Comedian Alan Carr is the latest in a line of entertainers being asked to apologise for wilfully making jokes.
Carr made his needless joke at the British Comedy Awards, the last place one would expect to hear something funny or satirical. Luckily a member of parliament was on hand to identify the one-liner as potentially dangerous and force an apology.
Comedians are the descendents of court jesters who at some point during the English civil war, revolted against the proletariat laughing at them, and demanded that they laughed with them. The proletariat in turn demanded that the comics must make them laugh with witty asides and anecdotes. The tradition has continued to the present day, although the practise of throwing stuff at the jesters/comedians still continues in some provinces (Glasgow).
Apparently todays MPs would prefer things to go back to when inoffensive comedians such as Bernard Manning and Jim Davidson were winning awards.
2008... and all that: A silly record of British life 