Sense of Humour?

We were talking in the office this morning about the apparent loss of the nations collective sense of humour - simple things that we once would have collectively laughed at are now seen as ‘bad taste’ - often seen that way for no valid reason.

At the Jersey International Air Display during the Red Arrows Display, last week, the Arrows performed a formation they’ve clearly done hundreds of times befe - The Stingray -  a woman watching the display from the airport commented “That’s a bit insensitive after Steve Irwin just died that way”.

We’ll for a start he DIDN’T die flying in a Hawk jet trying to make a few of them look like a sea creature, but that seemed to be beyond her.

That’s what I mean by no sense of humour - I personally would have liked to have seen the Red Arrows commentator say - and now “The Steve Irwin” - but that wasn’t going to happen.

On the other hand, some private jokes do go a bit to far.

The BBC London News team recently made a leaving video for one of their reporters, a fairly common thing to do in BBC TV Newsrooms and the people making the videos always do it in their own time.

The video is based on (Is this the way to) Amarillo? but is instead (Is this the way to) Al-Jazerra? It’s based on the fact that journalist Simon Torkington is leaving for Al-Jazeera where he will work with his wife, former ITN news anchor Shiulie Gosh.

The 3 minute video sees members of the BBC London team walking in a Peter Kay style and singing an altered version of the song.

The BBC have said the video was “completely ill-judged” and as much as I believe everyone should have the right to have a laugh if they want to - I sort of agree with the BBC on this one.

The thing is, 10 years ago this wouldn’t have been a problem, the chance of anyone outside BBC London seeing it would be remote at best - but in the age of You Tube I can post a link to the video below.

Is This The Way To Al-Jazeera?

To be honest the video is a bit rubbish, it’s a not overly creative take on a widely parodied sketch but the concept was one easily done by a busy team in their spare time for a friend. 

However most comments I’ve read on the web seem to see the funny side of it - but you do have to take the web and easy/rapid spread of content into account when making things like this.

A few comments I’ve been able to find include this one posted to the Daily Mail site (the Daily Mail must have found this a tough one to report - on one hand they’re heavily anti-BBC and on the other they have their right wing sensebilities to support).

“Sounds like fun to me! These journalists must get heartily sick of putting on a concerned expression and reporting doom and gloom all day and night. It’s just a bit of fun, for Heaven’s sake!”

Also this one “It’s quite funny, despite the appalling singing. Lighten up people, no one should be afraid of the PC Brigade. We should not be scared we might upset some group or other. Have they no sense of humour? Or is that not PC these days?”

This was on a Digg post linking to The Register “I think the video is awesome! Great creativity and a good spoof on the Muslim world… I think people have lost their sense of humor because of “Allah”…. Screw em! What a laugh.”

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