While speaking with Vulture in 2018, “Weird Al” Yankovic explained that there were certain words he’d used on his early records that he excludes when performing those songs today. The term “midget,” for example, popped up on a few of Yankovic’s tracks throughout his career. In the Flintstones-themed “Bedrock Anthem,” Yankovic raps, while imitating Red Hot Chili Peppers frontman Anthony Kiedis, “Got a neighbor by the name of Barney Rubble / He’s a midget, but he makes a lot of trouble.”
The slur can also be heard in the songs “Cable TV,” “Stuck in the Closet With Vanna White,” and “Confessions Part III.” Though Yankovic acknowledges that “midget” wasn’t a kind word when he wrote those lyrics, he says that it makes the tracks sound dated when listening to them nowadays. In fact, during his 2018 tour, he stopped the band while singing one of the songs in question and spoke to the audience about how language had evolved since he’d first written it.
“If I feel like I did something that I’m sorry for, of course I’ll apologize. I mean, we all make mistakes, and sometimes I did things I shouldn’t have done,” Yankovic said at the time.
‘Weird Al’ Yankovic Says He Skips Older Lyrics That Feel Offensive Now
A few years later, Yankovic appeared on Dave & Ethan’s 200” Weird Al Podcast, where he revealed that his self-censorship didn’t end with “midget.” The 2013 song “Word Crimes,” Yankovic points out, contains a verse in which he uses the word “spastic.” As Yankovic tells it, he didn’t know how offensive the term was outside of the U.S. until after the song was released. Now that he’s more educated on the subject, he opts to skip that verse entirely at live shows.
His 1999 track “Jerry Springer,” on the other hand, doesn’t even get taken into consideration when he plans his concerts these days. Although Yankovic doesn’t mention any specific words, he makes note of the fact that the song features several terms that are considered a lot more offensive now than they were when it first came out. Among the potentially insulting words he uses on the record are “hermaphrodite,” “crack ho,” “she-male,” and, yes, even “midget.” You can listen to Yankovic talk about his reasons for omitting the material from his sets in the clip below.
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