Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
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:
iklboo · 19/08/2019 22:10

Ah. Ye professionally offended on behalf of others. My friend with Tourette's thinks it's hilarious.

funmummy48 · 19/08/2019 22:14

It's an inoffensive pun.

StealthPolarBear · 19/08/2019 22:14

My cousin tried to tell me the sugar joke a few months ago. It took her 15 minutes as she was laughing so hard :o

ashtrayheart · 19/08/2019 22:16

Jess Thom, a comedian who has Tourette's, said she was "not surprised" by the insensitive gag.
"It's just exhausting. I woke up this morning and I looked at that, and it just made me feel sad and tired," she said.

But crack on, people are so easily offended aren't they Hmm

yearinyearout · 19/08/2019 22:16

Actually staggering that people can find the energy to be offended by this.

Oysterbabe · 19/08/2019 22:22

Every joke has a victim. Comedy is going to die eventually as it becomes impossible to joke about anything. It's harmless word play.

donquixotedelamancha · 19/08/2019 22:22

Is is just me being stuffy? Yes.

I am happy to be told that I am over thinking things You are.

maybe I am being over sensitive Yep.

I am happy to be told I am a pearl clutcher That too.

Do you have tourette's OP? I do. May I ask (as others have) what exactly is offensive about the joke.

donquixotedelamancha · 19/08/2019 22:24

Jess Thom, a comedian who has Tourette's, said she was "not surprised" by the insensitive gag. "It's just exhausting. I woke up this morning and I looked at that, and it just made me feel sad and tired," she said.

Did she explain why it made her sad? I'm still missing it.

FattyPeddledFuriously999 · 19/08/2019 22:24

I know someone who has tourettes who has had to put up with so many jibes and piss taking, it's heart breaking. He campaigns and supports younger people struggling to cope with this but it has caused him a lot of depression. For some reason this is the one disability we're still allowed to take the piss out of.

FlamedToACrisp · 19/08/2019 22:25

I totally disagree that only people with particular disabilities are allowed to be offended by jokes about them. No man is an island.

But I think if we are offended by any joke, we should probably be offended by almost every joke.

Have you heard the one about the blind man who went parachuting? "How do you know when you're getting near the ground?" he was asked. "It's easy," he replied. "I just wait until the lead goes slack."

I don't recall Guide Dogs for the Blind getting irate and demanding official apologies about it.

FattyPeddledFuriously999 · 19/08/2019 22:30

@cunningartificer Mon 19-Aug-19 21:39:30
I don’t think it’s the best joke in the shortlist, and I thought it was insensitive. If someone made a joke eg about being fascinated by cars where the punchline was “I think I’ve got auto-ism” I’d similarly think it was a bit rubbish. It’s not a great joke and it’s mocking a neurological condition. So I don’t think you’re unreasonable

^Yes! let's all see who can come up with the best jokes about autism! We know most of the posters here won't find it offensive... Hmm

donquixotedelamancha · 19/08/2019 22:30

I totally disagree that only people with particular disabilities are allowed to be offended by jokes about them. No man is an island.

Of course, but it's easy to miss what is wrong with something if it doesn't affect you.

There also seem to be people who are offended by everything- based on hypothetical harm to a particular group. I think if you are going to claim that you need to be able to articulate the harm in a way that a pretty large proportion of that group would agree.

It's easy to see why taking the piss out of a specific person with tourettes is wrong or why suggesting that people with tourettes are freaks would be wrong. Hopefully most people would object in that situation, they wouldn't need to have experienced it. No-one has yet articulated what is wrong with this particular joke.

LadyRannaldini · 19/08/2019 22:30

Ha, ever since I read this earlier today I've been waiting for a member of the easily offended squad to get onto their hind legs! Some people really do need to grow up.

I suppose you find The Last Leg offensive too. How do these people cope if they go through a day with nothing to offend them? Counselling?

frogsbreath · 19/08/2019 22:30

My seven year old heard this joke on the news while we were eating breakfast. He looked up and asked if people were joking about him.

Of course I said it was a stupid joke and means nothing to him, but I can see it did.

FlamedToACrisp · 19/08/2019 22:32

Likewise, the many jokes about dyslexia. My dyslexic stepson loves them.

Especially the dyslexic skier. "Where is the ski slope?" he asked. "I don't know, I'm a tobogganist," came the reply. "OK, in that case I'll have 20 Benson & Hedges and a box of matches."

donquixotedelamancha · 19/08/2019 22:33

it’s mocking a neurological condition

Is it? I think it's a pun combining a well known neurological condition with part of a vegetable and creating a humorous image of someone shouting about broccoli.

AnAC12UCOinanOCG · 19/08/2019 22:34

That was the BEST joke of the festival? Fuck me, I feel sorry for anyone who paid to go.

NotAnActualSheep · 19/08/2019 22:42

I went to see the show with this joke in a few weeks ago. It was a good show, but I honestly don't remember The Joke being told Blush . In my defence it was early, I hadn't had coffee and I was wrangling DS. But there wasn't any awkwardness or grimacing from the rest of the audience at any point, and as it was a children's show any inappropriateness for the context would be really, really obvious. There were a lot of quips about farting, as would be expected, and lots of general word play.... some vegetable-based given the name of the show. The comedian/author was very engaging and I'm sure he is horrified some people would consider the joke offensive. It wasn't a Jo Brand style "edgy" show where people were expecting to be offended...

Wasn't as good as another one I do remember (What's white and fluffy and sounds like an owl?... A towel..)- and that DS has been repeating to me again and again and again and again ever since....

donquixotedelamancha · 19/08/2019 22:49

What's white and fluffy and sounds like an owl?... A towel

Oh, that's much better. Tempted to wake DD, just to tell her.

AntiHop · 19/08/2019 22:51

I agree with you op.

Miaowing · 19/08/2019 22:57

it was a fucking joke.

ginandbearit · 19/08/2019 23:09

Best joke from a few years ago...
"Im just back from the holiday of a lifetime ..cuh..never again !"

Ohflippineck · 19/08/2019 23:14

So I guess the joke voted second was in extremely poor taste too:

“Someone has stolen my anti-depressants. I just hope they’re happy now!”

BananasAreTheSourceOfEvil · 19/08/2019 23:18

Ah come on- it’s one of those jokes that make you groan, they’re so bad they’re funny.

Anyone who is offended by that joke... well I hope you never stumble across Frankie Boyle.

NeelixFelicis · 19/08/2019 23:22

“Someone has stolen my anti-depressants. I just hope they’re happy now!”

Grin