This is a cross-post by Paul Canning
If you enjoy laughing and have ever watched the British (knowing laugh) nihilistic comedian Frankie Boyle I very much doubt that you have never laughed at his jokes.
The joke about the Queen’s vagina being haunted? If you heard it I would bet that something akin to laughter ensued.
Yet that and other comedic transgressions has resulted in transgressive Frankie being banished by the evil English establishment.
Except it hasn’t.
Oh no. We have the BBC commissioning a show headed by Boyle after the Scottish referendum and then another commission for online after the UK General Election. Some banishment. The Boyle election show was on the BBC iplayer homepage for weeks.
In his election show Boyle had two female comedians to bounce off and a ‘Grime’ commentator – aka a black British bloke. All of whom polished his mantle.
Now I can think of a number of bitchy conservatives who could have been a perfect foil to Boyle. Were they even considered? It would have made for great TV.
But why I am even asking this? Multi millionaire Boyle needs his ‘safe space’, bless. He has no history of stepping outside of his comfort zone but let’s try. Here we go Frankie. Here’s me puncturing your safe space.
The treatment of Australia and Australians by Boyle and his ‘Grime’ commentator Akala was colonialist and racist.
Boyle cherry picked a brief extract from Australian morning TV to showcase how Australians are all stupid fucking colonials and so so racist. This was as bad as the treatment of the ‘colonials’ by the Brits going way back has ever been. Barry Humphries, Private Eye and Humphries’ Barry McKenzie character were satirising this Brit attitude in the 1970s (the 70s FFS).
We recently had the Gallipoli hundredth anniversary. Gallipoli in the Australian imagination is all about how the Brits have traditionally treated Aussies as subaltern. This stuff has form.
After his cherrypick, Boyle, backed by Akala, then underlined by calling Australia, quote, “the most racist country in the world”.
Worse than Mali? Worse than Russia? Worse than India? Worse than Brazil?
Do read the rest of Paul’s post here