Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Are the Police Funny?

The Jaffe family television adventures ultimately led to the insanely comedic police adventures of Brooklyn Nine-Nine. I came in very skeptical. It’s been a long time since I’ve really enjoyed and appreciated a comedy. So I was pleasantly surprised to find myself not only laughing a lot, but repeatedly laughing out loud. There was even one scene recently in which I started laughing so hard, we needed to pause the show for more than five minutes until I was able to get control of myself.

I wasn’t sad or surprised to see that season eight would be the show’s final one. There are many reasons to end a show. Bad ratings. One of the primary actors was leaving. The writers decided it was the right time, often due to fear the show would become stale and unfunny.

The Fall of Arrested Development

I respect the decision to end a show before things get bad. I’ll never forget when Arrested Development made that decision. They left us with three seasons of comedy gold, untainted by writers who had all but given up on the art of creating quality television.

That is until, of course, they decided to shoot for a money grab and created an unwatchable, atrocious fourth season. I honestly couldn’t make it through more than a few episodes before angrily giving up.

Why Was Brooklyn Nine-Nine Cancelled?

But curiosity got the best of me, and I decided to check what the deal was with everyone’s favorite hysterical New York-based crime-fighting team. And I was appalled at what I found.

Essentially, the show was going off the air because their comedic antics placed police officers in a positive light. You see, the year is 2021. The narrative we are all supposed to accept, blindly, without any thought or consideration, is that all cops are bad. You see, there are police officers who do terrible things. No one is denying that. But because of them, we must accept full-scale condemnation of every police force across the Unites States of America, and every officer who serves in them.

And therefore, any attempt to make the police look kind or funny or likable or interesting is seen as a breach of conduct. And we no longer get to laugh at this tremendous comedy. That would be far too un-woke of us.

The Woke Police

What would I do if I were in their shoes? I suppose I could pander to the masses, get myself in good grace with those who would wish me harm for the crime of making people laugh alongside the police.

But what more could the show possibly do? There are seven main characters (throughout the bulk of the show). Two are black, two are Hispanic, one is gay, and one is bisexual. The two with the highest ranks are the black ones, and the one on top is also homosexual. The show has dedicated entire episodes to such harrowing modern topics as the difficulty of coming out to one’s very traditional parents, police bias against people of color, the need for prison reform, the terrifying reality of active shooter incidents, and rampant sexual harassment in the workplace.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine has done nothing but the right thing since day one, repeatedly putting humor to the side in order to make an important point for the greater good. And what’s the reward for that? Getting cancelled anyway, since some people can’t handle the fact that someone might walk away from a silly sitcom not loathing the police and all they stand for.

When Will This End?

How long can this go on for? How long can we continue biting ourselves in the ass? Will the culture we are currently enduring ever feel like it’s had enough, or will it not stop until all joy and humor has been sucked out of every aspect of all our lives?

I get it, there are corrupt cops. There are those who should have their badges taken from them with a vengenace, and others who should be rotting in prison. And yet I’d still call the police when I need their help and I would treat them with the utmost respect when they arrived, like I do for all people. And if they do in fact help, I will sing their praise for what they did for me.

Why? Because the profession is only as bad as humanity is bad. I was a teacher for a decade. Some teachers are absolute garbage, doing everything from a poor job educating students to sometimes even causing permanent damage. Does that mean I should condemn the profession and all who practice it? Of course not. Humanity is riddled with its lowest forms, and they will worm their way into every field, sadly some more dangerous than others. But to then belittle the entire profession does nothing but discourage the good among us from uplifting those fields.

And to attack a sitcom because it is about the police, thus robbing us of many more years of laughter, that is everywhere from upsetting to downright tragic. We need to laugh. In a world of disease and building collapses and global conflicts, I want to be able to relax at the end of the evening and just giggle a little. And someone’s misguided sense of justice is taking that away from me.

We Need Calm and Laughter

I don’t know how we got here, but we’re definitely here. We have somehow entered a world in which it is virtuous to search through each and every word a person makes, past or present, in order to prove that not only have they done something wrong, but that you are better than they are.

Humanity was never meant to be put under such a fine microscope, and doing so makes us worse versions of ourselves. It makes us weigh everything we say or do to the point where we cannot open our mouths without fear of repercussions. It makes us terrified of taking risks. And a life without taking risks is stagnant and dull.

We need to stop condemning without thinking. We need to stop looking for what’s wrong in everything around us and start seeing the sparks of greatness. And for God’s sake, we need to calm the hell down and laugh a little.