After months of circling one another over a joke made by Andrew Schulz on his Flagrant podcast, retired NFL safety and ESPN NFL analyst Ryan Clark finally hosted Schulz on The Pivot to hash out their differences. In a long conversation tracing back to Schulz’s comments last July about dating Black women, they discussed the fine line comedians walk when addressing stereotypes, life experiences, and respect.
On Flagrant last summer, Schulz faced backlash for an over-the-top description of Black girlfriends, including a riff on Meghan Markle’s role in the British royal family and the “Black girlfriend effect” as women stressing their boyfriends out. Clark responded on The Pivot, asserting that Schulz was being racist. The disagreement resurfaced in recent weeks as Schulz promoted his latest stand-up special. However, when Schulz finally sat for an interview on The Pivot, he acknowledged that the joke didn’t land well but defended himself against the accusation of being racist.
“The joke wasn’t funny enough for how much it hurt people,” Schulz said. “And they’re entitled to however they want to feel about it. I just don’t like it going into the territory of, ‘that’s how he really feels, and he’s just using it as a smokescreen for how he really feels.’ No, what happened is I just wanted us to laugh,” he added.
From his perspective, Clark explained that he believes Schulz’s humor can perpetuate stereotypes and give audiences permission to harbor negative views when he makes insensitive jokes. “To people who may see that … they’ll go, ‘well Andrew Schulz made this joke about Black women and there were two Black men sitting across from them, this must be true, so I can go behave like he behaves,’” Clark offered. He intended to use Schulz’s comments as a discussion point rather than to paint him negatively. Schulz, however, pushed back, arguing that Clark’s interpretations could also lead to misconceptions about him.
Schulz expressed concern that just as Clark worries about the perceptions of Black women from his joking, Clark’s comments could negatively portray him. He believes he approaches comedy—and life—with good intentions and should be afforded the benefit of the doubt. “I hope that people maybe learn more about me and see that I don’t have bad intentions for people and I make fun of everybody,” Schulz said. “I understand that we’ll have these little things we stumble across, and people’s feelings will be hurt. And it sucks.”
Later, Schulz acknowledged that he is mindful of how to discuss groups of people and lifestyles he hasn’t experienced and believed the context of his guests and the situation would clarify his intentions. “That was kind of, with that situation, what I thought people would see is, I’m not doing that joke in front of two white guys in a room. I’m doing it where there are two Black guys in the room as well. I thought that would communicate there’s good faith here, there’s no real animosity,” he explained.
For anyone familiar with Flagrant or Schulz’s comedy, this debate is no surprise. Depending on how one views comedy as an art form and the sensitivities involved, Schulz’s argument may or may not resonate. However, considering Clark’s direct criticism and the lack of a prior relationship between the two, it is commendable that they both sat down to discuss their sides respectfully. Such conversations are what most podcasters claim to facilitate, yet they frequently fall short of actually doing so.
