What Michael Richards Should Have Done

Michael Richards was known as Kosmo Kramer for a decade before his recent racial tirade. He was an eccentric, crazy, kooky dude who America loved for his ability to completely wig out in the midst of a ridiculously contrived situation.

Recently, he completely wigged out yet again, yet he made a crucial mistake; he introduced race into his rant as he ripped into an African American heckler.

But that wasn't his biggest mistake. If Michael Richards would've just not apologized, his career might not be wrecked right now.

Follow me on this. We expect the face of Kramer to be shocking and irreverent, am I right? If Richards would've just came out and shouted more racist epithets, we'd be likely to just dismiss it as an act. His apology on the Letterman show was too sincere; Americans know see the comedian as a legitimate racist-and really, rightly so. But if Richards had the foresight to embrace the most insane logic he could possibly muster, he might convince the majority of Americans that his screams of the N word were just part of a really racy (pardon the pun) act.

If he absolutely had to apologize for this actions, Michael Richards should've kept it brief and insincere. After all, those types of apologies seem to go over extremely well in Hollywood (cough, Mel Gibson, cough cough). Maybe even reference his work as Kramer on Seinfeld; he could've just gone on the Letterman show, and Letterman would introduce him.

David Letterman: "Folks, we have tonight live via satellite feed Michael Richards, TV's Kosmo Kramer, who would like to apologize for his racially offensive comments after a particularly brutal heckling this last week. Mr. Richards, what do you have to say for yourself?"

Michael Richards with a bag of Rold Gold: "These pretzels are making me racist!"

Jerry Seinfeld (sarcastically): "Well, now, that's terrific."

I guarantee you that would've been the end of the whole debacle. Nobody would seriously consider Michael Richards to be a racist, he'd just be Kramer being Kramer. And you can't stop Kramer from being Kramer, can you?

In a more serious sense, we've got to really look at this issue. The whole Michael Richards thing calls attention to the big problem with America; we've got a lot of people that don't know where the line is, or even that understand that there is a line. There are certain subjects that have to be approached carefully; some comics could have gone into the same territory as Michael Richards and came out of the whole thing spotless if they were very clear that they were parodying racism rather than engaging in it.

For Michael Richards, there's the rub. He's a racist dude, and didn't attempt to sarcastically portray racism, but rather let his hatred come spilling out of him like oil in a Kramerica rubber ball. It's a flaw he needs to work on, and shouldn't diminish his past work, nor should people boycott the man; it's clear that Richards went over the line of good taste, but he's a human being with problems that can be fixed. Even the worst racists (cough, cough, Mel Gibson, cough) have some good aspects, after all, and Michael Richards' problem is one of perception. Perception can be changed. It'd be a shame for a man as talented as Richards to be shunned by every U.S. citizen, many of whom are as racist in their hearts as Richards was that night on stage, just without the right public forum for their hate to come tumbling out into the open. Until America has a more open dialogue on real racial relations, it's a bit hypocritical to ostracize (though entirely right to criticize) a man who, very sadly, went too far.