“This also bears on the question: what happened to political humour, especially in the U.S.? It seemed so strong there during the Bush/Obama years, then dropped off a cliff under Trump. Could the decline be because politicians quite brilliantly learned to use mockery on themselves before others could, as if they actually were what they were lampooned for, albeit in a wily way?”
I half agree. And in the case of Johnson this may be a deliberate tactic. But I think people forget in the 2000’s it was also a self aware mockery. It was mocking a system that good comedians admitted they were a part of. Think about some of Dylan Moran’s stand ups like Monster, where he was really holding a mirror up to the way his demographic lived, and exposing the absurdity of it. Or Stewart Lee, openly saying he creates and uses the caricature of an over the top, condescending liberal as a form of part self deprecation.
I think part of the allure of Trump and Johnson is watching how the media spins in circles over every un-PC thing they say. People who support the two are doing so in a large part to mock the moral sensibilities, and outrage culture that’s taken a hold in both countries.
Some people find it refreshing to not have every sentence run through focus groups and PR managed into beige, inoffensive slogans. And have seen enough examples of words being twisted out of context, to have essentially lost all faith in the media.
And it becomes a voyeuristic sport to watch buttoned up liberals, who are so careful about how they speak, get wound up by the ridiculous and unprofessional things Johnson and Trump say.
Because in some sense, they are satirising what the suburban middle class left has become. And the lack of self awareness or self deprecation means we don’t even see it. ‘Look how stupid brexit voters are’, ‘look how stupid trump voters must be’ we sneer across polite dinner parties in trendy Shoreditch apartments. Eating our vegan lasagne, discussing how ‘yoga, really is a game changer’. Forgetting for the most part, we’re just sneering at the ‘uncouth’ working classes.
Complaining endlessly about the latest comment either of the two politicians have said. Completely unaware that we have basically become caricatures of ourselves.
And understandably, after enough snide comments, the working class have grown to distain these caricatures.
So the real butt of the joke that is Boris Johnson (and Trump) is actually what the conservative right see as the stereotypical ‘liberal elite’. And it’s hard to make fun of someone, who is ultimately making fun of you. And this is imo why satire has really died.
*For the record. I don’t think trump or Johnson should be in any position of power. And simply to ‘mock’ the other side is not a valid reason to put someone in office. I’m just offering my suggestion on how this has happened. And why left wing satire, whilst formerly so witty, is not working.
What does that say about the general populace who vote them in?
I’m old enough to remember the first time I was told UK satire was dead which was when Tony Blair got elected, but we ended up with the likes of the Thick of It out of it.
There’s good new UK satire being generated all the time, so what we have here is a Canadian based columnist talking out of his arse about a the comedy scene in a country he doesn’t live in.
It’s not dead at all, however it does need to be smarter when the government are already setting the bar so low. I watch panel shows and I make the same jokes as the comedians regularly, I don’t think I am a great comic though. Some comedians still have it but others need to step up their game and make jokes that their own audience could not come up with. Start by not focusing so much on the people but the situation we/they are in/have created. There are only so many jokes we can make about Trump’s tan or Johnson’s resemblance to an albino gorilla.
Written by someone not old enough to remember the 60s, 70s, 80s & 90s perhaps?
5 comments
“This also bears on the question: what happened to political humour, especially in the U.S.? It seemed so strong there during the Bush/Obama years, then dropped off a cliff under Trump. Could the decline be because politicians quite brilliantly learned to use mockery on themselves before others could, as if they actually were what they were lampooned for, albeit in a wily way?”
I half agree. And in the case of Johnson this may be a deliberate tactic. But I think people forget in the 2000’s it was also a self aware mockery. It was mocking a system that good comedians admitted they were a part of. Think about some of Dylan Moran’s stand ups like Monster, where he was really holding a mirror up to the way his demographic lived, and exposing the absurdity of it. Or Stewart Lee, openly saying he creates and uses the caricature of an over the top, condescending liberal as a form of part self deprecation.
I think part of the allure of Trump and Johnson is watching how the media spins in circles over every un-PC thing they say. People who support the two are doing so in a large part to mock the moral sensibilities, and outrage culture that’s taken a hold in both countries.
Some people find it refreshing to not have every sentence run through focus groups and PR managed into beige, inoffensive slogans. And have seen enough examples of words being twisted out of context, to have essentially lost all faith in the media.
And it becomes a voyeuristic sport to watch buttoned up liberals, who are so careful about how they speak, get wound up by the ridiculous and unprofessional things Johnson and Trump say.
Because in some sense, they are satirising what the suburban middle class left has become. And the lack of self awareness or self deprecation means we don’t even see it. ‘Look how stupid brexit voters are’, ‘look how stupid trump voters must be’ we sneer across polite dinner parties in trendy Shoreditch apartments. Eating our vegan lasagne, discussing how ‘yoga, really is a game changer’. Forgetting for the most part, we’re just sneering at the ‘uncouth’ working classes.
Complaining endlessly about the latest comment either of the two politicians have said. Completely unaware that we have basically become caricatures of ourselves.
And understandably, after enough snide comments, the working class have grown to distain these caricatures.
So the real butt of the joke that is Boris Johnson (and Trump) is actually what the conservative right see as the stereotypical ‘liberal elite’. And it’s hard to make fun of someone, who is ultimately making fun of you. And this is imo why satire has really died.
*For the record. I don’t think trump or Johnson should be in any position of power. And simply to ‘mock’ the other side is not a valid reason to put someone in office. I’m just offering my suggestion on how this has happened. And why left wing satire, whilst formerly so witty, is not working.
What does that say about the general populace who vote them in?
I’m old enough to remember the first time I was told UK satire was dead which was when Tony Blair got elected, but we ended up with the likes of the Thick of It out of it.
There’s good new UK satire being generated all the time, so what we have here is a Canadian based columnist talking out of his arse about a the comedy scene in a country he doesn’t live in.
It’s not dead at all, however it does need to be smarter when the government are already setting the bar so low. I watch panel shows and I make the same jokes as the comedians regularly, I don’t think I am a great comic though. Some comedians still have it but others need to step up their game and make jokes that their own audience could not come up with. Start by not focusing so much on the people but the situation we/they are in/have created. There are only so many jokes we can make about Trump’s tan or Johnson’s resemblance to an albino gorilla.
Written by someone not old enough to remember the 60s, 70s, 80s & 90s perhaps?