Comedian Akaash Singh describes heckler incidents where he was nearly assaulted and discusses recent violence at comedy venues, including a shooting at a Craig Robinson show and an attempted stabbing of Dave Chappelle. He argues comedians might need self-defense training but warns against adopting a victim mindset.
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What was like your craziest like heckler experience? I'm sure you've had a few.
I've almost gotten the shit kicked out of me a couple of times.
Um, I really need to learn how to fight because at some point it's gonna— dude, that's what Rogan has. Like that, I feel like for comedians, especially with what's going on lately, learning how to fight would be a good idea.
Like, I mean, yeah, and the Craig Robinson thing, I was at the Comedy Zone 3 weeks ago and then somebody came and and with a gun to that same club 3 weeks later, Craig Robinson. So, you know, maybe that's just a sign that I'm not nearly as famous as Craig Robinson. But it's fucking scary, man. It's like, yo, this is a thing that could happen.
Yeah. What was the thing with Chappelle? That didn't even make— I saw the thing. It was like a gun and a knife or something? That didn't even make sense. He had a knife, but it looked like a gun.
And he tried to stab Chappelle, which is just crazy. And nobody made that big of a deal about it. Nobody's making that big of a deal about Craig Robinson. Nobody's doing anything. Yeah, nobody made that video about Chris Rock getting slapped. It's really wild. And comedians, the last thing we need is to feel like victims because we'll milk that shit forever.
100%. Yeah, no, I think that's the craziest thing to me, that I don't understand why it's happening or why people— I, I call it like kind of like layered thinking, right? So if you go to a comedian show and they say something that pisses you off and you actually like allow it to piss you off, then I feel like that's like layer 1 thinking, like kind of pretty ignorant, right? Because they're not there to, like, necessarily make you happy or, uh, to, like— I mean, you can teach the audience things, like, you can do whatever you want, it's your time on stage, but, like, ultimately you can't necessarily take any of it, like, at face value of seriousness, right? So you got to think, like, just to the second layer and just be like, okay, that triggered me, but it's a fucking joke.
Yeah, that's where it should stop. Like, that's it. That's great layered thinking, 100%.
Yeah, and most people just don't have that, I guess. Like, I don't know.
Yeah, I think we've, um, we've made— and a lot of comedians exploit this— we've kind of made like a victimhood currency. So like, if you feel victimized by anything, there's some power in that because people will listen to it. So if I feel victimized by your joke, oh, there's power in that. And there's a lot of comedians who have made— I'm not gonna act like we're guilt-free because there's tons of comedians who have made a career out of Oh, we are victims. You guys should feel bad for us. And then in lieu of making you laugh, I'll just make you feel guilty. So there's an odd thing that happens. And that's— I think that's part of why there's so much layer one thinking, to use your term.
