To the heart of Sam Hyde
The dissipating world through the eyes of alt-right comedy
Sam Hyde is a guy, you can read about him here in Wikipedia (I’m not even trying). Long story short, Sam Hyde was part of a troupe of comedians in the early 2010s called Million Dollar Extreme (MDE). MDE hit it big in 2016 when they got their own Adult Swim show, Million Dollar Extreme Presents: World Peace. Those were the early days of the Trump presidential campaign, the one that’d ultimately grant the man his first term, and Sam Hyde was all for Trump. People started realizing that hey, perhaps this comedy group had a political agenda. A series of stink pieces was released, calling the show alt-right, leading World Peace to be ultimately cancelled in late 2016. That was already after Trump won the presidency, mind you, throwing us into whatever version of reality we live now. By that time, however, World Peace had been axed.
There have been some very good videos analysing the repercursions of World Peace and the troubled, yet profoundly interesting events that led to its cancellation, see Liam Porter’s (Tim Heidecker vs Sam Hyde) “I Am A Cuck” and Porsalin’s Blacklisted. Sam Hyde and the scattered remains of MDE still have an active YouTube account and, one would argue, are more mainstream than ever — even considering the short stint in Adult Swim. Or rather, they found their niche, they have expanded said niche as much as comfortably possible, and now they occupy a stable position in the digital comedy scene.
There has been a lot of discussion throughout the years on whether World Peace was effectively an alt-right comedy show or not. I believe this is a moot point — World Peace was absolutely an alt-right comedy show, or a comedy show with alt-right sensibilities, and to deny that is to deprive oneself of much of the humour there. The humour and the strangeness. For in truth, I do think that there is value in watching a couple of the MDE sketches for the simple reason that they provide an outrageously combative, uncompromisingly cynical and disgusted view of modernity that seems to be absent in many liberal-minded TV shows. And this alien perspective can sometimes result in poingnant, if often schizophrenic (and ultimately reactionary) sketches. There is a moment in the Hollywood Reporter interview with Sam Hyde where the following exchange happens:
HR: And, on a personal note, I’m both Jewish and gay. And I wasn’t taking offense. I was finding it weird and silly and at times kind of beautiful — like when that guy puts a noose around his neck and flies into the air.
SH: Thank you very much, man. I appreciate that.
HR: But then I watched that standup set you did in Williamsburg.
SH: Oh yeah.
HR: And I began to wonder: What is actually motivating you?
SH: I was trying to get those people the f— out of the room. Because I do not like Brooklyn hipsters. So I was trying to see how fast I could get them out. (Laughs.) And I got them out pretty fast. But the show we made is not supposed to make gay people or Jewish people or any people feel bad. It is not a vehicle of hate. It’s only supposed to make people laugh and bring joy and possibly clarity or understanding, but it is not a vehicle of hate.
And here is the thing. Sam Hyde is obviously full of bullshit and there is as much hate, anger and prejudice in some of the MDE sketches as there is comedy. But I agree with the interviewer in that there is beauty to be found in World Peace. In effect, years after having watched it, I often find myself thinking back to this or that scene. I don’t think they are funny (or at least they do not work for me as they should), but they leave me pensive and wondering.
Now, let’s look at three MDE sketches from World Peace that leave me pensive and wondering.
“Thank You White People” is classic alt-right MDE. The White Man (Sam Hyde) rolls the boulder of progress uphill, to the gratitude of the Black Man, the Latino Man, the Asian Man (who remains indifferent), and the White Woman. Arriving at the top of the hill, the White Man is distracted by the Jewish Man, and the boulder rolls downhill. The Jewish Man asks: “What happened to your boulder, goy?”. He replies: “I don’t know. I wasn’t looking, next thing I knew, boulder’s gone. I guess I’m a stupid goy.”
This sketch is obviously anti-semitic and racist. (A good primer for MDE, if you can stomach this you will be fine.) With that out of the way, it does reflect a peeve that white nationalists and “race realists” have with modernity — that, despite all the efforts towards progress and development brought about in first world nations, there is a sensation of betrayal. Fascists and racists will point the finger towards the Other, be them Jewish or otherwise. Notwithstanding, this feeling of betrayal, of wasted effort, wasted possibility, should not be novel to those who are disappointed with the world from a left-wing perspective.
So what happened? What happened to the future? Shouldn’t automation free some of our time and allow for the achievement of our full humane potential? Shouldn’t widespread literacy make it so that everyone would become a political citizen? Shouldn’t the diplomatic structures erected during the post-Second World War bring a period of peace and understanding? Shouldn’t increased production efficiencies free us from hunger and suffering? I don’t know. I wasn’t looking, next thing I knew, boulder’s gone.
“Police Are Like Garbage Men”. Though this is not a pro-cop skit, it’s not an anti-cop skit either. Just watch it for what it is. In the first half of the sketch, the policeman is obviously a buffoon. He is absolutely miserable, simply a tired old man, a labourer, a cog in the machine. Then, on the second half of the sketch, there is some pathos — or is there? (There are layers of irony in every MDE sketch, which muddies the waters, as pointed out by iDubbbz in a sorta popular YouTube video.)
I find it endlessly funny when people use their guns to point towards stuff. Something about breaking literally the first rule about gun safety, and continuously so, throughout the whole sketch, entertains me to no end. But it is the end scene, the one where the kids are led to the slums with all the homeless people drinking their own piss, that strikes me as beautiful surrealism.
It is dehumanizing, sure (it is an alt-right sketch), but that is fine if the intention is to portray the inner psyche of the cop & the kids. If the preceding scene showed the policeman in his most boorish, acting out to a bunch of teenagers in the suburbs, the scene in the slums is where he’s at his environment. That’s where he can finally turn to the camera and give his speech: “It’s my job to deal with those people. To make sure they pay. To make sure they never hurt anybody ever again. And to do that, I have to go to superhuman and extraordinary measures.”
It is surreal (those people are not hurting anyone), but you, who are watching the show, understand the implications. You understand, according to this particular narrative piece, where police brutality originates from for this particular cop. You understand how he sees his job, and the consequences of this reality:
“Sometimes my job is like a garbage man’s, the way I take out the trash. You understand? Then say ‘Thank you’. Say ‘Thank you, sir’.”
It is dire. Again, I do not believe this to be a pro-cop skit, but it’s not anti-cop either. It’s just…???
“The Man Who Would Never Be… What They Made Him To Be” is my favourite MDE sketch.
A man is imprisioned for a crime he did not commit, and which is never made clear (kafkaesque). Throughout the process, he refuses to acknowledge what is actually happening to him. He is sentenced to ten years of imprisonment and his answer is “Ten years, forty years, two hundred years… How about I’m doing none of them?”. He is then sent to jail. In jail, he thinks to himself: “Not me, not never. Ain’t happening.” But it is.
The man ultimately spends twenty years in jail, suffering all sorts of ignomies, and then he is released. Upon release, he is a complete imbecile, clearly unfit to return to society. John Maus then plays the song Cop Killer, and the sketch ends.
I will not over-analyse this skit. I’ll simply copy and paste some of the comments to the YouTube video:
@quarterlore6272
Interesting that the only moment of emotional sincerity on this show dealt with the lifelong consequences of refusing to be emotionally sincere.
@wonkybiscuit2760
This was written out of a genuine fear of destroying your own life with apathy and indifference, being consumed by cognitive dissonance as your only remaining link to reality. This piece feels like a stark warning to the late night cable kids who were smart enough to get the message, but didn’t know how to escape what they were doing to themselves. It’s okay to feel things bros. It’s okay to be genuine and to exist.
@Lelldorin84
This sketch is about wasting your life, prison is a metaphor for the situation you put your self in and the invisible walls you invent to trap you there. His attitude is the attitude of teens and early 20s, invincible, tons of potential, with all the time in the world.
One day you may get to the other side and realize all the time and effort you wasted is gone forever and the world has moved on with out you (The rundown home that was once beautiful).
So yeah, I really love this sketch. I also think that many of MDE sketches are great pieces of late-stage capitalism meta-irony. I think the political climate is amene enough for me to say that now. I also think that, beyond hurr-durr-horseshoe theory, there are contact points in the disenfranchisement and disgust with which the alt-right and the left sees the world. And, in the absence of a truly funny, scorched earth, no holds barred left-wing comedy show, I’ll think again, now and again, about these MDE skits.