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When Stephen Colbert hosted The Colbert Report on Comedy Central, everyone thought he was playing a character. He even admitted as much when he began hosting The Late Show on CBS. But how can we know for sure? After all, when Jordan Klepper started hosting The Opposition, everyone thought he was playing a conservative “Alex Jones” type character, but then Jordan said that he wasn't. Instead it was his liberal persona on The Daily Show that was the character. Indeed, Alex Jones's lawyers have argued, in court, that he's playing a character on his show. So who can tell? It turns out, the philosopher can. By using philosophy, and a little something called the principle of charity, we can examine what Stephen Colbert said on The Colbert Report and determine that he must have been playing a character. The ideas he espoused – like relativism, truthiness, gut thinking, and an unrestricted right to one's opinion – are so clearly absurd, he must be kidding. And in revealing this, we will be learning how to do philosophy.

Every night on my show, The Colbert Report, I speak straight from the gut … I give people the truth, unfiltered by rational argument.

– Stephen Colbert

White House Correspondents Dinner April 29, 2006

Stephen Colbert became the host of CBS's The Late Show in 2015, but his previous gig (2005–2014) was hosting The Colbert Report on Comedy Central. (Pronounce that “Cole‐bear Re‐pore,” so that both “t”s are silent.) He was kind of a hard nut to crack in those days. Colbert is an Irish Catholic born in Washington D.C. and raised as the youngest of 11 children in South Carolina. On The Colbert Report he (supposedly) played a character – an Irish Catholic born in Washington D.C. and raised as the youngest of 11 children in South Carolina. You read that right. The descriptions are exactly the same.

Now you might think this means that he wasn't really playing a character, but there is one major difference between the Colbert that hosts The Late Show, and the Colbert that hosted The Colbert Report: their political views. For example, while Late‐Show‐Colbert spent most of his monologues during the Trump presidency trashing Trump and the Republicans, Report‐Colbert endlessly spouted right‐wing talking points and defended politically conservative ideologies. For example, in an interview about global warming, Colbert asked CNN News Anchor Anderson Cooper “What's wrong with the ice melting … maybe now Greenland will actually turn green.”¹ And in doing so, he was not repeating but actually anticipating something that would eventually be said by right‐wing radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh.²

Now, again, conventional wisdom holds that Report‐Colbert was a character, and that when he began hosting The Late Show, he revealed his true self. Indeed, Report‐Colbert occasionally appears as a character on The Late Show. The Colbert Report was satire, the theory goes – a satire of conservative “talking head” shows that you could find on FOX News at the time, like Bill O'Reilly's The O'Reilly Factor. But Colbert delivered his lines in such a “dead‐pan style” that it was difficult for those unfamiliar with Colbert to realize he was joking. Studies – real, honest to God, studies – showed that most conservatives seeing Colbert for the first time thought that he was completely serious and defending the conservative positions he was stating.

Of course, those same studies also showed that liberals seeing Colbert for the first time were apt to think that he agreed with them and was mocking conservatives. So they really just reveal the human propensity to see what we want.³ But that raises an interesting question. If there is a human propensity to just see what we want in Colbert, how can anyone know that they are reading Colbert correctly? Was Report‐Colbert really kidding? Or could he have been serious? Maybe it's Late‐Show‐Colbert that is the character.

“But,” you might argue, “Colbert said that he was just playing a character on The Colbert Report, once he started hosting The Late Show.”⁴ Indeed he did.⁵ But that's exactly what Jordan Klepper said when he started hosting The Opposition (one of the many shows that tried to replace The Colbert Report on Comedy Central). Klepper said he was only playing a character on The Daily Show. “This is the real me,” he said on the first episode of The Opposition.⁶ And yet, everyone knew he was playing a character!⁷ Indeed, The Opposition was an admitted satire of Alex Jones's Info Wars.⁸ And to make matters worse, not only did Alex Jones's lawyer argue, in court, that Jones is just playing a character on Info Wars,⁹ but few who listen to Info Wars think that he is playing a character – and those that do, only think so because they think that all news pundits are playing a character.¹⁰ As Klepper put it (even before Jones's lawyer said Jones was playing a character):

If you see me in an interview, or a deposition, say that I'm playing a character, that's because in that moment, I'm simply playing a character who, to throw them off the scent, would say that he's playing a character. Because, the truth is, “I'm not playing a character, except when I am.”¹¹

How the hell can anyone tell who's playing a character and who's not?

Well, this is where philosophy, and a little thing called “the principle of charity,” comes in handy. According to this principle, when it is unclear what someone means, we should always choose the most charitable interpretation – for example, the one that makes them look least dimwitted. Such interpretations are usually right because, usually, people aren't that stupid. So what I would like to do this chapter is use this principle to argue that Report‐Colbert had to have been a character. The Colbert Report was satire. Colbert had to be kidding. Why? Because if he really meant most of the things he said on that show, Stephen Colbert would be idiotic beyond all comprehension. “Wrong!” Colbert said after scientists unveiled a 47‐million‐year‐old “missing link” fossil.¹² “The Earth is 6000 years old. Always has been, always will be.”¹³ He cannot be serious because, not only is the idea that the Earth is 6000 years old contrary to all relevant modern scientific findings, but the idea that the Earth does not age – that it has always been 6000 years old – is absurd.

Now to those who, like me, have watched Colbert for years, this might seem like a waste of time. We all know that The Colbert Report was satire (and thus that Late‐Show‐Colbert is the real McCoy). “It's obvious.” But the argument I am about to lay out, which exposes just how ludicrous Report‐Colbert was, will teach some of the most fundamental and important lessons about how to do philosophy.