September 16, 2007Poison Phrase: *$&# it Jesus

Filed under: Poison Phrase of the Week by merylrunion |

I’m a pseudo fan of comedienne Kathy Griffin. I enjoy her bombastic nature and some of the boats she rocks need the rocking. On her show, “My life on the ‘D’ List,” Griffin parodies her own grubbing for media as she shows herself scheming to be seen with famous people for photo ops, pretends to fall out of a limo drunk and invents other charades to get press.

I like how she laughs at herself, but I don’t care for it when she seems just plain mean.

When accepting her Grammy award, Griffin said:
- &()%# it Jesus

Her comment had one purpose – to stir up controversy and get her press. It did. Her comment was censored, and that brought up Free Speech questions in the media.

I’m a big fan of free speech, and I’m a big opponent of censoring speech because it offends people. However, I don’t care at all for shock talk, and am disappointed when people exploit free speech rights.

I advocate saying what you mean and meaning what you say, without being mean when you say it. Griffin did none of those things, in my opinion. I believe the sole motivator of her comment was her desire to get her name in the media. She succeeded. But she wasn’t speaking strong.

I contrast that to Sally Field’s Emmy comment that was also censored. Field said,
“Let’s face it, if mothers ruled the world, there wouldn’t be any GD wars.”

Yes, Fields words were offensive to some. But I believe her purpose was to speak what was in her heart and mind.

That’s a whole different situation from the purpose of seeking shock effect for the PR that Griffin sought – and received.