10 Weird Secrets To Wrestlers' Success
4. MJF - Pushing The Envelope At A Time Of Great Sensitivity
Quick rap on, sigh, "cancel culture".
It isn't a real thing. Everybody gets work again. The "F*ck it, nobody will care in a few months" cycle hasn't been dented. Your faves will be fine. Nonetheless, that the phrase exists does somewhat describe These Times, in which empathy is considered cynical, depending on the extent to which you are a piece of sh*t. It's no longer socially acceptable to be a complete c*nt. That...can't not be good, surely.
The weird secret to MJF's success is that he falls just short of being a complete c*nt with an ingenious precision.
He plays a constantly on heel character in a time of much sensitivity without ever drawing the wrong strain of heat. He is the a**hole who will whale on a bilateral amputee and spit on the clothing worn by a grieving child. He punches down.
But he gets it. He gets it because he's too funny for any element of his act to veer into dreaded cheap heat controversy. Yes, he attacked a bilateral amputee, but the sheer audacity of it, the involuntary pop it generated, made it work. He spat on -1's mask because he was savvy enough to grasp that the punchline was funny - and crucially, cathartic - enough to warrant that "F*cking hell" lip-purser of a set-up. He made the grieving child laugh.
"They" - they being hacks - claim that you're "not allowed" to do comedy anymore.
They should watch Dynamite.