BOB GARFIELD: Stephen Colbert of Comedy Central’s Colbert Report plays the character of a narcissistic right wing blowhard. A couple of weeks ago, when the National Organization for Marriage put out an ad warning of a looming storm of gay marriage, Colbert responded with an ad of his own.
[CLIP]:
WOMAN: There’s a storm gathering.
[MUSIC UP AND UNDER]
STEPHEN COLBERT: A giant, gay storm.
[LAUGHTER] Did you know that if all 50 states approve gay marriage, straight marriage becomes illegal?
[LAUGHTER]
MAN: Yes, I heard that somewhere.
STEPHEN COLBERT: But there is hope. Join the Colbert Coalition, a rainbow of proud people coming together, in a commercial. Join us.
[SOUND OF BIRDS CHIRPING]
[LAUGHTER]
[END CLIP]
BOB GARFIELD: As usual, Colbert wields satire like a blunt instrument. Or does he? National Organization for Marriage President Maggie Gallagher responded to the segment by writing, quote, “I've always thought Stephen Colbert was a double agent, pretending to pretend to be a conservative to pull one over Hollywood. Now I'm sure.” Ohio State University’s Heather LeMarre is co-author of a study that actually found most conservatives do take Colbert’s fake politics at face value.
HEATHER LeMARRE: You might watch that and you might think that’s hilarious, he’s making fun of conservatives, look how funny that is, which is what we found for liberals. However, if you’re conservative, you might look at that and say, that’s hilarious, he’s using comedy to expose flaws or holes in liberal thinking. So both sides basically see what they want to see.
BOB GARFIELD: But you haven't found that conservatives watching this show are too stupid to figure out that they're being made fun of.
HEATHER LeMARRE: Right. This has been misinterpreted widely, actually, in the press, to date. There is no question in anyone’s mind, according to our results, that conservatives, in fact, do understand that it’s satire. What’s going on here is that even though conservatives understand he’s parodying a conservative, they believe he’s truly targeting liberal thinking.
BOB GARFIELD: What I haven't seen much of is conservatives using Colbert-style satire to poke fun at liberals. Is there such an animal out there?
HEATHER LeMARRE: Well, I haven't found one yet. Most conservatives who use satire, such as talk radio show host Glenn Beck, sometimes Rush Limbaugh, the problem is we already know as viewers where they stand. It doesn't work the same. So until we find somebody who remains in character, remains vague, remains ambiguous on and off camera, it will be very difficult to test these hypotheses and running in the opposite direction.
BOB GARFIELD: So you mean it’s on a technicality; the fact [LAUGHS] that he refuses to break character is what makes him a perfect Petri dish specimen for your research.
HEATHER LeMARRE: Yes, but I think Stephen Colbert wouldn't call that a technicality. I think he would probably say that’s a stroke of genius. I think this boils down to what the goal of the humorist is. Some people use satire as a means to make political statements. Other people use satire simply to entertain their audience. If Stephen Colbert’s goal is simply to entertain his audience, he’s extremely brilliant. He’s the big tent entertainer. [LAUGHS] He’s found a way to include all groups from all stripes. They can cast upon him anything they wish to see in his humor and interpret it for themselves as always making fun of someone else.
BOB GARFIELD: In your research, you did identify one difference between conservatives and liberals and how they process Colbert, a result that has not found its way into your officially published study. Can you give me a sneak peek into what that’s all about?
HEATHER LeMARRE: Sure. Something that is being put out in a follow-up study is one interesting difference we did find is that the more conservative someone reported themself to be, the more they also reported Stephen Colbert to be a credible and excellent source for political information. When we're talking about just enjoyment or humor, we don't find differences. But when we get down to sort of the brass tacks of do you use Stephen Colbert to get political information, and when he says something political do you find it credible and reliable, conservatives are more likely to say yes.
BOB GARFIELD: But doesn't that fly in the face of the rest of your findings? Doesn't that suggest that, ah-ha, as much of the press has misreported [LAUGHS] your study, that right-wingers are more likely to be really, really obtuse?
HEATHER LeMARRE: Well, actually, I would say it confirms our study. I guess my best analogy would be when somebody makes some caustic or dry humor joke that could be hurtful to someone else, and at the end they polish it off with a smile and, oh, I'm just kidding, and that leaves the victim of that joke, and everyone else who listened to the joke in the room, wondering, well, were they really kidding or was there some hidden meaning there? Were they trying to convey a message and they just used humor to do it? That is what conservatives believe is going on with Colbert. And because of that, it prompts them to do information seeking, discussion and more thinking about the topics he brings up, and it also allows them to perceive him as being a credible source for political information.
BOB GARFIELD: Heather LeMarre is a doctoral candidate at Ohio State and has just accepted a job as assistant professor at the University of Minnesota. Heather, thank you so much.
HEATHER LeMARRE: [LAUGHING] You’re quite welcome.
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BOB GARFIELD: That's it for this week's show. On the Media was produced by Jamie York, Mike Vuolo, Mark Phillips, Nazanin Rafsanjani, Michael Bernstein and P.J. Vogt, with more help from Kara Gionfriddo and Ethan Chiel, and edited – by Brooke. We had technical direction from Jennifer Munson and more engineering help from Zach Marsh. Our webmaster is Amy Pearl.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Katya Rogers is our senior producer and John Keefe our executive producer. Bassist/composer Ben Allison wrote our theme. This is On the Media from WNYC. I'm Brooke Gladstone.
BOB GARFIELD: And I'm Bob Garfield.