"Eventually, he asked the audience, 'So, do you want to talk about the thing?' He was referring, of course, to the accusations against him."

"The audience cheered. Somewhat wearily, he said, 'I like to jerk off, and I don’t like to be alone.' More laughter. 'So what can I tell you? I can offer you some advice. If you ask, "Can I jerk off in front of you?"—don’t do it! And if they say O.K., don’t do it!' The warnings weren’t exactly sobering or remorseful; they gestured at his actions without really acknowledging what he’d done or to whom or, more important, why. It was a nod in the direction of his troubles, but with no hard look at what those troubles meant. 'Everybody has their thing sexually,' he said. 'But when everyone knows what your thing is . . . now Obama knows what my thing is. Oh, God.'... As the show went on, I began to want to feed C.K., telepathically, the different forms of storytelling he brought to his work when he was at the top of his game and unafraid of losing out on being loved. What if he were to turn his shame into a story? What if he imagined how his dick looked to a woman he had horrified? Couldn’t he go there, Richard Pryor style, and talk from the vantage point of his disgraced penis? Instead, he let his better stories trail off, fearing perhaps the existential ramifications of doing what he used to do, digging and dancing in the minefields of our collective unconscious."

In "Can Louis C.K. Spin His Troubles Into Art?/Touring for the first time since his sexual-misconduct scandal, the comedian gestured at his actions without really acknowledging what he’d done," The New Yorker's Hilton Als gives the genius-idiot comedian some advice on how to do comedy. Why not?

You probably won't read the whole thing because you probably don't have a subscription to The New Yorker, so I've got to tell you that much of the essay is about black people. It's too much trouble to explain why, so I'll just gesture at it: He begins by talking about the Norman Mailer essay "The White Negro," drags in a conversation between Louis C.K. and Chris Rock (with lots of "n-word"), refers to Pigmeat Markham and Big Mama Thornton, has some stuff about a black character on the "Louis" TV show, quotes Louis saying it would be "hot" if your mother told you she once had sex with "a black guy," and said it would be "hot" if Louis, in his new show, "became his mother, teetering toward that black consort, in love with the American forbidden?"

To absorb this you probably need to know if Hilton Als is black. If you don't already know, examine your thoughts first picturing him as white and then picturing him as black. Are they different? I think they they are!

ADDED: "Now Obama knows what my thing is. Oh, God." I like the "Oh, God," because, essentially, Obama has taken the place of God. He sees and He knows and His knowing that you have fallen short is a heavy burden for which you know you must atone.

AND: Here's Wikipedia on "The White Negro":