Trevor Noah might not have been Comedy Central’s first choice to replace Jon Stewart on The Daily Show, at least if you believe Bill Simmons, but he has certainly brought a lot of attention to the network this week. What’s strange is that it wasn’t anything he did recently, but instead some hand-picked Tweets from the last five years that people find offensive. The young standup comic, like most of his peers, regularly uses Twitter to try out material, and not every joke has been a winner. Some of them have been downright flat and dumb, but it’s the subject matter that has the Internet’s torches lit and pitchforks sharpened.
As with most cases of comedian outrage, Noah’s fellow comics have rushed to his defense, from Seth MacFarlane in a single accurate Tweet to Patton Oswalt’s latest online lesson in coping with thin skin. Even Comedy Central stands behind Noah as Stewart’s successor. But what does the young man himself have to say about it?
To reduce my views to a handful of jokes that didn’t land is not a true reflection of my character, nor my evolution as a comedian.
— Trevor Noah (@Trevornoah) March 31, 2015
I guess if you’re in trouble because of Twitter, then it’s a good medium with which to start. It’s just a shame that The Daily Show is on a break, because this whole situation could probably serve as a nice way for Noah to show everyone what he’s really made of.
