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A Laughing Matter Jewish jokes in the age of humourlessness by PHOEBE MALTZ BOVY
THE MOST META-JEWISH JOKE of all time was told in “The Yada Yada,” a 1997 episode of Seinfeld . Jerry—Jewish on the show, as in life—shows up at a priest’s confessional. He does so because of a grievance he has with his dentist, a man who was, until recently, Catholic: Jerry: I wanted to talk to you about Dr. Whatley. I have a suspicion that he’s converted to Judaism purely for the jokes. Father Curtis: And this offends you as a Jewish person? Jerry: No, it offends me as a comedian. It’s a quip that is in keeping with the show’s history of ribbing the Jews who make a big thing of antisemitism. (Jer- ry’s Uncle Leo does this incessantly in 1996’s “The Shower Head.”) But it is also quintessentially of its moment. Who was worried about antisemitism in the 1990s? Fast-forward to today, when Jerry Seinfeld is one of the major anti-antisemitism celebrities. (Consider that there is even a category: anti-antisemitism celebrities.) The Sec- ond Intifada, 9/11, and, most definitively, October 7 have
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