IT’S NO LAUGHING MATTER – HOW THE BEEB’S GAGS ARE RIGHT ON... OR JUST ANTI-RIGHT
ARE YOU A BOY OR A GIRL?
BBC Radio 4, November 25 Comedienne Sarah Keyworth described herself as ‘ a nongender- conforming being’ at the beginning of the episode, before continuing with a history of ‘gender-queer people and the long fight for acceptance that we are still pursuing’. Keyworth said: ‘That is what gender is, it’s a performance, it’ s decoration ... your sex organs are the physical bits of you, but what we have done as human beings is pile a load of arbitrary meanings on to those body parts.’
HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU
BBC One, November 27 Programme host Jo Brand introduced newsreader and guest Charlene White as a woman who has interviewed a string of British leaders ‘except t he c ur r e nt o ne – Carri e Symonds’. Miss White suggested a caption for a photo showing the Prime Minister and Priti Patel talking to a policeman: ‘You’d better smile, or I’ll set her on you.’
Speaking about the friendship between Health Secretary Matt Hancock and the former landlord of The Cock Inn at Little Thurlow, Suffolk, team captain Paul Merton remarked: ‘When Matt Hancock’s there people say, “Is the c**k in?”.’
MOCK THE WEEK
BBC Two, November 26 Panelist Hugh Dennis, asked to pose a question with the number five as its answer, suggested: ‘How many times yesterday did Priti Patel flush a colleague’s head down the lavatory?’ Asked the same thing, comedian Rhys James said: ‘Taking into account the rule of six, how many spaces are left at Priti Patel’s office Christmas party?’ Host Dara O’Briain said of Boris Johnson: ‘ He has announced mass testing just after three separate vaccines have arrived. He has announced the one thing we don’t need.’
THE RANGANATION
BBC Two, November 9 Host Romesh Ranganathan said: ‘A recent poll revealed just 27 per cent of Brits think Boris Johnson is an honest person. Boris has lied so many times that if he told me that stat I‘d presume it was bulls***.’ He added: ‘Yes, he got corona and he had a baby, but as far as we know neither of those have symptoms that include p***poor decision-making.’
THE MINI MASH REPORT,
BBC 2, November 26 Presenter Nish Kumar launched a broadside against Brexit and those who argue against mass immigration. He quoted a 2016 report by the Centre for Economic Performance that claimed EU immigrants had no impact on the jobs and wages of UK workers, had no negative effect on local services and paid more in tax than they took in benefits. In part of the show, there was an item about a post-Brexit recipe for spaghetti bolognese which included rat hair as a result, he said, of the absence of ‘tiresome EU food standard regulations’.