And Now, This: How John Oliver Is Changing the Television Landscape
An important moment happened on a recent episode of Last Week Tonight With John Oliver. Let me back up a bit. The first time I saw John Oliver on television playing an obnoxious, possibly alcoholic professor in Community, I hardly thought that a few years later he would have a weekly late night show featuring […]
The Sadcom: How a new genre of comedy is teaching people about depression
In a recent segment, John Oliver pointed out something very disturbing about the way our politicians treat mental health: they discuss it for a week or so after a mass shooting in an attempt to prove that America’s lack of gun control isn’t the real problem. They use this deflection to avoid passing sensible legislation, […]
War of the Words
Almost thirty years ago to this day, Tipper Gore, wife of then-senator Al Gore, met with three other wives of prominent politicians to discuss a very serious issue: children were in mortal danger from the insidious threat of explicit lyrics. After hearing her daughter listening to Prince’s “Darling Nikki,” which contains references to sex and […]