Ben Elton - authentic stupidity

[mids2019]

He's a grumpy old man essentially but made some telling jokes about gender identity for newer generatiosn. Have a potted history of feminism with the conclusion gen z might do all the good with with a fixation on trans rights. Some giggle moments with sex allocation at both not being too hard 'boy sick girl fanny'.

He could have gone a bit further but maybe doesn't need the grief. Nice to see a bit of mockery of the teams movement in a non aggressive way using a bit of mockery. Pity the guys old really like the audience but fun.

I think Elton is very aware of the issues. His dystopian novel Blind Faith, published in 2007, is prescient regarding anti-vax panic and the where queer theory has pushed kink shaming so far that every perversion has become a cause for celebration. It feels sickeningly real today.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blind_Faith_(novel)#:~:text=Blind%20Faith%20is%20an%20English%20dystopian%20novel%20by%20writer%20and

Sorry forgot to link.

I'm struggling to parse this post to be honest

His novel Stark where billionaires build a rcoket to escape climate change is also terrifyingly comic satire becoming reality. And This Other Eden, where everyone agrees climate change is dreadful but what can you really do about it? and carries on buying stuff.

I went to see Ben Elton at Richmond Theatre last week. He’s very good and I recommend getting tickets if you can find any. He’s on stage a long time and I’m guessing he could have ranted for a few more hours so that was just the truncated version 😂. He takes very serious topics - old age, assisted dying, the chasmous differences between the generations- and he does broach the trans debate, with the plea that he has a lesbian daughter so that should be his shield against cancellation. He can’t be cancelled as the generation who are his fans definitely know sex is binary & immutable so he’s not going to offend there. When you think of all the things he’s written over the years I’m trying to think of anyone as talented. Anyway, I’m a big fan and delighted I managed to see him live at last.

Translation please - you need a new proof reader deary

This post is really hard to read. Maybe I'm too old ? 🤨

Identity crisis is a Gc book

What he said was “Gen Z might UNdo all the good of feminism with their focus on trans rights”. I saw the show - it was excellent. Very on point about some of the crazy language and ideas of today’s generation and the damage being done to women’s rights.

Ben Elton's younger than me. I don't mind if people think that's old, what I object to is using someone's age as an insult.

Anyway I too read the op title and feared the worst so good to hear he's still on form, but then he always was a smart guy

I think that OP was saying he was talking sense, and that it's a shame that it's older people in his audience.
Though I have a 19yo friend- Gen Z- and she says even in her age group it's a very vocal minority who are GI, but the rest of them stay quiet ( most of them think its a load of attention seeking nonsense)

Ed to say the Ben Elton tour is called Authentic Stupidity, hence thread title.

So disappointed that you are mocking the Op for spelling and grammar. The meaning was perfectly clear!

I'm sorry to be so very MN, but I genuinely can't understand that OP!

Ben Elton wrote one of his comedy novels on identity and gender identity in particular and actually, for a comedian whose USP used to be Right-On-er Than Thou (and I loved him SO MUCH in the 80/90's! 😀) I thought it was surprisingly balanced and gently mocking the absurdities of the cult. So if I've translated the inarticulate OP correctly, sounds like more of the same?

Not at all - spelling and grammar weren't the reason that OP didn't make sense. It was incoherent. Not mocking, just pointing out that several of us read it and went 'eh?'.

I still don't know what boy sick girl fanny is meant to signify.

I'm not sure anybody was mocking - more questioning what exactly OP meant. Not everybody is fluent in 'typo'
Sick = dick, @DeanElderberry

ah. So sick = dick and do = undo, and us poor old crocks are to blame for not understanding it?

I'm reading identity crisis at the moment and nearly finished. It's fab!

Ha! Me four ...
I agree that 'old' is always a generation older than you are.
but, think of the alternative to not getting old.
Back to BE - I am glad if he is being sensible about this madness.
Not many are.

Saw this tonight and can also thoroughly recommend. DH and I were discussing how interesting it is that he doesn’t seem to have attracted the cancellation movement for his most definite terfiness. I think that’s because his demographic is noticeably narrower and older than other comedians we’ve seen recently and also because he’s not on any social media.

It was also interesting that the biggest cheer of the evening was at the culmination of one rant that Boomers thought their achievements as a generation were the invention of sex thanks to the Pill and seeing women freed from the social restraints of their biological body, only to have Gen Z tell us that there is no such thing as sex and being a woman has nothing to do with biology.

Dick - boy and fanny - girl was part of a routine acting a doctor “assigning” sex to babies (including the air quotes). Honestly, at points I thought he’s been reading FWR given the topics he covered, particularly the reference to blue haired teenagers.

When Elton was MC on the dreadful C4 show that featured the even more dreadful Jordan Grey (was that his name? The bloke who smeared his penis on the keyboard, anyway), he told us his pronouns. Which turned me right off him.

Should I give him another chance?

Is this the same Ben Elton that had a woman() play the piano with her() penis and celebrated it?

** Deliberate misuse of the words "woman" and "her" to make the statement sound more ridiculous, when describing a heterosexual male who self-IDs as a comedian.

I went to see him, on the back of this very thread, he was excellent so thanks! Good to see a much loved comic turning his eye to our collective contemporary madness.

It wasn’t.

Some giggle moments with sex allocation at both not being too hard 'boy sick girl fanny'.

op I don’t understand this sentence.