Key & Peele...& Satire

In a world of television that has a fundamentally white audience, Key & Peele stands out as one of the best shows that pinpoint what is funny about race, while also unveiling the alarming face of racism. The two biracial hosts have a continuous conversation on race and the perception of it and how it creates a sort of barrier between races. They specifically focus on White vs. Black and somehow manage to perfectly describe this American dichotomy through the use of satire and farce. They describe how perception changes because of race and how even watching something like a newscast can highlight the differences between being black and white.

In the third season of Key & Peele, they made a segment called Black Ice in which two white news reporters report on a winter storm and the black ice that it produced. They even repeat "black ice" enough times that it starts to sound like "black guys" and flash a picture of a black ice cube with gold teeth and its cap to the back. Peele, who plays a reporter standing in the blowing snow picks up on the insult, and says, "One must remember how hard it is for black ice to survive, what with the authorities trying to destroy it with the snowplows and the salt trucks. But black ice perseveres." Then Key, who plays the weatherman says, " As you can see right now, the city is being controlled by oppressive white snow, making it hard for all people to advance... we do not hear much 'news' about that, though. Do we?" Then the white female anchor says that black ice  almost "robbed me of my...balance." Obviously, Key & Peele were talking about more than just a storm, and they achieve the perfect combination of setting a light on the problem of race and how different people interpret it while also adding a satire to the piece.

White Zombies is another skit that they performed that highlighted racism without directly commenting on it with satirization. The skit begins with them stranded in an affluent neighborhood surrounded by zombies. Their white partner who promised to help them reach a safe haven gets attacked by the zombies, and they have to try to get to the police station on their own. While running through a crowd of zombies, they notice that the zombies do not try to attack them, in fact, that zombies are scared of them! The zombies hide their kids, lock their doors, and climb fences in order to get away from them-- because of the fact that they are black. This is obviously a funny idea, but once you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, it is clear that they are commenting on how racism will never truly disappear, regardless of the circumstances.

Although the show uses satire to make certain situations like these funny, it also makes certain people reconsider their own morals-- especially when it comes to race.