Good evening, I’m Shana Alexander. Home Box Office has asked me to introduce tonight’s On Location featuring George Carlin. Tonight you will see a performance usually seen only if you can get to the nightclubs, college campuses, and theaters where George Carlin is a constant sell-out. A portion of Mr. Carlin’s performance needs special introduction, at least for television. His target is language, how we use it and abuse it. Some would simply say that tonight’s language is very strong. Others would say it goes beyond this, and would find it vulgar. Aristophanes, Chaucer and Shakespeare were vulgar, too, at times. Anyway, the segment is controversial; it provoked a legal proceeding At the Federal Communications Commission. In March of this year I am happy to say, a federal court of appeals ruled in favor of Mr. Carlin’s right to freedom of speech. Home Box Office intends to provide top programming to subscribers of widely different tastes. One proof of that has been their commitment to bring you the best in contemporary comedy. In the United States in 1977, that includes George Carlin, one of this generation’s philosophers of comedy, defining, reflecting and refining the way we see our own time. Home Box Office is proud to present this very important performer, but we respect your decision about whether you want to see the program. It contains language you hear every day on the street, though rarely on TV. For those of you who already know George Carlin, you’re in for a special evening. For those of you who want to know George Carlin, I’m glad to be here to introduce you. And now, George Carlin, On Location.
The people who have influenced me, uh, for the most part, I don’t know about influenced, but made me laugh the hardest, and I guess the influence would be part of that, uh, was, as a child starting out with Danny Kaye, Abbott and Costello, Spike Jones, the Marx Brothers. Uh, then a little older, like Ernie Kovacs, Bob and Ray, and Steve Allen when, when he first had those late night shows. Mort Saul, Lenny Bruce, Jonathan Winters, Nichols and May, and, uh, that line of… of craziness. I don’t know how many had their influence, some did obviously, some more than others, but Danny Kaye was the biggest influence because it made me want to be in show business.
So that would have to be the, the starter, you know? What are the most dramatic ways you’re forced to alter your performances for television? Well, the, the most important alteration is that you can’t use the body of language that’s generally called dirty or bad or filthy language. Um, that’s the primary, and that’s not a big restriction if you have something to say, obviously you don’t need a series of, uh, of… of street terms to make your ideas clear. But they’re very useful in enhancing ideas, and enhancing characters. And in, and in giving the element of… of reality to speech that, that you want. You can suspend that for six minutes on television. I wouldn’t like to suspend it for two hours on the stage, cause I think it would take something away from it. Although I’m sure I could do two hours without it, I just feel that I’d missed a lot of important emphases if I didn’t, uh, have access to the whole language, you know? When I was on the Ed Sullivan… this is the funniest censorship one I know of, when I was on Ed Sullivan, uh, I had two jokes and one monologue in… in one six-minute area I was doing. One was about Wallace, it was during the time of that election, it was about Wallace, George Wallace, and I said he keeps calling everybody pointy-head… he… he refers to pointy-headed intellectuals. I said, have you ever seen the sheets they wear down there, or something like that. It was, it was said better so that it was a good joke. I was referring to the Klan, of course, right? So that was a Klan joke. The other thing was I was referring to little crimes we don’t worry about in this country, like padding your income tax, cheating on the expense account, and genocide. And that, and that was right in the middle of the Vietnam War. So they told me I had a choice, they said you can either have the Wallace joke or the genocide joke, but you can’t have both. So I said take out the Wallace, give me the genocide. It seemed like a better joke. So that’s, uh, all I can tell you. But you don’t go in there to try and change their system usually. You go in there to fit within it for, for your own narrow purposes, you know? Hello, thank you. Thank you. Thank you all, Hello. Yeah, thank you. Within the first few moments he had the snakes going. How are you all, all right, huh? You sound, geez… Yeah, you sure sound like that. Did you all come in the same van, by any chance? There’s an awful lot of unity here. Anyway, good to see you. Fucking tourists, hmm. What can you do? Yeah, it’s Home Box Office, you know? It’s not our home yet, but we can watch it at home. Cause, uh, I never did a concert before where I got a chance to look at it later, and, uh, tape it. You can do that thing, but I’ve always just avoided it. But, uh, we’re doing a little tape for home consumption, and, uh, are you nervous? Yeah, you have a nice character. It’s, uh – – pardon me? What, what, louder, is the louder family here? They follow me everywhere. They’ve been in every city I’ve ever appeared in. They just sit there and yell their name, louder. Yes, I know. I know. This is the Los Angeles louders. Yes. Yeah, when you do a sound check with no bodies here, it always changes a little. Later we’ll all get used to how this place sounds, not only to you and me, but to the guy who’s going (sound). We’ll all meet each other somewhere in the middle. And if I think of anything really intelligent, I’ll say it slowly and clearly. But those periods will be quite noticeable. So, have you noticed there aren’t many Chinese guys named Rusty? It’s true. I assume the name just never caught on over there, you know? Well, that’s sort of my job to think about stuff that a lot of us are too busy for most of the time. Little things that occur to us, we have universal ground, you know? We have little common areas of turf that we all meet, but stuff we don’t talk about, little experiences that happen, they’re just not important enough. You’re thinking about the economy, you’re thinking about your future, you’re thinking about your family, you don’t have time for little things like did you ever, did you ever belch and almost puke? I almost puked. It was a belch, but puke was involved. Sometimes you belch and taste a hot dog you had two days ago. You might even remember the setting, you know, and the temperature, there was a breeze, who you were with, you know, a lot of things, just… just gone so quickly, you know? Did you ever clear your throat for another person? Someone’s talking and he has a hocker and he’s going (sound) And you go (clears throat). That ought to knock it loose. So we share a lot of little funny things. Uh, when you’re alone, when someone in… when you’re in someone else’s house and they leave you in the room, any room, alone for a moment, do you look in the drawers? Yeah, I do. Yaaah! Yeah, I don’t want to steal anything, you know, I just want to know where everything is in case I’m asked. That’s right, Officer, the third drawer on the left. Yeah, there it is. You’ll never get me for withholding evidence.
Sure well, anyway, we get to travel around in a lot of spots alone. You know, most places we go, we go alone, sometimes two people go places, you know, two people, three, four, a lot of different size groups we have. You know, we go places in a lot of different sizes. Sometimes there’s 73 of us… in the place, that’s it, 73 of us went there. Stadium, 80,000, a jammed stadium. Wow, 80,000 of us went there. A million and a half view parade. Boy, a million and a half of us getting together, that’s really a big bunch, you know? Come on, everybody, okay. You know there’s no place that we’ve all been together, there’s no place where everybody goes. Wouldn’t that be great to have a meeting that everybody would have to go to. Everybody, over here. Wouldn’t it be great if everybody came to your house? (knocking) Who is it? Everybody. Hold on a minute, Marge, chairs. She’s not prepared, you don’t just drop over.
Well, anyway, so you know some of the kind of places I’d like to, to bring us, we could go to play Monopoly… in groups of, uh, four, five, six, huh? I guess, Monopoly. I still play now and then. I think you never leave that completely. You know, if they need an extra guy, you know? I don’t start them up. Come on, we need… okay, put me in, I’ll play. Cause I was never very good at it, you know? I didn’t, uh, do very well. Well, all right, I have a couple of railroads, you know? I’m not a complete asshole. I have a couple of railroads, snap up Baltic Avenue as soon as that became available. How much is that, 60, let me have that mother. About the best thing that I’d ever have would be, oh, maybe one piece of property in the light blue series; Oriental Avenue, nothing on it, of course. Maybe an excavation, that’s about all I ever had on my stuff was… plans… surveyors marks. All my friends had industrial parks, condominiums, shopping centers, malls, oh boy, Carlin, you’re coming down my side now, man. Wow, big one. Ha ha, hot shit, a 12. Of course, you can’t move your token till you… remember which one you had. Which token did I have, which did l… you had the… maybe you had the… I got the ship, I get the battleship every game. The worst token to have was the gun, the big cannon. It was the only token that kept falling over, you know? It was the only top heavy. Throw the dice anywhere near that one, boom, boom. What are you, are you the gun, are you the gun? Pick it up, would you please? And you, are you in jail or just visiting? Okay, well, put the car on the outside if you’re just visiting. Some guys cared. That’s right. That’s why they won. I never won. I was always in there at the end, though, at the end of the game, cause I’d have all the one dollar bills, man. Sure, 1500 in singles and they needed me to make change, man, for all their filthy deals. No, I wasn’t that good at the game. I, uh, generally I used to… I would land on Chance all the time, I was constantly landing on Chance. Tried to buy it. I’d get in more fights trying to buy Chance. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, Chance, (pop) little man with a hat. $200 for being an asshole. Shuffle them good, that’s the second time I got that one. Did you ever go to shake hands with a guy and he doesn’t notice? And you go… and you have to make believe it’s something you do all the time, you know? Something I picked up in college.
Seeing at the supermarket, a lot of things happen in the supermarket that we all I think experience when we’re there. Obviously it doesn’t happen to you when you’re not there. But, uh, little things like have you ever selected an item at the supermarket… and begun to put it in someone else’s basket by mistake. You feel alien for a moment, it’s like, ooh, ooh, I almost put that in his basket. My basket, my basket. Are those mine? Yes, with the macaroni and the cupcakes, that’s mine. My goodness, look at this here, we’re going to… oh, we have a little trouble with the mike? Okay, tell Johnson I’ll call him at the end of the week. I figure why not utilize the contact to pass along information, no wasted things. Yaaaah! Well, let’s see if the jokes get any better. We’ve got a new microphone. Where was I, oh, yes, I believe I was over here. Supermarket. Did you ever in the supermarket walk away with someone else’s cart? They get mad. Hey, come here, that’s my stuff. Not yet it isn’t. Still belongs to all of us. And if I want to shop out of your cart, I’ll shop out of your cart. You got any scallions? Okay, let him go. Did you ever look at someone else’s cart and say, ooh, goddamn, look what they eat, yech? Do this, get your cart full, get a full cart, a whole mound of groceries. And fill up the bottom part, too, you know what goes down there, case of Shasta, large box of Tide. Get the whole thing full and go on down to the check-out counter and look for somebody with just one item, and ask them if you can get ahead of them. Do you mind? Yeah, pardon me. Do you mind if I get ahead of you? Okay. All I have is a full cart.
Did you ever try to go through the express lane with more than the prescribed number of items, and you have to give them the quick count? One, two, three, 111 packs of franks, it’s all one item. Go ahead, it’s quicker than arguing. I find the best way to go shopping at the supermarket is to be a little hungry. Don’t eat for a couple of days, two days is just about right. You go any longer than that, you begin to hallucinate and all the cans look the same. But two days is pretty nice. And get good and hungry, and then smoke eight joints, take $500 and go to the supermarket. You buy everything, canned cans, just what I need. And things you really love, you buy two of them, cause you know you’re gonna eat one as soon as you get home. But you get over a few aisles in that condition and you realize that well, you’ve overdone it a little bit. You have a motorcade of carts, complete with tow hitches and reflector raincoats, man. You’ve lost control again. And whenever you spend too much money in the supermarket, you have to start putting back some of the expensive items, like ham, canned ham, $8, fuck ham, boom. Get some more Junior Mints, honey, I put the ham back. Yeah, and you know the nice thing about putting things back in the supermarket, when you return an item you know where you put it don’t you? You put it anywhere you want. They expect that, eh, put it anywhere, Marge, they don’t care, they don’t give a shit. They have guys who straighten that out, guys with purple fingers come around at midnight. In the morning everything is back. It’s the mystery of the supermarket. Uh… did you ever go to the supermarket in a head neighborhood? Obviously you have.
Did you ever go to the supermarket in any neighborhood where people are getting a little higher than they are in the average neighborhood, which is pretty high already, when you think about it. But any neighborhood that’s near a university or near an old, uh, an old beatnik ghetto, you know, or a bohemian area, hippie neighborhood. You know, the supermarket in that area, go into the supermarket in a head neighborhood and take a look at the cookie section, looks like a war zone. Half the packages are open. And all the good cookies are gone. Where the hell are the Mallomars? Oh, hell, we can’t get them in the store, they line up at the truck for Mallomars. There’s always lots of shitty cookies, you know? Local cookies, fucking Jim’s Cookies, 63 varieties. Man, if you can’t make cookies in 62 tries, leave me out, man. I don’t want to be part of your experiment, Jim. Hey, you know, in the supermarket I’m really a sucker, at the checkout line, well, I’m kind of an impulse buyer, you know? Anything that’s hanging up, I want it. Give me a case of C batteries, please, a dozen razors, subscription to, uh, Women’s Day, and how about that cash register, is that for sale, by any chance? It’s a lovely model. I think that’ll be it. Oh, no, I gotta buy the bargain of the week, you know? The garbage can full of Juicy Fruit. Forty-four cents, shit, can’t go wrong, you’ll never need gum again. Hey, Marge, we’re set on gum. That would be a good feeling, you know? To be really ahead on one commodity. Never have to worry about it again, you know? Like buy, you know, sneakers, hey, let me have 66 pairs of sneakers, would you please? Shit, that’s it, never have to sweat that again. Never have to shop for sneakers again as long as I live. Yeah, that’s gotta make you feel good. Then you go on to other things, you know? Now the real work.
Well, anyway, walking, just plain old walking is a source of a lot of experience we’d recognize. Just, I mean, of course, you know, we walk pretty well, humans. Got it down pretty good, wouldn’t you say? Hello there, hi Dan. Look at this, still walking. Especially I’m talking about walking erect, right, yeah, home erectus, or whatever he was. This dude, cause I mean, uh, it’s one of the few things that separates us from the lowest, lower animals, walking and hats, right? Rarely see a lower animal with a hat. If he does, chances are a man put it on him, you know? But, uh, there are some animals that walk erect for short bursts. You’ve seen them, you know? Ahhhh. That’s not it, and we know it, man. This is fucking walking. We know what walking is, we have a right to be proud, being able to walk like that. And a right to be embarrassed when it doesn’t work, when we walk dopey. Sometimes you do something dumb, you know? Sometimes it’s not your fault, but you always blame it on something else. Just a little misstep, blame it on the sidewalk, it can’t be me, I’m graceful. You’re singing, oh, da, da, da, da. Not me, fucking boulder in the road. Might be the shoes, they’re not mine, I borrowed them. Not used to the soles, goodbye. Couldn’t be me. That’s why I like with a limp, you know, if you limp, some people go ooh, that’s not right, a guy who limps don’t do that, unless he just got the limp. But you’ve seen some guys, some guys are good, man. Some guys are really into their limp, they’ve had it a long time, man. You’ve seen guys like that, man, shit, they pivot on it, shoom. Hey. You’ve seen those guys. They go up a, you see them go up a spiral staircase. You see that shit? Screws himself… Guys can handle it when they’ve had a limp a long time, it’s when you just get a limp, when it’s a new limp that you’re not good at it yet. Then you go, ahh, ahhh, like a steal beam on my leg. That’s when you’re not too cool. Did you ever walk and count your footsteps? You know how many of them fall in each box on the sidewalk. One, two, one, two, one, two and a half, carry a half, one, two and a half. I hate doing math when I’m walking. Do you ever look at yourself in store windows? Got to check it out, right? Trying to see your profile. Let me see it. Sometimes you’re walking up the stairs… and you think there’s another stair. You have to go into a little routine, you know, to throw them off. Hi there, hi. Good thing stereos on mezzanine. Sometimes you’re going down the stairs… and you think there’s another one.
How’s your dog, how’s your dog? What? Said, how’s your dog? He’s fine, man, fine. Got new neighbors, man. How’s our dogs. My dog has complete freedom. How’s he like it? Don’t know, we haven’t seen him in eight years. What do dogs do on their day off? They can’t lie around, that’s their job. Get up, it’s your day off. Does this ever happen to you, your dog and you are home, and you’re home with your person, whoever your person might be. And, uh, you’re upstairs watching TV late at night in bed got the dog with you, got the light on, you’re reading, talking to each other, you got half of a Pepsi there, some Doritos, man, everything is nice. And, uh, a dog is shown on television. When a dog is shown on TV, do you try to get your dog to look at the dog who’s on? Look at the doggie, look at the dog, look at the dog, you asshole, would you look at that dog? Look. They never look where you want. If you point, they look at your hand. Yeah, you try to get them to look, they watch your hand. Hey, look at this hand, it’s pushing my head. What did I do now? Well, for one thing, you missed the dog. Same situation, late at night, you’re with your person, you’re with your dog in the bedroom, television’s on, the lights are on, you’re talking, still got some Pepsi left, Doritos are holding out good. And one of you says to the other, (sniff) Honey, did you fart? Did you? Not me. I thought you farted. Not me. Now that’s not even one of my farts. I know, the dog farted. Look at him, Kippy, why did you fart? Look, he knows he farted. I seen his ass open up. Well, I just happened to be looking at his ass by chance. I thought he was doing deep breathing exercises, I don’t know. What the hell do I know about dogs, for chrissakes. Now your dog, you may know this, your dog… doesn’t care. Dogs essentially don’t care. Don’t, don’t really care at all. You’ve never seen a dog with a list of priorities. Dogs have no standards. Most things they do, they will do anywhere at any time, except the few that you taught them better never do that or I’ll beat the shit out of you. They do catch on to that. They can also be made to appear smart by performing a series of meaningless tricks, like chasing a rubber newspaper that squeaks. This doesn’t make for intelligence. As far as I’m concerned, dogs are highly emotional, ESP going for them, they’re telepathic but not so greatly smart. A lot of that. Now, your dog might just embarrass you if it gets the chance. Let’s go out to the front of your house, out to the living room, and, uh, you’re there now with dog, he’s there, of course. And you have some friends in, some neighbors over, sitting around the coffee table. And, uh, chit chat, you know, talking to each other, you brought your Pepsi down, but fuck ’em, let them get their own Doritos. I’m not here to feed the neighborhood. And everybody’s sitting around, and the dog is licking his balls. And nobody mentions it. Spectacular thing going on there. If I could reach, I’d never leave the house, man, are you kidding me? They don’t even mention it. They say things like, isn’t he cute? He’s taking a bath. He appears to be licking his balls to me, Marge. Yeah, he’s been on that one spot for over an hour. That’s a mighty selective bath. No, no, no, no, nice doggie, no, no, nice doggie, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Nice doggie, no, no, no. Don’t you know they have the cleanest mouth of any animal? I’m just going by where he’s been, honey. I am not a chemist.
And when we have cats, we usually have them for a different reason, because of their independence. I mean, that’s generally one of the qualities we like, there’s a certain affectionateness which I think has to do with static electricity. But, um, cats are cool because they’re independent. That’s usually, people always who have them they say well, you know, hey, he takes care of himself, makes his own clothes, drives himself to work. I never have to do a thing for him. Cats are cool, cats are aloof and separate, you know? And that’s kind of nice. Uh, you ever pet a cat who’s lying flat, and by the time you get half way, his ass is way up in the air? Oh, look at the nice… holy Christ, how did he do that? What the hell is that? And there he goes… there he goes again. And they jump on your chest, they put their ass in your face and go. What is that, get him off me, will ‘ya? I don’t even know what that is and I don’t like it. I think it has to do with ecstasy or something. He misses his mommy. Yeah, bullshit, you always say that. You said that about the mailman. I have a theory on why people moan at certain jokes… envy. I’m… I’m forced into that position. Uh, cats have a great quality. Cats have the quality of somehow never having to pay dues for things they do that are really moronic. Dumb things. If you see a cat do something really poor, for a cat, that is, like jumping from the floor up onto a table and landing in four coffee cups. Did you ever notice that somehow they get out of it? They just go on to the next thing, there’s no postmortem, no reference to the dumb thing. Hi there, I’m doing this now, look at this, you know? I mean, a cat can race across the carpet and crash into a glass door… (crash) I meant that, I meant that. I’ve been practicing that for a year. Fuckin’ meow, fuckin’ meow, fuckin’ meow, fuckin’ meow. That’s what they do when they get behind the couch, fuckin’… look behind your couch, you will find a cat recuperating. They have little slings and crutches and shit. Hi, I like tried to make it to the window sill from the bed, didn’t make it.
It’s my theory that old folks, old folks and kids got a lot in common. Uh, for one thing, they both look like this. We call them both farts. Right? Cute little farts, and old farts. I’m just an old fart. But mainly they’re both discriminated against because of… their… age, how old they are, or how old they aren’t. That’s how it starts out, you’re too young, you’re not old enough. Pretty soon they’re saying, sorry, you’re too old. Jesus, that was quick. I was standing right here. Yes, uh, old folks are really just… bent kids, you know? Used children. Sure, it’s in between that we forget how to act, in between those two states, in that awe, you know, in that innocence that we, uh, have to act a certain way. I’m 21 now, gotta stand, talk and walk a certain way. How do you do? I’m 25, 30 now. How do you do? I’m grown up, 35, 40. How do you do? Play some golf, good to see you, say hello to the wife. 45, 50, I’m 55, 60, 65, I’m 70, 75, oh, now I can piss in my pants again, man. Goddamn, I’m 1. Whoooo. So anyway, kids, besides being… too young, are also too little. That’s another thing they have to put up with, they’re too goddamn little. You’ve noticed them, haven’t you? I wouldn’t laugh in front of them, man, but they’re too fucking little. Kids spend all that time, all those important years way the hell down there. Teeny little things. They really do start you out small when you’re a kid, don’t they? Look at this, Dan, we’ve got a kid. What you gonna do with him? Gonna raise him. Don’t plant him too deep, you know? Sure, for all those years, you’re stuck down there and the whole world’s up here. Or, you’re stuck down here, and the whole world is up there. Everything is up there. Everything is built for them, all the furniture, right? Oh, they give you one little table and a couple of chairs in your room, you know? But your brother sits on it and breaks it, man. You’re stuck, everything’s up there. Hey, pardon me, hey, look out for the cigarette, will ya’? Ouch, goddamn it. Hey, you wanna look for the cookies? Would you look for the cookies, please? Yeah, they’re up there, they’re not down here. They don’t keep them here, they keep them up there. I can’t see up there at all. I’ve never seen it up there. I wouldn’t know where to look, they’re up there somewhere, just take a look around, would you? Would you please look… just give it a chance, give it a try, just look everywhere, open everything up, open everything, look in everything up high. You know where they are? He knows where they are. Tell him, Ed. Tell him where they are. He knows where they are. Give him your help. Hey tell him. Just tell him you know. Hey come on. Ah hurry up, Finish your cup. Come on. Yeah, man, you don’t know much down here. Well, you know about the nap of the rug. You have a pretty clear idea about the migration of dust in an urban apartment. You know where all the electrical outlets are. Makes you handy as hell the week before Christmas. Come here, Dad, I’ll show you, come on, hey, come on over here. This one had a brown mark on it. Sure, you’re just a little guy down here, and your handle is extended. That’s the thing they use to take you places. Come on, we’re going downtown. And simply because you’re so small, just because you’re… tiny, they pick you up and throw you in the air. You don’t see them throwing each other in the air, do you? It isn’t safe. Just you, because you’re teeny. Your uncle comes over on Thanksgiving. Whoa boy, look at him. Ain’t he a teeny? Goddamn, I’m gonna throw him up in the air. Come here. I got him, I got you, hold on. I got him. Okay. Okay, okay. Okay, I got him. Oh, Margaret, I’m sorry. I lost him in the sun. We got any turkey left? Yeah, there were rules, I wasn’t too good at rules myself. Well, I was good at breaking them. You’d think that would count, you know, it’s a category. No such luck, it was marked against you. Didn’t have a lot of luck with them because they didn’t all seem logical to me. For some reason or another, some of them seemed dumb. Now, there were good rules, to be sure, there were some fine rules. No running with the scissors, that’s one I always obeyed. Made sense to me. Shit, this big mother will go right through me. What are you doing? I’m not running with the scissors. Another good rule was no sticking your head out of the high speed railroad train window. Goddamn, Dad, good rule. Oh, yeah. Doesn’t want us to get our heads chopped off. Fucking great, must be having a great day, Dad. There were some rules that were not so intelligently drawn, I felt, some things that didn’t make a lot of sense, no running in the halls. Hey, why? Cause it looks like fun, that’s why. No running in the halls. Where you gonna run, in the rooms? I keep turning in the rooms, man. Can’t get up any speed at all in the rooms. Hallways, made for running. Another, uh, dumb rule I thought was no singing at the table. Why? One guy with a bad voice a hundred years ago fucked it up for everybody else? Why? No singing at the table. Why? Because I said so. First sign of a dumb rule. Yeah, you can stand right next to the table all during dinner and sing your ass off, it’s not covered by the rule. “I’m standing near the table during dinner and I’m singing, and it isn’t even covered by your rules.” Sit down, you. That was your middle name, you.
Did you ever, at home when you go to make a sandwich, you reach down past the first two or three pieces of bread to get the good bread? It’s sort of a survival thing, a self, you know, it’s sort of like a, let my family have the rotten bread, I’ll take care of numero uno. Down we go into the healthy part of the loaf. Sometimes you’re going down into the loaf not so much because of, uh, freshness or mold, but because of the size of the piece of bread you want. As we all know, the fat slices are somewhere near the middle. Down you go, and you have to go past about eight or nine slices till you get what you want, and then you hope they don’t rip on the way up. And just before you get them out, the top eight slices go boom and fall the other way. Oh, shit, I just leave them crooked, don’t you? Yeah, let them think a burglar made a sandwich, you know? Not me, honey, I didn’t do that, I never do that. That’s like who the fuck is it in my house who puts away the milk carton with this much milk in it, man? Who the fuck put that away? I thought that was full. Yeah. Frozen peas, did you ever notice that frozen peas are all the same size? There are no small frozen peas, they’re all alike. If you have a favorite frozen pea and you drop the box, you’ll never see your favorite again. A strange thing, the butter warmer. We have that. We were cold, man originally was cold so he built a house, hot box to live in, warm box, live inside the warm box, pretty cool, cold out here, warm inside the warm box. Everything was nice until he realized the meat didn’t keep in the warm box. So, he built a refrigerator, built a cold box inside the warm box. Meat keeps fine, but the butter doesn’t spread. So he built the butter warmer, put a warm box inside the cold box, inside the warm box. Strange folks. If you use vitamins, most good vitamins don’t have a trade name stamped on them, they’re blank pills. They look like vitamins, but they’re not marked. And if you go on the road and you take a lot of vitamins with you, enough for like two weeks, you might put them in another big vial, unmarked. And now you got an unmarked vial with unmarked pills in it. And if you’re going through some little place maybe where the cops got a hard on that day, and he wants to give you a little trouble, a little heat, he can hold you for a while, while they send these things down to the lab. And off your vitamins go, and that’s why I, I always travel with Flintstone Vitamins. Honest, Officer, there’s Wilma and Dino, look. Hey, you’re right, look it there’s Wilma. The guy had to cut me loose, man, he had to cut me loose, I had Wilma. Pussyfoot, interesting word, it’s a rare female birth defect. A lot of people don’t know that. Caught you again. Envy. Somebody, somebody has to think of this stuff.
Oh, that’s what I wanted to do, I wanted to bring a little of the news your way. It’s time to find out… oh, yes. All right. I’d like to take a look at the news. First of all, the headlines, Welcome Wagon Runs Over Newcomer, Terrorists Blow Up Central America And Leave A Note, Off-Duty Policeman Killed By On-Duty Criminal, 21 Killed In 21-Gun Salute, and a Football Team Dies In Sudden Death Overtime. “Police fired over the heads of rioters today, however, they killed 200 people living on the second floor.” “Scientists have discovered a new disease which has no symptoms. It is impossible to detect, and there’s no known cure. Fortunately, no cases have been reported thus far.” “Doctors in Florida claim they are treating a 107-year-old woman who is pregnant. They say that because of her advanced age, she will have a grown-up.” “A man has barricaded himself inside of his house, however, he is not armed and no one is paying any attention to him.” “A man in Milwaukee has been arrested for attempting to use food stamps to mail a watermelon.” Christ, fucking studio audience in a newsroom, did you ever hear of anything like that? “Food and Drug Administration announced today that saliva causes stomach cancer. However, however, only when swallowed in small amounts over a long period of time.” “A man in Philadelphia has been arrested for attempting to make an unauthorized deposit in a sperm bank.” Use vote with your diaphragms, folks. “At the lake in City Park today, police arrested a one-armed man who was bothering the other boaters by continuously rowing in a circle.” “A dog has exploded on a busy downtown street corner. No one was killed, however, 20 people were overcome by fur. Police claim that 50 to 60 fleas also lost their lives in the blast.” Kind of wind up the news tonight, “Scientists have discovered a vaccine for apathy. However, they claim no one is showing the slightest bit of interest in it. They’re gonna throw it away.” Thank you, thank you.
La la la la. George. Well, I knew that, uh, with a name like George, uh, I would have to add something else. Any old name could have emotion for you, though, even a brand name. Product names have things you expect from them. You have a little emotional investment in certain names. I mean, you wouldn’t buy, you wouldn’t eat Good Year pancakes, right? Any more than you would drive on Aunt Jemima tires, right? It’s just, you have feelings, you have expectations about it. If Janitor in a Drum made a douche, no one would buy it. There’s no market. It’s like 20 Mule Team mini pads, man. There’s no market for them. Raid feminine hygiene spray. Raid, wow. That’s what they call them, feminine hygiene spray. They’re under leg deodorants. Why do they avoid that. It’s obvious, under arm, under leg. Why do they avoid that, you know? I know, I guess it’s cause you have two armpits, you only have one leg pit. Uh… Well, I think things ought to be named for what they are. I think there ought to be a little more truth in names, you know? They’ve tried to clean up, to clean up advertising claims, let them clean up some of the names, like Excello and Acme and Ace and Top. Bullshit. Things should be called what they are. I’d like to bring out a new car, the 1977 Piece of Shit. A Division of United Consumer Fuckers. Yeah, company names are fun. Whammo, Whammo is a toy company. Aren’t you glad it’s not an airline? Would you get in the big Whammo bird, huh?
Uh, there’s some just plain old words that are sort of fun to, uh, think of or look at more closely than usual. Things like hot water heater. Have you ever, have you thought of hot water heaters? Pardon me, I said… I’d like to buy a hot water heater. What the hell for. Hot water doesn’t need to be heated. You must want a cold water heater. How about a hot water cooler?
Yeah, some words are fun, words like flammable. Flammable… inflammable… and non-inflammable. Why are there three? Doesn’t it seem to you as though two words ought to be able to handle that idea? I mean, either the thing flams or it doesn’t flam. Now, flammable, flammable, that’s the one that’s on the side of the truck, flammable, as if you’re gonna get out of your car at 60 miles an hour and smoke on this truck, right? Flammable, I found out the reason it says that on the truck is so that just in case you should be spinning out of control at 70 or 80, heading for the truck, you’ll know what it was that happened, you know? Gives you a chance to make a few plans, you know? Put the cigarettes out. Put the cigarettes out. And of course, there’s a moment just after beginning to blow up when you stop blowing up for just a moment… and you say… fucking flammable. Then, of course, you do continue to blow up. Nothing we can do about that.
Jumbo shrimp. Indeed, what do you expect when you order that, what will arrive? Will it be a large shrimp, or a little jumbo. Jumbo shrimp, those words don’t even go together, man.
That’s like military intelligence, they have that, too. How did they do that? There’s a, there’s another phrase like that, business ethics. Say, uh, we’re discussing business ethics. Yes, no wonder we couldn’t hear anything over here. That’s like a plastic glass. They have them. Mine isn’t, mine is a glass glass, goddammit. But they have them. Get me a plastic glass. Well, I’ll see what I can do. Pretty soon they’ll have nylon rubbers. They do, they have nylon rubbers, what the fuck? Hey, all right, none of your filth. Shoot me. Hey, three moans wasn’t bad so far, about an hour and a half. Now, uh, hold on, I have a real great idea. As soon as I think of it, we’re all going to laugh our asses off. Right?
The airline has given us a lot of strange words and expressions, and ways to look at language that they force us into. We have words like, from the airline, like deplane. I’ve never deboated, I’ve never debussed, by God, I’ve deplaned. We’ll be deplaning through the forward door. I’m already on deplane. That’s what they tell you, get on the plane, get on the plane. Fuck you, I’m getting in the plane. Let Evil Knevil get on the plane. I’ll be inside with you folks in uniform, you seem to know where to sit. Airlines got a load of things, they tell you to go to your gate, go to your gate, there’s no gates. Have you ever seen a gate at the airport? There ain’t no fucking gates. Where the hell are the gates at? A lot of doorways, they have a lot of pathways, they have a lot of carpeting, they have a lot of seats, they got rostrums and podiums, they got railings, they got velvet ropes, there ain’t a goddamn gate at the airport. Shit, I’ve missed three planes looking for my gate. Gate 49, goddamn, there must be a bunch of them around here someplace. Where are they? And the airlines also have another thing called a non-stop flight. Not me, bullshit. I insist that my flight stop, preferably, right at the end. That’s when they tell you you’ll be landing shortly. Does that mean we’re gonna miss the runway, honey? No, it just means we’re on our final approach. That’s when they tell you to put your seat back forward. Wow. You mean one time, or a lot of times, honey? Put, put your seat back. I don’t bend like that. And then, one further example of the airline’s perversion of language, when two airplanes almost crash right into each other up in the sky, they call that a near miss. It’s a near hit, gang. Thank you. Well, thank you, you’re nice guys.
“THE FINAL SEGMENT OF MR. CARLIN’S PERFORMANCE CONTAINS ESPECIALLY CONTROVERSIAL LANGUAGE, PLEASE CONSIDER WHETHER YOU WISH TO CONTINUE VIEWING.”
We’re having fun, you know? Uh, I had a couple more, uh, word thoughts, but, ah, screw ’em. I thought of most of them anyway. There is left that group of words that we, uh… Hey, hey, hey, well, they’re your words, gang, and I praise them, too because they are sort of fun. Just as a hobby, if nothing else, these words are only, let’s see, let’s call them this, they’re, uh, the words that we can’t say all the time, I find that to be about the most comfortable, um, umbrella, you know? Uh, they’re just words that we can’t say all the time. Sometimes, yes, sometimes, but not all the time. When you’re a kid, you can’t say them at all, not one. None, that’s it. Nope. But you do keep growing, they can’t stop that. Pretty soon the words hell and damn break through. Hey, I didn’t get hit. I know. Then dad tells you a joke with shit in it. Now don’t tell your mom I said that. Why not? Well, you can’t use them words all the time. I, I was, my trouble was, I wanted a list. I didn’t think it was asking much. Here are these words I’m not supposed to say, let’s have a look at them. I’ll be glad to avoid them if I could just see them and know what they are. You gotta say them to find out what they are man. Shit. Oh fuck. All right, hey, enough man, a list, please Ma. Sure, that’s all you need. When you’re six years old now, here’s the list of words your dad and I don’t ever want to hear you say. Oh, thanks, Ma. Hey, that’ll save me an ass kicking, you know? There’s no list. So, enough of trial and error, goddamn. Now, there are different places where you can’t use words, right? I mean, sometimes… the minister’s wife is one, you definitely don’t say them to the minister’s wife. And all of those thousands of other places that you don’t use those words. Come on, mixed company here, hey, there’s ladies in the kitchen, chrissakes. I got a really filthy joke for you, Bill, but there’s a lady here. Well, that’s okay, she’s filthy, too. Go ahead, Glenn, let’s hear it. Depends on who you’re with, right? They’re just the words we can’t say all the time. Now, I wanted my list to reflect an area I was interested in, the time that you can’t say them all the time that I picked was radio and television time. That’s one of the places where we can’t use them, and, uh, I guess that’s largely because, uh, television is a paid for by private industry, and regulated by the government. So, whew, you know, you think of what, think of what two groups are doing even to each other, you know? And, uh, so you can imagine what they did to radio and television, right? They turned it into a billboard and it belongs to the brillo and biscuit folks, and, uh, that’s all it’ll ever be. And so as a result they want to restrict your language some of the time. Not all of the time, some of those words aren’t always dirty. I found that out trying to make a list, trying to get a little journeyman list going here for myself. Want to know the ones I can never, never say on television, because some of the words you can say… part of the time. It’s the same word but it’s only a part-time dirty word, and 50 percent it’s okay depending on what you meant. So, I figure looking for a list, I started running into all the categories of dirty words, started to realize there were more ways to describe filthy words than there are filthy words. Seemed curious to me. Someone was awfully interested in them. They found an awful lot of ways to refer to them, and, uh, I did, too, called them bad language, dirty, filthy, foul, vile, vulgar, coarse, unseemly, in poor taste, street language, locker room talk, gutter talk, barracks language, naughty, saucy, bawdy, raunchy, rude, lewd, lascivious, indecent, profane, obscene, blue, off-color, risque, suggestive, cursing, cussing, swearing. All I could think of was shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker and tits, man… seven. And it wasn’t complete, I knew the list wasn’t complete, but it was the initial list that first evening. Shit, piss, fuck, cunt cocksucker, motherfucker, tits, and I knew I had ones that could never be said cause they didn’t mean anything else. There are some words you can say part of the time. Talking about an ass kicking, ass is a word that’s hardly even a curse word anymore, but it still is in a little way. I mean, most of the time, ass is all right. On television you can say well, you’ve made a perfect ass of yourself tonight. But you can’t say, you half-ass. Only perfect ass is allowed. You can use ass in the religious sense, if you happen to be the Redeemer riding into town on one, perfectly all right. But don’t get off and say, you know, the donkey hurt my ass. Sometimes, that’s the way it is. Bitch, another word, another animal word, too, bitch. Bitch is all right on television if you happen to be the lady from the San Diego Zoo who brought a bunch of little canines up to Johnny Carson. This one’s a bitch. That’s cool. Don’t refer to the singer that way. Is that bitch gonna do another number? Animals are fine on TV, it’s all right. I’d like to tell a story about a cock and a pussy and a beaver and a bitch and an ass. Get him out of here. Get him out of here. Get him out. Tits, of course, doesn’t belong on a list like that. You know, tits. Tits, you know, too cheerful, nothing harmful. You know, no threat from that word, tits. Tit, tit is a cute little word, tit. Sure, any word I think that’s spelled the same frontwards and backwards is cute as hell. I think Otto is a great name, I always liked it. Here comes fucking Otto. We don’t know if he’s coming or going, cause he’s fucking Otto, you know? I also like Otto cause Otto is toot inside out. Just a hobby. But, uh, tit, cute word. Come on, tits, you can’t say tits. You can say boobs. You can say boobs. Boob starts and ends with the same letter, boob, like tit. You know, you can say it. Tits, no good, can’t say tits, boobs. In fact, boobs is an answer on Match Game. I had boobs, Gene. Boobs, $200. Holy shit. Can’t say, uh, tits. Nice tits on the singer, huh, Ed? But you can go like this, hey, she’s really built, you know? You can’t, you can’t say, uh, you can say teats. Teats is okay if you’re on at 5:00 in the morning and a cow is your guest. But you can’t say jugs, you know, or… Well, you gotta pull the cow’s knockers, Dan, you know? Now, tits also says, you know, well, it sounds to me like a snack anyway? Doesn’t it sound… Give me the Nabisco, new Nabisco double-wrapped tits, man. Pass the tits, would you, Dean? Say, these things are responding. Just a few for while I’m watching TV tonight. Uh, now, we’ve added, uh, three words have been added. There was only one official, uh, induction, one group of three words was added. Uh, there was no balloting this year, as many of you know, right, And some of you have supported some of the words that were in line to be on the list that haven’t made it, I say, you know, just hang in there. Fart, turd, and twat, of course, have. Fart, turd and twat all belong because they don’t mean anything else. Uh, they mean that only, and you can’t say them on TV. Now, fart, again, like tit in a way is, you know, a cute kind of word. Uh, fart’s, you know, a cute little fart, and hey, man, kids know farts are fun, you know? Kids know farts are shit without the mess, right? Same funny sound, same vile smell, kids, no fuss, no muss. Remember when you were a kid one time maybe with short pants on, sitting in church on a wooden bench and you had to do the one cheek sneak. [Squeak] Right in tune with the organ. That’s why they call those pews, I found that out, man, pew. Farts are, uh, hey, farts keep us in our place. Well, actually they disperse us many times. But they do, they keep you in your place, they keep you humble, they remind you of who you are. That’s right, Dr. Goddard, uh, well, the initial series of Mariner flights, of course, all the Mariner landings are complete circumnavigation of the complete global – running of the entire series on Mars with the Mariner (sound). Pardon me. Come over here, why don’t you come over here. Then, uh, we’ll be going to Jupiter right after that. Uh, this man still has exhaust of his own, you know? Did you ever notice that your own farts smell okay? Say, that’s fairly decent. I think I’ll stay home today, do some reading in the closet. Not only do you not mention the word fart, but you never refer to farts. They’re more secret and worse than fucking. No fart mentions, no references to fart. You never see a fart reference. You’d think by now after 20 or 30 years of television that some guy once would have gone, whew. Hasn’t happened. There has never been a fart as far as they’re concerned. They don’t exist, we do not recognize them. Just once I wanna see somebody on the Johnny Carson panel, you know? Whew, hey, Ed, move down, man. Whew. Fucking Ed, fucking Ed let go. Whew. Give me the lighter, Johnny, wow. Oh, hey, Ed, if you’re sick man, see the nurse, will ya’? Something died inside of Ed. Geez, Ed, it ain’t the smell, you know? It’s the burning of my eyes. Often tried to think what it might be like to have never farted, and suddenly have that happen in your thirties, maybe. I just, just had never farted before, and one day the inevitable, man. Air is coming out of me. I don’t wanna be a balloon. Man, if it happened to me, I’d probably use it to try to get out of work, you know? Wouldn’t you, yeah, that’s right, boss, I won’t be in today. Well, air is coming out of my ass. That’s right. No, air, not hair, air. Air, that’s right. Well, I don’t know, I think I might have picked it up from the dog. Yeah, shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, motherfucker, tits, fart, turd, twat. Turd, you can’t say turd on TV, but who wants to? I don’t care if I ever hear that one again. And twat, twat is on the list because it doesn’t mean anything else, you know? No saving meaning, twat’s twat. Right in the twat, right in the twat, no mistaking that. Yes, twat doesn’t have any other meaning. It’s not like, uh, like prick, prick, you can say prick on television. If it happens to your finger, it’s all right. You can prick your finger, just don’t finger your prick, that’s all. Hey, uh, now, in line with those kinds of words, words that are dirty sometimes, and not dirty sometimes, those are the ones that got you in trouble as a kid, cause you noticed that they had two meanings and you began to make a little pun or a joke, and you got caught with it, and it was dirty mind. And it’s not a dirty mind, it’s a fuckin, okay, a little joke, you know? But that’s true, the word ball is the two-way word, the non and curse variety of ball is the most prevalent in that kind of situation. And boy, it comes up more often in real life to make it a double meaning. Uh, ball is, uh, well, every sport is played with a ball, right? Except hockey, and that rhymes with fuck anyway. Take your comfort where you find it. Well, the word ball is a, you know, a part of your life. As a kid, man, it’s one of the early, uh, toys, right? Let’s go play with your ball. What, you sure? Right, yes. That was confusing, ball. Ball has three meanings now, of course, ball also means to fuck, to get laid, to ball, to have balled, to have been balling. Actually, it always meant that, we just didn’t know, you know? Now we know that. Of course, when I was a kid, ball only meant either testicle or small round object you play with, right? That’s all, just those two. And, uh, it’s all right for Kurt Goudy to say it all across the nation, Johnny Bench has two balls on him. Fine, no problem there at all, the whole country nods in agreement, right. Shit, I figured him for two, you know, hell yeah. Hell yeah, that whole team I think. He cannot, however, although he can say that, turn to his sidekick Tony Kubeck and say, Tony, I think he hurt his balls on that play. He’s holding them, by God. Well, that’s true, Kurt, generally when they hurt their balls, they hold them. He’s holding his, he’s hurt his balls. Thank you, Tony, this team has been plagued with ball injuries this spring. Johnson pulled a ball the other day. Jamison has a sprung ball. Nicholas woke up with a tight ball this morning. Williams has a twisted ball from last night. Never hear about those injuries, they call them groin injuries. It’s a groin injury. I never knew where my groin was when I was a kid, did you? Where the hell is my groin, is it dirty, do you cover it up? Put your groin away, wow, what the hell. Where does my groin end and my loin begin. I know I have them both, I just don’t have any dotted lines like a cow picture. Where the hell are they? Just tell me what to cover, I don’t mind. Groin, they pulled their groin muscles. If I pulled my groin muscle, they’d have my ass out of the stadium in no time. These guys sit around, big stars pulling their groin muscles on the weekend. Well, anyway, there is an overlapping, there is a confusion about sex and violence. Some folks don’t know where one ends and the other begins with sex and violence. Sex and violence. A lot of people running around trying to stamp it out like it’s all one thing. What are you doing, trying to stamp out sex and violence. Starts with a S, ends in a A. There’s an overlapping, there’s a gray area, there’s some folks don’t understand. Even folks who like those things together think of them as one, sex and violence. Some people like, as you know, violence with their sex. I don’t care for that myself, I like my violence a little earlier in the afternoon. But it’s true that there’s a confusing area. I mean, even a little child might make a mistake when he’s too young, wandering into the bedroom, oh, daddy’s winning. It has the look of competition. So it got confusing enough to people that someone finally had to sort it out and said, make love, not war. Get it? We said, huh? Make love, not war. A guy finally sorted it out. Probably a lady, it sounds more like a lady’s thing, I don’t know why, make love, not war. Why must there always be killing? That was it. Shit, if I had thought of that phrase, make love, not war, I would have retired that day if I thought of that. Wouldn’t you? I wouldn’t expect to be able to top myself later in life. That would be it, go out with a biggie. I think I’d, you know, just leave my car at the red light, man. That’s it, I’m going to the beach. You guys gotta make love, not war, see you later, and be gone. Well, I have a little phrase of my own, make fuck, not kill. It’s not as graceful a phrase, I know, but I’m not looking to retire at this time. Make fuck, not kill deals with just what we call those things, not what they are, let the experts and behavior folks work on those, what they are. I just like what we call them, fucking and killing. You got fucking and killing, I say let’s change the words around. If language is our servant, let’s put the son of a bitch to work. Let’s call fucking killing, and killing fucking for about a month and a half, just long enough to confuse us a little about which one we really fear and want, all right? Fucking and killing, just anywhere you see them Movies, the movies would be great. Better get down off the horse, Sheriff, we’re fixing to fuck you now. What’s this? Mass fucker still on the loose. Man fucks three, self. No, I think we got him now. He made his first big mistake, he fucked a cop. Yeah, he’s a cop fucker now. Every cop in the state will be looking for him. Okay, thank you, Dan. Hey guys, uh, my horse broke his leg, I’m gonna fuck him. I’ll be right back, excuse me. Shamu, the fucker whale. So all I’m saying I guess really is that fuck you is a positive phrase, it’s just a way of making, you know, direct verbal love from across the street. Next time you hear it feel that way. – Fuck you. – Okay, hey. Thanks for being here tonight and being part of this. I hope we all get to see it. I love you, fuck you, see you later, bye-bye. Jack, how are you? Hello there, folks at home. Well, welcome to our place… Sometimes a girl comes in and leaves things. If you want something just have it, you know? Uh, that’s a nice chair you have over there. I’m sorry. I just feel silly. I’m off now, see? I gotta lady here, who’d like to see ya. Oh, yeah, let me say hi. You know this lady? How you doing girlfriend? Great.