Cue outrage: Gervais' new Netflix special just dropped.

His joke is about the Umbridges who like to police other people's thoughts and speech really.

A lot of them actually aren't trans (though some are), and they're making life much more difficult for transpeople.

I think it's really sad for those who really have gender dysphoria that they've been used as a cause for the type of people who like to wield power in this way. Because it's not going to make their lives easier, not in the long run.

That was very clever. The use of the word whore coupled with terf. Making them the same. Everyone knows that whore is a horrible, very specifically misogynistic, insult, so now they see terf in the same way.

And yes, he's not poking fun at transwomen. He's poking fun at the TRAs who wield the power.

I haven’t seen it yet but him bringing up
money makes me think again that he’s one of the few people who can speak up on this. Him, Chapelle, JKR - they have their money and fanbases. None of them had to get involved in this. They could have easily sounded off in private and towed the line in public. And yet, fuck it, they’ve done it anyway! It’s Cheering that such people still exist.

I thought this was brilliant. Really clever. I have new found respect for RG. Clever and thought provoking. Deliberately provocative, sure, but like he said, spot the irony.

The ever-excellent James Kirkup in the Spectator:

There’s nothing right-wing about gender critical views

Piece is mainly on Onjali Rauf, but talks about Ricky Gervais as the background to that.

I don’t think that’s a joke about transwomen. I don’t think it’s a suggestion that transwomen pose an inherent threat to women. I think it’s a joke about people who dismiss women’s fears of sexual crime and regard such concerns as less important than the feelings of transwomen. I think such people exist and the point of the joke is worth exploring.

Sounds like it's worth reactivating our Netflix sub just read the Times article and their £26pm from us is safe for a while, too!

Loved it 😍

Just finished watching, funny and clever, you aren't expected to agree with him just sit back and take what you want from it

I have a very weird "six degrees of..." connection with one of the people behind The 11 O'Clock Show that I haven't thought about in years! I'm still very vaguely in touch with an ex who is married to my connection (we all knew each other back in the day) which makes things stranger still. Not sure where all of the years have gone...

DH - who doesn't usually watch stand up and rarely engages in politics (much less anything on FWR!) - declared it "funny and true" over dinner. And said Stonewall "have shown themselves in their true colours...how can they tell us what to talk about?". Then "they're like a terror group".

To me, that shows this is cutting through.

Joanna William's comment in the Times:

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/bf4828ae-dd23-11ec-8de3-573a6521e09e?shareToken=068b86f2184c4ff29177157b2afb91d8

LGB Alliance's view:

twitter.com/ALLIANCELGB/status/1529838226076311560

It’s not for us to defend individual jokes that
@rickygervais
makes in his shows. We’d rather he didn’t make jokes about AIDS but we defend his right to tell them. The policing of speech in the public realm means that the role of performers has never been more important. 1/2

twitter.com/ALLIANCELGB/status/1529838227552620544

They can say the unsayable and that may empower ordinary employees in hospitals, schools and offices to speak up. Gender identity ideology is full of absurd contradictions and surreal claims - you’d have to have a heart of stone not to laugh at it. 2/2

I always thought RG's stand up persona was supposed to be a bit of an arsehole, so took the bragging about money as part of that. Like I said earlier it very much reminded me of his comedy on the 11 O'Clock Show in the 90s, which was similarly deliberately obnoxious in delivery. I could be wrong though!

I don't think anything has gone wrong in his life. He is rich, that's the reality of his life. I much prefer it to some man of the people shtick.

I really don’t think so.
I think it’s to preempt inverse snobbery.

On a slightly different note, did anyone else notice how much Ricky kept banging on about his wealth/how rich he is/how he's a millionaire/how he can afford this and that blah blah blah???

I find it very it very odd, vulgar, and classless, when someone brags about their 'wealth.' It often signifies they're trying to compensate for something too.

Something in their life is shit/wrong/bad and they're not terribly happy, so they brag about their 'wealth' and flash cars, expensive houses, and fancy holidays abroad etc... Wonder that's going wrong/gone wrong in his life?

He wrote for The Sun too, yet somehow avoids being a Right Wing Bigot.

Since his TV comeback, he seems like a man leashed, with no real conviction in the work he's involved in. He seems really weary, and just agreeing with the young comedians because he has to.

I think he still humiliated from when he lost his TV work after the rape joke, and also resentful for what he has to do to get TV work now.

That's why he's angry with RG - he's can still find and say the funny in anything he wants, boyle can't.

Never forget Frankie Boyle joked about Katie Price’s disabled child raping her.

didn't mock pronouns so he’s ok with the TRAs.

Ugh every time I hear Boyles name it gives me the rage with his "low hanging fruit" comment, the guy who mocked a specific disabled child accusing someone else of punching down, the absolute bare faced cheek of him!

"I'm a fucking TERF whore!’”
Just had a lovely T-shirt made with this on. Replaces my 'live,laugh,love' one.

It's always been the case that comedians like Kumar, boyle, Acaster and Ince who support the establishment (universities, the media, lots of corporations all have the same world views) are very angry at other comedians for being more questioning of mainstream opinions.

Can’t help but think Robin is just very bitter about Ricky’s meteoric rise in caparison to his own silent fart of a career.

Certainly makes one think less of a person if they should really know better than to fall for this crap.
See also Alice Roberts.

Robin Ince is an idiot. I don't know how Gia Milinovich hasn't instructed Brian to smack him over the head with something heavy - like a biology textbook!