Seth Rogen is the latest comedian to sound off on cancel culture; however, his position is quite different than those previously expressed by greats like Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle.
The 39-year-old comedian weighed in on the issue while promoting his new book, Yearbook, on Good Morning Britain. At one point during the interview, Rogen was asked about some of his old movies that contained controversial jokes that may not fly in today’s climate. The Superbad star admitted some of his material hasn’t aged well, but accepts some jokes aren’t “built to last.”
“To me when I see comedians complaining about this kind of thing, I don’t understand what they’re complaining about,” he said. “If you’ve made a joke that’s aged terribly, accept it. And if you don’t think it’s aged terribly, then say that.”
Rogen was then asked if he has ever gone through his old social media posts to delete comments or jokes that may ignite calls for cancelation.
“I was never a comedian that made jokes that were truly designed to target groups that were subjugated in some way,” he explained. “Have we done that without realizing it? Definitely. And those things are in our movies and they’re out there, and they’re things that I am more than happy to say that they have not aged well. But in my Twitter, I’ve never made a joke that’s outwardly horrific in some way, and if you have, I would question why you did that.”
He went on to say that being confronted about ill-conceived jokes isn’t necessarily amount to “cancel culture,” as it is important to be held accountable for any comments that may cause offense.
“Saying terrible things is bad, so if you’ve said something terrible, then it’s something you should confront in some way, shape, or form,” he said. “I don’t think that’s cancel culture. That’s you saying something terrible if that’s what you’ve done.”
You can hear Rogen’s comments below.
