Justin Bieber becomes a real joke for Comedy Central roast

There are many in the pop culture universe who would say Justin Bieber has become a joke.

The blazing career of the heavily-tattooed young singer has been mostly sidetracked by his tabloid exploits, including run-ins with the law, reported drug use and his rocky love life with his on-and-off girlfriend Selena Gomez. His new Calvin Klein ads were skewered last week on “Saturday Night Live.”

But the once-hot Bieber is headed to the hot seat as the headliner for Comedy Central’s next celebrity roast. “The Comedy Central Roast of Justin Bieber” will take place in the coming months, with a date still to be determined.

“Justin has been asking us for a few years to roast him, and we just kept telling him to go create some source material first,” said Kent Alterman, president of content development and original programming for Comedy Central. “We’re thrilled he listened.”

Bieber seems like an unlikely choice for the Comedy Central roasts, which in the past have focused on industry veterans such as Roseanne Barr, Pamela Anderson, William Shatner and the late Joan Rivers. James Franco was the target in 2013 for the last roast.

But Bieber may be taking a page out of the playbook of Charlie Sheen, who used his roast in 2011 as a way to address his bad boy behavior and start a fresh chapter of his career.

And Bieber has already demonstrated that he has some comedy chops, as evidenced by his hosting gig on “Saturday Night Live” in 2013.

Let’s just hope the Biebs has a sense of humor.

Twitter: @gebraxton