Humor & Life Quote by Wanda Sykes

Comedy can be a bunker: the punchlines go out first, and the person stays safely behind the blast door. Wanda Sykes is naming the moment she stopped using jokes as camouflage and started using them as a vehicle. The distinction matters. Early in a career, especially for someone whose identity and point of view can be politicized on sight, “the jokes” can function like a decoy - take the laugh, don’t take me. That posture wins approval while keeping vulnerability off the table.

Her line maps a shift from craft-as-shield to craft-as-self. “Put myself forward” doesn’t mean less funny; it means the comic is no longer hiding the stakes. The subtext is about authority: confidence isn’t just personal comfort, it’s permission to occupy the stage as a fully legible subject, not merely a delivery system for setups. When she says she was “behind the jokes,” you can hear the industry logic that rewards palatability: be quick, be sharp, but don’t be too present.

Sykes’s context makes the move sharper. As a Black queer woman in mainstream comedy, being “forward” risks backlash - not because the material changes, but because the audience now has to reconcile the laugh with the person making it. Her intent is almost instructional: the strongest comedy isn’t only precision writing, it’s the decision to stand in the line of fire and let the joke point back at you. That’s where persona becomes power.