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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to find this " Best Gag of the Edinburgh Festival in poor taste?

418 replies

speakout · 19/08/2019 21:04

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-49389208

I have seen and read this "joke " repeated several times on TV in the past few days and find it in very poor taste. Newsreaders on TV have been chuckling. Tourette's can be a serious and debilatating condition and sufferers have huge challenges in everyday life. Surely we are a bit more grown up these days than to poke fun at people with a neurological condition?
Is is just me being stuffy?

OP posts:
mydogisthebest · 21/08/2019 15:38

Well I laughed out loud at it and not that many things make me do that!

I guess some people will find it offensive but just about every joke someone will find offensive. In fact almost every story, every film etc someone will find offensive.

I see that offence was taken because Gary Lineker joked about his 2 bald co-presenters!

Soon we won't be able to talk about anything, joke about anything or write about anything in case someone somewhere is offended

mydogisthebest · 21/08/2019 15:40

I don't find the Eton one funny in the slightest

Loveislandaddict · 21/08/2019 15:42

I thought it was a clever play on words, but didn’t find it funny, and felt uncomfortable when i heard it.

Lifecraft · 21/08/2019 15:47

I guess some people will find it offensive but just about every joke someone will find offensive. In fact almost every story, every film etc someone will find offensive.

Absolutely spot on.

BertrandRussell · 21/08/2019 15:53

“I see that offence was taken because Gary Lineker joked about his 2 bald co-presenters”

Well- one person phoned the BBC complaints line. One.

BertrandRussell · 21/08/2019 15:57

People are continuing to avoid the point. The fact that this joke got a very public mainstream award now means that it is OK to make jokes about people with disabilities, and anyone who is not happy about that is being oversensitive. Personally I think oversensitive is much preferable to under sensitive.........

DGRossetti · 21/08/2019 16:03

People are continuing to avoid the point. The fact that this joke got a very public mainstream award now means that it is OK to make jokes about people with disabilities

Does it ?

and anyone who is not happy about that is being oversensitive

Or lacks a sense of humour ?

Personally I think oversensitive is much preferable to under sensitive.........

Suggesting it's more about virtue signalling than anything else ... I'm guessing the smaller the number of people agreeing with the OP (the ratio seems to have remained an interesting 85/15) the more virtue there is too signal until you become the only person objecting and therefore the most virtuous.

There's a gag about the sound of one person applauding that springs to mind ...

chomalungma · 21/08/2019 16:07

uggesting it's more about virtue signalling than anything else

I tend to find that people who use the words "virtue signalling" tend to be the kind of people who don't give a shit about other people and who they upset.

Sorry if that offends you. Not sorry. Just saying it as it is and all that.

worriedaboutmygirl · 21/08/2019 16:19

That’s exactly it. I could be wrong but I don’t see a joke that uses (and doesn’t subvert) a racial stereotype, delivered by a white person, making a shortlist for a prize like this. Or one about people with Downs Sydrome or CP. Maybe people have the right to tell those jokes but they are considered sufficiently socially unacceptable (tasteless/offensive) that they aren’t condoned by getting mainstream prizes. At least I hope they aren’t. But it’s ok apparently to reward a joke based on a stereotype about Tourette’s (or diabetes etc) for some reason.

DGRossetti · 21/08/2019 16:19

I tend to find that people who use the words "virtue signalling" tend to be the kind of people who don't give a shit about other people and who they upset.

Sorry if that offends you. Not sorry. Just saying it as it is and all that.

Nothing on here could offend me. Homelessness - yes that offends me. Vulnerable women having to run a gauntlet of harrassment and criminal intimidation - that offends me. People being denied opportunities because of accidents of birth, or circumstances. That offends me. Disabled peopled being denied access to benefits they are entitled to offends me.

I guess I just have weird priorities then. I'll try and exercise my offense muscles more ....

worriedaboutmygirl · 21/08/2019 16:24

“The more virtue there is to signal.... blah blah blah”

Um nope. I’d prefer it if the world were kinder and more empathetic and it says a lot about you that you would think this. Have a word with yourself.

YouTheCat · 21/08/2019 16:40

Can't you see that by making light of a disability in a 'joke' just makes it more difficult for those who need those benefits to be taken seriously by the authorities that assign them?

BertrandRussell · 21/08/2019 16:49

“‘Virtue signalling’, a term which seeks to ridicule the ideas of altruism and generosity by suggesting that they are only ever undertaken in search of admiration”

DGRossetti · 21/08/2019 16:52

Can't you see that by making light of a disability in a 'joke' just makes it more difficult for those who need those benefits to be taken seriously by the authorities that assign them?

I really don't thing the authorities need the cloak of a joke to fail to take people seriously. It's hardly like ATOS and Capita sent their assessors to Edinburgh for disability awareness training, is it ?

Lifecraft · 21/08/2019 16:57

I see that offence was taken because Gary Lineker joked about his 2 bald co-presenters

Well- one person phoned the BBC complaints line. One.

So someone was offended. Someone had their feelings hurt. Can you give me a minimum number of people that need to be offended before we should care? Or maybe we shouldn't care at all? Maybe the offended bald person should just stop watching Gary Linekar.

DGRossetti · 21/08/2019 17:00

“‘Virtue signalling’, a term which seeks to ridicule the ideas of altruism and generosity by suggesting that they are only ever undertaken in search of admiration”

is one definition ....

YouTheCat · 21/08/2019 17:04

That maybe so but by making these jokes mainstream and acceptable it lessens people in the eyes of the kind of arses who work as assessors.

In the 70s racist jokes were accepted as fine by the majority does that make them right?

CendrillonSings · 21/08/2019 18:16

You can always tell a virtue-signaller by how offended they get at the term...

chomalungma · 21/08/2019 18:32

You can always tell a virtue-signaller by how offended they get at the term

Someone who uses the words "virtue signaller" reveals to the world what they are really like.

YouTheCat · 21/08/2019 18:41

Why would I need to virtue signal to a bunch of strangers on the internet? I really don't give a fuck.

Snoozysnoozy · 21/08/2019 19:04

Can you imagine the Mumsnet comedy fest? It'd just be jokes for 8 year olds.

What do you call a dinosaur with one eye?

Oops. Offensive to the partially sighted.

Why did the chicken... Oops offensive to twitchers and the RSPB

Knock knock... Offensive to the homeless

Fuck. There's no joke left to tell.

CendrillonSings · 21/08/2019 19:08

chomalungma

Your rapid and precise illustration of my point is much appreciated! Wink

Iggi999 · 21/08/2019 19:08

Snoozy I find mumsnet posters witty and sometimes hilarious. Hence the whole "snorting out my tea" comments you read on here. I think they do this without resorting to tired old one liners. Awarding the best joke of the festival award to that joke is similar to those who think penis beaker was the funniest thread on mumsnet.

MarshaBradyo · 21/08/2019 19:14

It is about that level yep. It’s chosen by Dave, not quite Nuts or PaddyPower but probably wants to be.

MarshaBradyo · 21/08/2019 19:17

This one is better “I just deleted all the German names off my phone. It’s Hans free” 2015

I know someone will do what was done to the Eton joke in a mo...

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