Mae Martin Quotes

Laughter is such a healing thing, and through laughter, we find commonalities with each other. There's a lot of separation in the world, and by creating more things to laugh at, we can create a common ground for open discussion.

To be treated well in places where you don't expect to be treated well, to find things in common with people you thought previously you had very, very little in common with, that can't be a bad thing.

Humor is this great equalizer. It gets people's defenses down, and once they're down, you can discuss some really difficult topics.

I think comedy is a good way to help people change their minds. I think that if you're laughing and getting a message across, it's a lot easier than when somebody is screaming in your face.

Comedy relieves you. A lot of times, we think we're the only people bothered by certain things. Then you hear a comic say, 'Don't you hate it when...' And it's, 'Oh, my God! Of course!'

My parents and my brother instilled in me my sense of humor. That's kind of the way we communicate with each other, and it's always been a way for me to get to know people.

I think no matter where you're from, you're going to be laughing about stuff going on around you.

When a novelist manages to describe or evoke something you thought or felt, without realizing that other people also found themselves in the same situation and had the same feelings, it creates that same solidarity. Maybe it's better to think of humor not as a tool to express the solidarity, but a kind of by-product. Maybe the realization "I'm not on my own on this one" is always, or often, funny.

My way of making people like me was to make 'em laugh.

I was heavily influenced by Andy Kaufman and Steven Wright.

I think comedy does have that powerful thing that doesn't seem too preachy because you're also making people laugh, so it's really kind of a good tool for messaging.

I don't want to offend people and I don't want to be mean, but social commentary and comedy for me are part and parcel. I think the greatest social activists are comedians.

Many of the writers who have inspired me most are outside the genre: Humorists like Robert Benchley and James Thurber, screenwriters like Ben Hecht and William Goldman, and journalists/columnists like H.L. Mencken, Mike Royko and Molly Ivins.

But in terms of satire and comedy, our biggest and earliest influence was Mad magazine.

I think, through comedy, sometimes we're allowed to discuss things that you'd never be able to talk about in a drama.

Bill Maher fancies himself the reincarnation of Lenny Bruce.

Making people laugh is a really fabulous thing because it means you're getting deep inside somebody, into their psyche, and their ability to look at themselves.

Comedy has become, I think, a very important branch of public intellectualism. But it still ain't Washington.

'Hairspray' maybe did change people's minds, and that's how you get your political enemies to change their minds - by making them laugh and making them look at something in a way they haven't seen it. Not by preaching and cutting them off and being a separatist.

If you can appeal to another person's sense of humor, you can introduce ideas, thoughts, things that they may disagree with or not believe in. At least they'll listen.

I don't know if it's changing already with 'Joanne,' but my intention is to bring people together that don't know each other and that would maybe feel awkward, but somehow be brought together by the music. That's what I wanted to do. Because that is pure and authentic to my family history and what I stand for.

Can you think of a single situation, no matter how grave, where the atmosphere would not be instantly shattered with a loud fart - or a drawing of a butt? There is no faster way to create universal common ground.

It's cool to be able to relate to people who aren't necessarily from the same way of life as me or don't even maybe know what I'm talking about in some of my songs. It's just cool that music has that ability to do that.

I look to icons like George Carlin, Chris Rock, and Richard Pryor on how to present these concepts of social change and subversiveness to an audience in a way that's palatable.