I had a Twitter exchange yesterday with CNN’s Roland Martin about this Tracy Morgan controversy, who told me, “You are the prime reason for my CNN.com column tomorrow.”  Since he has a way bigger platform to get his voice out, I thought I’d give you the whole back and forth, which you can see here.

I ended the conversation where I did, partly because of his smug sense of superiority and his condescending use of “dude” and “man”, but also because he kept responding not what I was writing, but to what he was projecting that I wrote.  I’m all for debating what comedy is, and like every comedian I’ve done it more night’s than I’d like to admit. But the comparisons he was making were over the top, and there was no point. (I also wanted to go play with my one year old nephew and some things take precedence even over 140 character arguments.) 

At the end of the exchange, I got a tweet from Lisa Lampanelli, who Roland brought into the conversation, not me.  Lisa (who has been a guest on my podcast The Six Pack, a very gay show, I assure you) wrote “Hey, Dave, thanks for defending me so eloquently against certain people.  You are a true gentleman.  Really appreciate it!”  

Simply put, we all know that there is a difference between a comedian who has a varied audience across sexuality, gender, race and religion and who is an equal opportunity offender, and one who just spews hate.  I even asked Kelly Carlin, daughter of the late, great, George Carlin what she thinks he would’ve thought about this, and she said, “He never went after the oppressed.”  Also, Roland kept saying that I was implying that if a comedian writes a check that they have a carte blanche to say whatever they want, however it was obvious I was saying that Lisa puts her money where her mouth is, and is a true ally of the gay community.  Doubt that for a moment? How about her standing up to the Westboro Baptist Church and then donating $50,000 to the Gay Men’s Health Crisis?

If absolutely nothing else here, if I am wrong on every single point, and if Roland is the end all and know all of the universe, I have but one other thought to add to this…

Perhaps right now, on June 12, 2011, gay people simply deserve a break.  Perhaps smack in the middle of gay pride month, as CNN airs specials about gay bullying and conversion therapy, in between the last gay kid to kill himself and the next, we just deserve a break at this very moment.  We deserve to be able to turn on the TV and not be marginalized or stereotyped.  We deserve to to celebrate pride month loudly and proudly.  And we even deserve to go to a comedy club and not watch a major sitcom star talk about how he’d kill his son if he was one of us.

Oh, and maybe even get married, too, but I don’t wanna push it.