The College Fix

Liberals are fond of saying that conservatives don’t know how to be funny. But actor and comedian Steven Crowder is out to prove them wrong.

Take his recent performance at Hillsdale College, during which Crowder leapt to the stage and began his evening of entertainment with this:

“Let’s hear it from this side of the room!” he said, riling up the crowd.

Applause thundered.

“And let’s hear it for Obama!” he finished, bringing the first laugh of the night.

The event was hosted by Hillsdale Young Americans for Freedom. The student activist group hoped that Crowder’s routine would provide a break from the serious political discussions typical at Hillsdale and throughout the conservative world.

“The students here are always busy with academics,” Hillsdale YAF President Nathan Brand said. “We have so many lectures here, we wanted to bring in somebody different to lighten it up.”

Crowder, an actor, comedian and former contributor to Fox News, used his sarcastic commentary to keep the audience chuckling throughout the routine.

“I honestly think that terrorist was new to the terrorism game,” Crowder said of the Detroit Christmas underwear bomber of 2009, “the other terrorists were just hazing him.”

Amid a deluge of jokes about culture – from smart cars to Halloween costumes – Crowder poked fun at liberal stereotypes like hipsters, vegans, and gay-pride activists.

“How does a fat, hairy, naked guy in glitter make anybody proud?” he asked.

An anecdote about nursery rhymes quickly turned politically incorrect with a poke at “women’s rights.”

“There once was an old lady who lived in a shoe – how do you have so many kids that you don’t know what to do?” he questioned. “I guess that’s better than the liberal version: there once was a lady who went to an abortion center, and her name was Sandra Fluke!”

Crowder also referenced recent political history, such as the controversy that arose when Chick-Fil-A Chief Operating Officer Dan Cathy made comments opposing same-sex marriage in 2012.

“Rosie O’Donnell tweeted me ‘I hope you enjoy that intolerance, and I hope you choke on it!’ That’s exactly what she tweeted me,” Crowder said. “That’s a horrible argument for you, because now you’ve framed intolerance as something delicious. Oh, this intolerance is fantastic! You’ve stepped up the flavor of homophobia.”

The audience was generally supportive. At times, though, Crowder’s willingness to cross the bounds of political correctness appeared to make some in the audience a bit uncomfortable.

The grand finale of the event was a question and answer session, where students picked Crowder’s mind about conservative activism.

Tyler Wilke, a Hillsdale junior, asked the best way to combat the apathy so prevalent in American culture.

“I’ve seen Ben Shapiro talk,” Wilke said, “and his way to deal with liberals is to publicly humiliate them in front of as many people as possible in order to dissuade them.”

Crowder answered with his disapproval of Shapiro’s methods, and suggested that conservatives should use more courteous, yet more persuasive, ones.

He explained one reason he did not return to his previous internet outlet was the hateful comment discussions that would inevitably appear on his video channel.

“People treat each other really badly, and it’s corrosive to the human soul,” he said. “The liberals dehumanize people, they think that makes it okay to treat people as subhuman.”

Some audience members found the comment ironic.

Hillsdale student Jack Shannon pointed out Crowder’s method is to mock stereotypically liberal behavior, which is both offensive and unconvincing to them.

“It was the medium, not so much the message, that bothered me,” Shannon said. “It was a bunch of like minded people sitting around laughing at stereotypes of the other ones. We were dealing with common sense arguments that don’t really have any traction with people outside of our likeminded circle. I found it inconsistent with his message at the end.”

Others, however, found Crowder’s comedy effective – and even inspiring.

“Denigrating people is never a solid strategy for building support,” Hillsdale student Matthew Little said. “And even if it is solid, I don’t think it’s the right thing to do. We’ve got to be better than that. I think he was right on.”

College Fix contributor Vivian Hughbanks is a student at Hillsdale College.

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