“I got a promise I will not be going to jail.” So began comedian Trevor Noah’s set at the 2022 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, the Washington equivalent of a comedy “roast.” With his impunity assured, Noah’s job that night was to continue a long-standing tradition of the yearly gala: to publicly mock the president of the United States.

Noah may not have realized it, but his set—with its lighthearted jabs at President Biden’s stalled agenda—tapped into a ritual that long precedes today’s high-society dinners. In medieval and Renaissance courts, it was the role of the jester to mock the king and his noblemen and elicit their laughter. The concept of “jester’s privilege” protected his right to ridicule without facing the chopping block—within reason.

Jester’s privilege, after all, was no apolitical gift granted by munificent leaders: It was a way of upholding their power. The custom fashioned a legitimized space to invert the social hierarchy, creating a pressure valve for popular discontent. And the commoners, satiated by their stint of rebellious good humor, would then return to quiescence. The Russian theorist Mikhail Bakhtin developed a framework for understanding these moments of social inversion, which he characterized as “carnivalesque.” Bakhtin saw it as a form that was full of subversive potential; for his critics, it was simply blowing off steam.

The principle has been passed down from royal courts to awards ceremonies and celebrity roasts. The cost to the target of mockery? A few excruciating camera cuts that capture their pearly-toothed reaction. And the benefit? A reminder to the public that they, too, can take a joke—that they are self-aware, human, just like us.

Now that politicians double as celebrities, embracing jester’s privilege can be a smart PR move. Clips of Donald Trump letting Jimmy Fallon tousle his hair, or of Hillary Clinton caricaturing herself on Saturday Night Live, promise a welcome boost in virality in a way committee meetings and policy announcements do not. The privilege has continued into the 21st century precisely because it performs a 21st century function: quenching the public’s desire for an off-the-books, out-of-hours authenticity. At the end of his set, Noah dutifully reminded the audience what a “blessing” it was, to “speak truth, even if it makes the people in power uncomfortable.” Having paid the jester their dues for the year, one imagines that the people in power will carry on just fine.