Your weekend must reads🗞️

👋 Hi there, friends of The Short List! I’m Nicole Fallert, and it’s my pleasure to share with you some of the best reads of the week from the Paste BN newsroom.

😂 From TikTok stars to up-close comedian specials, what does the future of comedy look like? There's no doubt the world is changing – and thus comedy is evolving too. But is the future bright for the genre, or is it being diluted amid "cancel culture" and a more conscious society? Paste BN explores this question in a new series about what's next for the industry.

What's making us laugh – or not:

• The importance of punching up: There's a fierce dispute among comedians over who should be the subject of a joke: Those with less power or those in positions of power.
• Do stereotypes have a place in comedy? Stereotypes have long been embedded into American comedy and the jokes, more often than not, are aimed at marginalized communities. And a once tried-and-true method of unifying people has now divided audiences across generations.
• A new wave of authentic comedy:  Meet the comedians earning laughs on TikTok — and refueling the industry with sincere humanity. 

Here are more must-reads below 👇 See you next week!