Offensive?
by Tommy
I’m kind of half giving an ear to Marian Finucane on Radio something or other at the moment, where they’re getting people to text in what they think of Tommy Tiernan’s latest ballyhoohaah as she chats to someone on the phone. I actually had no clue what they’re talking about – so I did what everyone does these days:
I had to tweak the search terms a wee bit but eventually found this Times article. The only problem is that all that article tells me is that he hasn’t apologized for his Anti-Sematic remarks.. but what were they?
However, the article wasn’t completely useless – it told me that his controversial comments involved Jewish people. Cue some more googling and I find this Culch.ie article.
The most interesting thing in that article for me was his later quote: “about allowing whatever lunacy is inside you to come out in a special protected environment where people know that nothing they say is being taken seriously”
He has got a point.
Now, I’ll come out right now and say I know very little about comedians and stand-ups. The only live show I’ve really seen start to finish is Dylan Moran’s Like, Totally! (which I loved, incidentally. Watch here on YouTube, well worth it) so I don’t know Tiernan all that much.
So, whether his explanation justifies what he said, he’s got a very good point. Comedians, people who do standup are in a very unusual and unique state. People who get up on stage with a mike and make the audience laugh are no different to the performers playing Sweeney Todd or You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown, except maybe that there’s more audience interaction. At the end of the day, they’re both doing monologues and for the most part, they’re equally scripted.
Do I condone what Tiernan said? Reading through the comments on Culch.ie post it seems that he’s offensive to other people as well and uses them as the butt of his jokes, but also that when he started he wasn’t like this, more that he evolved.
I think that last fact is sad. It’s sad to think that people believe they have to be offensive to appeal to today’s society :( Comics can totally be funny without being offensive, I think.