Let’s not use “edgy” as a cover for “rude”
In scandals it’s not usually the initial misdemeanour which gets you, it’s how you handle the consequences — incident followed by attempted cover-up does a lot more damage than incident followed by immediate contrition. Following the Russell Brand/Jonathan Ross farrago we now have a Mock the Week/Frank Boyle furore. After the broadcasting the comedian’s comments which even I refuse to reproduce on this value-free blog, this is what happened:
In a statement last night, the BBC said: “Mock the Week is a well-established satirical comedy series whose audience have very clear expectations of its bold and sometimes provocative humour.”
Interviewed on Newsnight, Thompson, said that millions of viewers and listeners enjoyed the “edginess” of comedy programmes, but admitted that the humour “sometimes gets close to the wind.”
To me this is not playing it straight. I’ve always interpretted “edgy” as challenging people’s preconceptions, ideally in a clever and creative way. Sarah Silverman is edgy [*] — she’s clever and challenging. Edgy is absolutely not the same as being rude and sweary. Rude and sweary can be funny, but I don’t want to hear people dressing it up as clever or creative or as challenging ideas. When people like Mark Thompson do that they’re covering up the fact that the material is really cheap humour. It may be funny, but’s it’s not imaginative, and they’re insulting us if they pretend it is.
I am reliably informed via Twitter that meeja pundit Kelvin MacKenzie was interviewed on Today and said “when comedians are edgy, sometimes they go over the edgy”. That only tells half the story.
[*] Sarah Silverman example: “People are always introducing me as ‘Sarah Silverman, Jewish comedian,’ [...] I hate that! I wish people would see me for who I really am. I’m white!”
