I have had my fair share of debates on feminism with men. It’s sort of become (however unwittingly) a hobby. So, when a certain British-American podcasting kickboxer turned-male-chauvinist-who-desperately-needs-a-therapist began making the rounds, I inevitably found myself back in the arena asking the same questions and hearing the same answer: ‘It’s just a joke.’
Humour has always been a balm. It masks uncomfortable realities. Were we not relieved to see ‘live laugh love’ plastered over the Covid guidelines gracing Boris’ PMQ stand? Did we not laugh at his uncut hair as his questionable pronunciation of ‘blue’ replayed in our heads? Comedy – as we know it – is our communication. Captions upon pictures layering meanings upon references, all wrapped up in a screen. And we deserve to laugh. It wouldn’t be fair to say those who manipulate our humour get to exploit it purely as a political tool. But they also don’t deserve to profit while we distract ourselves with jokes.
The debate on the interaction of hate and humour has often been confined to stand-up. We rightly decry the use of hateful language on the stage, so why are we wearing blinkers when comedy is used as a smokescreen for hate right in front of us? The problem goes beyond Ricky Gervais’ stage.
Cue the bitter chorus of rolling eyes, seething over such serious Zoomers and craving the good old days when jokes were jokes. You know – the ones in that distant, mystical past which no one ever seems to be able to define.
It is an unavoidable truth that comedy permeates everyday life and political discourse in the West. It has always been a literary device ripe for exploitation, with real-world consequences. In 2016 (the olden days), Donald Trump employed comedy to stir up division by making fun of ‘politically correct’ culture and the ‘liberal elite’ to excavate the store of resentment in his supporters. Media Historian Jeffrey P. Jones has argued that Trump’s humour had the potential to incite violence and hatred and criticised American media for not taking his comedy seriously. Did January 6th not provide a harsh reminder that there is a palpable threat in underestimating the virulence of a group we once dismissed as entertaining?
The unfortunate brainchild of this media malady stretching to both sides of the pond is the aforementioned podcaster, Andrew Tate. Tate reflects not only a crisis in masculinity but the reality that hateful ‘humour’ is providing answers to a ‘disenfranchised’ and impressionable generation of young men.
As he remained in prison charged with human trafficking, he goaded ‘the matrix’ into submission and shared poetry designed to inspire the flood of ‘Free Top G’ posts. When he is not chastising people for not attempting to fly (out of cowardice, not impossibility), he is comparing himself to former South African president and Apartheid activist Nelson Mandela. Whilst the reliability of such tweets is suspect considering his incarceration, Tate’s underlying rhetoric has been inspiring young men for years. His anti-establishment yet simultaneously self-serving, capitalistic ideology centres on a toxic masculinity which is incompatible with modern society. For instance, he has said rape victims must “bear responsibility” for their attacks and claims to date women aged 18–19 because he can “make an imprint” on them. His current fame comes directly from the purposeful spread of his most controversial videos: manipulating the young men he claims to help. I personally find that attempting to have a reasonable conversation about Andrew Tate is futile because, contrary to popular belief, influencers like him trade in outrage and emotion, not ‘straight talking reason.’
Comedy has the potential to facilitate hate as well as acting as a smokescreen for it. In 2022, a paper in the International Journal for the Semiotics of Law on Humour and Free Speech in the European Court of Human Rights noted how exposure to sexist humour can act as a “releaser” of prejudice by “facilitating the expression and acceptance of discrimination or violence towards the target group”.
That Tate’s defence lawyer argues he is merely ‘playing’ a character serves to intensify a threatening precedent for these target groups: when hate is masked as humour there are no consequences. The problem is, we are clearly at an impasse when it comes to how to prevent this hateful rhetoric from radicalising young minds. This is not just angry people with microphones shouting into a void.
In March 2023, The Casey Report found the Met Police to be institutionally racist, misogynistic and homophobic. It is the language of comedy which lets the first warnings of crime slip through the cracks. In 2022, the American Secret Service examined a 2018 shooting at a yoga class in Florida, where a man killed two women and wounded six. The shooter had previously been arrested three times for groping women and was called ‘Ted Bundy’ by his roommates. In 2021, Sarah Everard was repeatedly failed by the British police when she was murdered by a serving police officer, reportedly nicknamed ‘the rapist’ by his colleagues: a man who maintained his authority and position in the force, even after having been reported for indecent exposure.
The rise of ‘incel’ culture (characterised by a toxic and misogynistic worldview) has further fuelled the spread of harmful humour and contributed to a culture of harassment and abuse. Incel-inspired violence, such as the 2018 Toronto van attack, highlights the dangerous and radicalising nature of some of these online communities. Ultimately, these ideologies act in tandem even as they fight for top billing, and it’s a frightening reality. To note the most sinister thing Andrew Tate has said: ‘you can’t kill an idea’.
I volunteer as tribute to say that maybe, sometimes, it is that deep. Maybe we are culpable if we roll over and play dead whilst parroting incel language ‘ironically’ and basking in our self-awareness. Comedy is a tool of wit, irony and absurdity. Hate speech, on the other hand, attacks a person or group on the basis of their identity. But each feeds off the other. It’s not uptight to know the difference.
Comedy uplifts, galvanises and entertains, but it can also isolate, terrorise and distort. It would be a dark proposition to condemn some facets of comedy without resorting to absolutism, but even darker to allow it to fester and become a free-pass for hate. I don’t think Andrew Tate is a joke; I think he is a threatening reminder that crime can go unanswered when using the defence of comedy.
Now, I’m not saying laughing at Boris Johnson or reacting with incredulity at Tate fighting ghosts in his cell makes us responsible for the consequences of their actions. How many of us have found something so genuinely outrageous or ridiculous that in our disbelief we have found it funny? What’s that saying? We laugh so we don’t cry.
I’m saying that every little helps when it comes to forging a culture which normalises online hate and disinformation. We just have to notice. We shouldn’t allow ourselves to be lulled into a false security which not everyone can afford. Jokes always require a butt: when will we realise sometimes we’re laughing at ourselves?
Image Credit: Staticsens//CC BY-SA 4.0
