Comedy Being Strangled?

[AngleEyes]

A lot of the anti-racism comedians don't see a problem about attacking so called white people. e.g. Romesh Ranganathan, ...

Any examples of that, or is it a figment of your imagination?

 

[^woody^]

I am personally offended by James Corden

He should be arrested for impersonating a comedian and obtaining money by deception, and then sued under the Trades Description Act.

 

[AngleEyes]

Perhaps 'Woke' can become embraced over time to separate the people who continue to use antediluvian ways of thinking from those who wish our society to become truly cosmopolitan.

'Woke' has already become weaponised from its original concept of meaning an awareness of inequality in society.
So rather then it becoming an innocuous word, it started as innocuous and it has been adopted by the right wing to be insulting.

Woke (/ˈwoʊk/ WOHK) is an English adjective meaning 'alert to racial prejudice and discrimination'
...
By 2020, parts of the political center and right wing in several Western countries were using the term woke, often in an ironic way, as an insult for various progressive or leftist movements and ideologies
...
some commentators came to consider it an offensive term with negative associations to those who promote political ideas involving identity and race
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woke​

 

[Dork Lard]

On one of the few occasions I've actually managed to find a mentally well balanced & intelligent extreme left winger to sit down & chat with she mentioned a theory that troubled me. She asked if I thought Chubby Brown was a comedy show or was it a white supremacists rally?

I last saw Chubby back in the 90's when he was not just selling out venues he was performing several nights in a row, my memory was of a 100% white audience but predominantly man & wife couples.

I saw Jim Davidson just before xmas, a half empty auditorium of 100% white, mostly males with noticeably few man & wife couples !

 

[AngleEyes]

On one of the few occasions I've actually managed to find a mentally well balanced & intelligent extreme left winger to sit down & chat with she mentioned a theory that troubled me. She asked if I thought Chubby Brown was a comedy show or was it a white supremacists rally?

I last saw Chubby back in the 90's when he was not just selling out venues he was performing several nights in a row, my memory was of a 100% white audience but predominantly man & wife couples.

I saw Jim Davidson just before xmas, a half empty auditorium of 100% white, mostly males with noticeably few man & wife couples !

Male strippers tend to perform to a mainly female audience.
They'd probably be laughed off the stage if their audience was predominantly males or couples.
It's probably a known fact that audiences tend to be sympathetic with the type of humour being presented.

 

[motorbiking]

I go when the tickets are free and often you get great comedy. Not always from those you expect. I've see Rob Brydon and Julian Clary a couple of times, they were both dire. Lee Nelson was surprisingly hilarious, same for jimmy Carr, yet I've never been a fan of his on TV.

 

[Dork Lard]

I go when the tickets are free and often you get great comedy. Not always from those you expect.

By far the best comedian I ever saw live was a chap called Stan Richards who played Seth Armstrong on Emmerdale. How he never made it big time as a comedian I'll never understand.

 

[The Samaritan]

The best comedian I've ever seen is, Boris Johnson.

 

[CBW]

The best comedian I've ever seen is, Boris Johnson.

I see him more of a clown.

 

[AngleEyes]

A lot of the anti-racism comedians don't see a problem about attacking so called white people. e.g. Romesh Ranganathan, who just isn't funny on any level.

Any examples of that, or is it a figment of your imagination?

Can we assume it was a figment of your imagination?

 

[^woody^]

The best comedian I've ever seen is, Boris Johnson.

I can believe that.
But not because Johnson is funny.

 

[fillyboy]

Was looking at some Ricky Gervais on youtube, hosting of awards do's and so on, this appeared, very similar if not the same as the Jimmy Carr 'joke', Ricky seems to have got away with it, same joke but with a slightly different nuance. Carr was insulting the gypsies whereas Gervais is insulting Hitler. Both are acceptable in my opinion.

 

[diy_fun_uk]

Les Dawson from 1974, watch from 14 mins 20 secs in. To me he's talking a lot of common sense.

Parkinson - Les Dawson - 1974.avi - YouTube

 

[AngleEyes]

Les Dawson from 1974, watch from 14 mins 20 secs in. To me he's talking a lot of common sense.

Parkinson - Les Dawson - 1974.avi - YouTube

Fair comments by Les. But let's not forget that those comments were nearly 50 years ago, when racism was rife, it was barely 6 years after the legislation stopped people putting discriminatory notices in their windows, and homosexuality was still illegal in Scotland and NI.

 

[diy_fun_uk]

Fair comments by Les. But let's not forget that those comments were nearly 50 years ago, when racism was rife, it was barely 6 years after the legislation stopped people putting discriminatory notices in their windows, and homosexuality was still illegal in Scotland and NI.

To me his points are still valid, both in 74 and now. We'll never square the circle because comedy/humour can mean dramatically different things to people. Of course it's not right for comedians or anyone else to incite any of the isms and in the main comedy has significantly moved on from the 60s/70s. However if we try to completely re-mould it to the point no one is ever offended, what do we end up with? Bland, vanilla 'comedy' that doesn't achieve what comedy sometimes should ... that is to provoke, make us think and challenge perceptions. In doing that, people will sometimes be offended.