mesakke Bangsaku‟, which, if loosely translated, the hosts of the show both Pandji and Kompas TV thought there are pitiful
things related to the country, Indonesia, and that they felt they were obliged to do something about that in the form of criticizing unwanted circumstances and offering
changes, wrapped in the light fashion of a Stand Up Comedy show. Another element the writer found relevant to the theme and missions of the show
is the homey setting of the stage. There was no lavish property on the stage. Rather, presented there were a chair for Pandji to sit on, an aluminum flask for Pandji to have
water breaks from, and more interestingly, an artificial tree with branches. However, there was no leaf because the leaves were replaced by pictures, which unfortunately were
too small to be seen in the video. Interpreting the artificial tree deeply, the writer could say that the branches on the
tree represented one branch of life while every picture hanging there was a representation of impending national issues waiting to be solved. However, while problem solving was
out of Pandji‟s hands, it was evident that during the show Pandji would tactfully jump across branches to cleverly address a plethora of problems faced by his country,
Indonesia. So far the writer has presented brief profiles of comics whose live performances
were the subjects of this study, from which we could see how the four comics arrived from four different backgrounds. Having different backgrounds, thus different
experiences, however, did not mean that their bits had nothing in common, since the differences they had only enriched materials for their bits as well as helped them sharpen
the way they presented their provocative bits to their audiences. It all happened due to a fact that the four of them, at several points of their life, found themselves as members of
minority groups in their society, exposing them to various kinds of assaults from majority groups. What the writer meant by the term „minority‟ was not limited to their being
„minor‟ due to their racial attributes but also in a more abstract level, where they were „minor‟ when they were placed eyeball to eyeball against „majority‟ groups, whose
ideology and actions were frown upon hence the persistent protest through their witty jokes delivered on their Stand Up Comedy stages.
As written by …. in the previous chapter that Stand Up Comedy shows were venues where freedom of speech was given space to grow, the four comics observed in
this study acted as the embodiment of that statement through their clever lines and in so doing provided the writer enormous help to answ
er the study‟s first research question of „whose freedom might be encouraged by the comics‟ bits in their performances?‟.
In order to answer the question, the writer would below start the discussion by presenting the couple of American comics. Later, the writer would analyze their bits to
find out how the personas they were taking with them onto the stage really did present screams of certain groups of people which had been silent, or silenced, for long. The last
step taken in answering the first question would then be repeated the same steps, only this time to analyze the content of bits delivered by the Indonesian comics. Having completed
those steps, the writer would then offer a conclusion for the first research question. While tailoring research questions for this thesis was quite a challenge, finding
answers to the very questions was not a piece of cake, either. However, the writer finally
found out that the answer to the first research question, “In what ways do American and Indonesian Stand-Up Comedy shows offer new dimensions of dealing with social
issues?” could be found not only by closely observing the comics and the materials they delivered on the stages, but also by executing a dramatic change point of view; that is by
taking the place of the comics on the stage in order to able to observe what was really going on among the audience during shows. The groundings being set, the writer was
now confident to argue that the hypothesis offered about Stand-Up Comedy shows being a potential tool to communicate existing social issues could be seen from different
perspectives: comics‟ selection of bits, on-stage communication style, and their intended target, and in doing so, the writers cited examples from the four comics‟ shows to make
the answers legitimate.
E. COMICS‟ SELECTION OF BITS: THE CREATION OF COMMON
ENEMIES.
At first it did seem awkward when the writer found out that Stand-Up Comedy shows, which was seen as media to establish close relationship by Ross xii turned out to
be the exact same media through which comics introduced „a common enemy‟, a word
which cancelled out any notion of „close relationship‟. However, that was really the case as the writer delved into the recordings as the common enemy getting introduced to the
stage took the shape of social issues which the comics brought under the spotlight and right in front of the microphone, through the comics‟ bit selections, in order for the
audience to see and hear its presentation clearly. Briefly, the writer noticed that comics
effectively used butt of jokes of their bits; that was where common enemies in forms of immediate social issues were presented to the audience as something to fight together.
The social issues the writer found in the four shows covered various topics, among them were bits about technology, national security, racial issues, and health-
service matters. In order to add some weight to his claims, the writer has chosen bits from all four shows.
Without any particular order, the writer began with the observation of Russell Peters‟ bits to find how he inserted vital issues to his bits and discovered that he attacked
how various media had been presenting news across the globe in exaggerated manners. From Peters‟ London show, the writer noted one bit in which he addressed the media
tendency when on minute 34.05 he said, “You should go check the Middle East. It‟s not at all how the media makes
the Middle East seems. You watch the news, especially the North American news, they have been so hard on the Arabs. They make the Arabs look crazy.
When you watch the CNN, don‟t you get mad? They just make Arabs look like they‟re exploding every five minutes.”
Russell Peters‟ being American-Indian also meant him being a hybrid, and being just that gave him the privilege of presenting multiple points of view which allowed him
to use America-related and India-related issues as his butts of jokes, and he did exactly that in the above bit as he made fun of American news media, CNN, by implying that it
had been sending wrong messages to its audience by giving false perceptions on Arab countries. The use of „like they‟re the Arabs exploding every five minutes‟ term
