Chris Rock has never been afraid to put it all out there. And almost everyone agrees with him at one time or another, but not usually all the time.

Chris Rock can talk about the differences between “black people” and “ni**ers” and the most staunch redneck will applaud. But his next bit is about white people “marrying their cousins, eating mayonnaise sandwiches, listening to John Cougar Mellencamp records.” And the white guy just checked out.

Rock’s recent hosting appearance on SNL raised some eyebrows when he joked that he would not go into the newly-opened One World Trade center tower. He caught some flak the next day in the media for that. But Rock told New York Magazine recently:

“[I]t’s not that people were offended by what I said. They get offended by how much fun I appear to be having while saying it. You could literally take everything I said on Saturday night and say it on Meet the Press, and it would be a general debate, and it would go away.”

That kind of political correctness is the reason Rock quit playing colleges. He says everyone is so easily offended and in a rush to silence anything that might sound off-color.

“I stopped playing colleges, and the reason is because they’re way too conservative. … Not in their political views — not like they’re voting Republican — but in their social views and their willingness not to offend anybody. Kids raised on a culture of ‘We’re not going to keep score in the game because we don’t want anybody to lose.’ Or just ignoring race to a fault. You can’t say ‘the black kid over there.’ No, it’s ‘the guy with the red shoes.’ You can’t even be offensive on your way to being inoffensive.”

Rock says that, for all its efforts to be inoffensive, most of America has no idea how the “other half” — which is actually far, far smaller than half — lives.

“If poor people knew how rich rich people are, there would be riots in the streets. If the average person could see the Virgin Airlines first-class lounge, they’d go, ‘What? What? This is food, and it’s free, and they … what? Massage? Are you kidding me?’”