Daily Inspiration Quote by Delta Burke

Burke draws a bright line between self-deprecation as agency and mockery as extraction. Coming from an actress whose body and persona were routinely treated as public property in the late-80s/90s celebrity machine, the insistence on "that's me and I can do it to me" lands like a boundary, not a punchline. It reframes humor as consent-based: if you own the target, you own the risk.

The quote’s power is its plainspoken moral clarity. She doesn’t dress it up in theory; she uses the everyday language of someone who’s been expected to smile through the joke. "Poke fun" is softened, almost friendly. "Cruel" is the harder word, and it shifts the whole register. Burke is pointing at how comedy can function as social permission: once the room laughs, the wound gets retroactively justified. Her distinction calls out a dynamic audiences often pretend not to see: jokes are rarely just jokes when the target has less control, less status, less ability to retaliate.

There’s also a savvy performer’s subtext here. Self-deprecation can be a strategic move, a way to preempt criticism and manage the narrative. Burke knows that trick; she’s saying she’ll use it on her own terms, not as a license for others to take swings. In an era that still confuses "edgy" with "accurate", she’s arguing for comedy with accountability: laughter that doesn’t require someone else’s humiliation as the entry fee.