David Cross Doesn’t Give a Shit if People Were Offended By His Religious Garment Twitter Joke
David Cross tells Mormons offended by his joke: Get your own fucking house in order.
Last week David Cross posted a photoshopped photo to promote his Salt Lake City show that freaked out hundreds of social media users. Wednesday night, as promised, he spent the first ten minutes of his show addressing the mild uproar.
Last Saturday, Cross tweeted out a picture of Tobias from Arrested Development, but photoshopped it so he was wearing Morman underwear captioned “Utah! Learn the real truth” printed on the photo. Hundreds of tweets poured in claiming the tweet was insensitive and offensive because it made a joke using sacred religious undergarments. The University of Utah initially thought it was funny but later apologized. Cross did not, and instead tweeted “Read the replies for some underwear fun,” and promised an opening 10 minutes that would be “on fire” at Wednesday’s show. He did not disappoint.
“I feel like there’s something I want to address,” he said, opening the show with a big laugh from the crowd who were obviously waiting to hear it and very clearly not offended. Cross explained the tweet saying that he truly had no idea how much offense people would take to his promotional tweet. “I never would have imagined…it doesn’t make sense to me…and I truly didn’t know that would be so upsetting to so many people,” he said. However, he wanted to be clear that he had no regrets. “Although I didn’t know it would be so deeply offensive, I also don’t give a shit.”
Cross made it clear that the notion of underwear that was sacred was absolutely hilarious to him, and said he would never be offended by any misappropriation of underwear or religious clothing, whether it be a yarmulke, hajib, habit, burka or otherwise. And we definitely “will never be offended by a photoshopped picture of a dude wearing long johns that you can get at a target.”
And what happened next was truly great, Cross took to task the Mormon religion, and all organized religion, explaining what does offend him. “When people in powerful positions cover up sexual abuse and molesting children. That I find very offensive,” he said. “I find telling people that a large part of the human population are being punished because they have black skin. I am also offended by people who ostracize homosexuals, gay people, ostracize them until sometimes they commit suicide. I find that offensive. I find that very upsetting.”
Cross’ message to those offended: “get your own fucking house in order first before you fucking yell at me for a photoshopped picture of underwear. Because I don’t like hypocrisy.”
One last thing, he said before turning to address a few other issues he has with some of the tourist attractions in Salt Lake City, the joke was not lazy. For those who criticized the tweet as lazy comedy, he explained that just because a joke is easy, doesn’t mean it’s lazy. For those who don’t watch Arrested Development, he explained the layer behind the joke, which you can hear in the clip below, and moved on.
And whether you like his joke, or don’t like it, or you don’t get it or you find it insensitive, it’s pretty fucking great to see a comedian not only stand behind a joke and actually put together coherent reasons why people should stop kvetching. Watch the video clip below.
David’s tour continues in North America through August, he will perform in Europe in September/October and at BAM in Brooklyn on Nov 10 as part of the New York Comedy Festival. For all tour dates, visit officialdavidcross.com.
