Your Racist Uncle Found a New Voice: AI
AI-generated comedy is starting to sound a lot like old-school hate speech with a new kind of invisibility cloak.
There’s a Bigfoot wandering the internet, and honestly? He’s kind of delightful. He’s AI-Generated but I’ve found his chaos to be knee-slapping good fun.
Tiktok failed to load.Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browser
He’s out here trying to navigate dating apps, getting booted from Whole Foods, and generally just lumbering through life with the unhinged energy of a hairy Gen Zer who probably smells like beef jerky and wet moss. It’s weird. It’s charming. It’s the kind of dumb, engaging humor that reminds you: oh right, AI can be fun and creative. It doesn’t always have to be so serious and existential.
AI-Bigfoot is almost like the perfect representation of a relatable, chaotic, and flawed everyday working person. In some ways, he sort of reminds me of Philadelphia Flyers’ goofy unhinged mascot, Gritty.
And then, there’s the other stuff.
You scroll once again and, bam. A different kind of AI “comedy” going viral shows up, trying to take advantage of the viral phenomenon goofy, more ‘pg’ accounts like Bigfoot have paved. Same format, same tools, but this one comes with a wink and a punchline aimed straight at marginalized groups. Racist “jokes.” Misogynistic skits. Homophobic bits dressed up as “just edgy AI fun.” And somehow, it’s all okay because, hey, a real person didn’t say it. AI did. So we’re all off the hook, right?
Here’s the thing: AI isn’t inventing hate. It’s just reflecting what it’s been fed, prompted, then scaling it, sanitizing it, and serving it up with a laugh track while we let it slide. Not because it’s funny. But because it’s more convenient to pretend there’s no one to blame.
My father gave us many lectures (too many to count), but one of his most memorable lessons was that “it’s what you do when you think no one’s looking that defines you.”
As a society, we spent the last two decades learning (the hard way) that when many people think no one’s watching, they feel liberated to say whatever they want online. Anonymous usernames gave trolls undeserved freedom and arrogance to go full maskless and the internet paid a toxic price. Some even paid with their lives.
Now we’ve added a new layer: you don’t even need to create content on your own. Just type a few prompts, spin up a fake voice, and boom: you’ve got an AI puppet to say whatever hateful thing you didn’t want to put your actual name on. It’s not satire. It’s not clever. It’s just people laundering their bigotry through machines and calling it comedy while they try to make a cheap buck.
And the audience? A mix of amused, confused, and complicit. Some genuinely think, “Well, it’s just AI that said it so it’s not really that racist.” Others just don’t care because apparently, accountability doesn’t apply when the punchline is delivered by a robot.
But whether the hate comes from a real face, a burner account, or a synthetic voice actor named “AI Larry,” the impact is the same. These posts go viral because AI has figured out the human algorithm that entertains us and bad actors with little skill or cultural craft take advantage of the proven opportunity to magnetize and monetize eyeballs. The stereotypes get reinforced and it all snowballs while we inch a little closer to a world where cruelty is normalized not in spite of the algorithm, but because of it.
This isn’t just offensive. It’s dangerous. Because once something catches fire it becomes infinitely harder to challenge. And when that meme is hate masquerading as humor, we’ve got a Crow-esque fire spreading fast and we’re too busy mindlessly scrolling to grab the hose.
I’ve been performing improv comedy for over a decade and if there’s one thing they drill into your head from day one, it’s this:
Don’t punch down.
Not because it’s bad optics. Not because someone might take it the wrong way. But because deep down you already know it’s offensive. That’s why you wouldn’t say it out loud on a stage. That’s why it feels safer to let a machine say it for you. It’s not edgy. It’s not daring. It’s just hiding and avoiding accountability.
I’ll be honest though: I think sometimes we’ve gone too far trying to sanitize comedy in this country. Not every off-color joke is a hate crime. Not every dark bit is an attack. More importantly, people should be allowed to make mistakes, learn from them, and earn the opportunity to show accountability when they’re wrong.
But what we’re seeing now isn’t just boundary-pushing. It’s boundary-denying.
It’s creators using AI to bypass every filter; moral, social, or platform-based, and acting like that makes them edgy or brave. Spoiler: it doesn’t. It makes them lazy. And it’s that kind of behavior that got us here in the first place - where platforms panic, people over-correct, and suddenly nobody’s allowed to make a joke about anything.
So no, the answer isn’t “ban AI comedy.” The answer is: do better with it. Hold it to the same standard we hold human comedy to. Maybe even higher, since AI doesn’t get nuance or context unless we put it there.
And if you’re going to use AI to tell a joke? Ask yourself the same question any good improv coach would: