Samay Raina's problematic abortion joke and why he is no Ricky Gervais or Dave Chappelle

Comedian Samay Raina has landed himself in hot water after his tweet on abortion got massive blowback not just from fans, but Twitter in general, as netizens slammed the comedian for being insensitive towards women’s rights and their bodily autonomy. What happened to Samay is not a classic case of a joke gone wrong where a comedian’s oversight and poor judgment leads to misplaced humour. On the contrary, it seems like a well-thought, perfectly-timed and orchestrated ploy to grab media attention and further his career. To put this into context - Munawar Faruqui, who got into trouble over his stand-up act in Indore in 2020, made headlines this year because of his decision to participate in Kangana Ranaut’s reality show Lock Upp, which he eventually won. Samay extended his support to Munawar multiple times during his journey on the reality show and stood by him when Munawar couldn’t participate in Khatron Ke Khiladi 12, a stunt-based reality show.

It might not be an exaggeration to think that Samay, too, wishes to go on the same route as Munawar - put his stand-up career on hold for a while, participate in Bigg Boss to get the attention of the mainstream audience and then continue with his stand-up gigs. It all perfectly adds up because the casting for the second season of Bigg Boss OTT is underway and the showrunners have started scouting and looking for celebs who are ‘controversial’. Samay’s abortion tweet could very well be a ploy to get into the news for the wrong reasons (much like his friend, Munawar) and participate in a reality show. For the uninitiated, contestants in Bigg Boss get paid in lakhs per-week which could very well be a better business decision for Samay keeping in mind that the stand-up tours, while they make comics big money, might not be as lucrative as getting into a reality show. As several users on Twitter took to social media and shared their angst, some went as far as calling Samay’s abortion tweet his ‘Bigg Boss audition tape’. It is worth noting that there is online chatter about Samay not being a mentor on the third season of Comicstaan which premieres on Prime Video next week. The timing of his tweet, given that Bigg Boss 16 is near and Comicstaan is premiering, seems like a perfect way to get into the news and have people talking about him.

Why else would a stand-up comic, especially one as popular as Samay, risk his career and his livelihood by tweeting something as tone-deaf as he did, and still stand by it? Think of it this way - all popular stand-up comics at some point, crack jokes which go too far. They either apologise for it and delete the tweet or stand by it and live their life as usual. What they definitely don’t do, is respond to every single tweet with viciousness and spite - which is what Samay did. As a response to one of the tweets calling him out, Samay went as far as wishing death upon the person who sent out the tweet, with ‘Fingers Crossed’ written at the end.

It is apparent that Samay’s Twitter meltdown is a desperate ploy for attention. He is trying to milk the controversy and the negative publicity as much as he can. However, that is not the only problematic bit about the whole fiasco. Samay also played the victim at one point alleging that comics like David Chapelle and Ricky Gervais haven’t emerged in India because they fear cancellation by the left. For starters, Samay is no Ricky Gervais. Yes, both Chapelle and Gervais have faced ire and backlash from the American left because they were ‘punching down’ instead of ‘punching up’. However, with their jokes directed at the LGBT community, both Chapelle and Gervais meant to critique the problematic ‘cancel culture’ and the hypersensitivity of the left-wing. While both Gervais and Chapelle were ‘punching down’, their jokes served a greater purpose. Samay’s joke on abortion on the other hand, serves no greater purpose and is ill-timed given the recent ‘Roe v. Wade’ judgment which sent shockwaves across the world. While comics are allowed to ‘punch down’ as long as they are making an important point, some, like Samay, do it just for the sake of publicity.

Had made a simple joke saying 'My girlfriend made me delete my funny tweet so I guess I can now make her delete her fetus'. Was an obviously ironical joke.
She didn't like the joke and said I need to change it immediately and I did. The joke now beings with 'My ex girlfriend...'

— Samay Raina (@ReheSamay) July 6, 2022

That’s not all. What’s particularly concerning is the deafening silence of the Indian stand-up community, the likes of Tanmay Bhat, Zakir Khan, Rohan Joshi who have appeared on YouTube live streams with Samay on multiple occasions and are still silent and not calling Raina out over his insensitive tweet. What makes it worse is that these comics, on multiple occasions, have stood up for women’s rights and have called out sexism and misogyny throughout their career but fail to call out a member of their own clique because it apparently goes against their interests. If a community claims to be tight-knight and progressive, shouldn’t it call out its own members from time-to-time when they make an error? The silence of the stand-up community is very, very concerning and makes one wonder if the ‘woke’ image of Tanmay, Zakir and other comics is an act that they put on to gain woke points from their followers.

Rest assured, Samay needs a primer on women’s rights and bodily autonomy. And the stand-up community (there’s no easy way to say this), must grow a spine and call out its own members when they err.

Deepansh Duggal is an entertainment, pop-culture and trends writer based in New Delhi. He specializes in op-eds based on the socio-political and gender issues in the world of entertainment and showbiz. He also writes explainers and occasionally reviews shows in the OTT space. He tweets at @Deepansh75. 

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