Tom Ammiano was the first person on the San Francisco Bay Times cover in 1978 and remains an LGBTQ+ activist and stand-up comic offering hope and laughs amid right-wing-fueled cancel culture. Ammiano says, "The more s-t you give us, the stronger we get. And every good comic will take any kind of adversity and turn it into comic gold." Authoritarian governments increase risks for comedians, a pattern visible since Roman-era punishments for libel and slander and strict social laws. A brutal assassination of Charlie Kirk on September 10, 2025, intensified right-wing cancel culture, and hosts Stephen Colbert and Jimmy Kimmel now face serious career repercussions. Jon Stewart calls comedy a bellwether for societal threat, noting comedians are often targeted first. Both far-left and far-right have contested control over free speech.
"The more s-t you give us, the stronger we get. And every good comic will take any kind of adversity and turn it into comic gold."
"Comedy doesn't change the world, but it's a bellwether. We're the banana peel in the coal mine. When a society is under threat, comedians are the ones who get sent away first."
Read at San Francisco Bay Times
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