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A controversial Little Britain sketch is “explicitly racist and outdated”, and it is surprising it is still available on BBC iPlayer, according to audience research by Ofcom.
The regulator showed people a number of clips of television as part of a study into audience expectations on potentially offensive content across linear TV and streaming services.
One sketch from Little Britain, originally broadcast in 2002 and available on iPlayer, shows David Walliams as university employee Linda Flint describing an Asian student, Kenneth Lao, over the phone to her manager.
He is described as having “yellowish skin, slight smell of soy sauce … the ching-chong China man.”
The scene is accompanied by a laugh track.
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That part was satire. It was mocking racists by depicting an unsavory character engaging in racist behavior. This is like pulling Blazing Saddles because of the colorful language it employs.
Satire is stone cold dead. Was killed publicly in 2016. RIP.
Exactly! Reading beyond the headline, the shocking part is the short-sightedness of the people being polled.
One respondent, a father from Scotland, said: “If I saw my daughter watching that and then mimicking it, I’d be horrified.
Maybe don’t show the programme with a 15 rating to your presumably young child then?
There are plenty of examples of really bad stuff in Little Britain, this isn’t one.
I wasn’t a fan at the time - it felt like they did far too much punching down and had failed to properly learn the lessons of The Fast Show (as did a lot of sketch shows that followed in its wake that thought all you really needed was a catchphrase).
Wait what was wrong with the Fast Show?
It had the same ten jokes every week.
Well, that was the point. The jokes built on the situations from the previous show. It wasn’t literally the same joke, it was an ever increasingly weirder variation. That’s what sketch shows are. Same with Goodness Gracious Me.
I thought maybe someone was saying it was racist.
Even at the time it looked very outdated.
Yes, I was trying to get my head around the main conclusion:
The research participants, who were questioned by polling company Ipsos, viewed the content as “explicitly racist and outdated, and felt that society had moved on”, the report said.
As it felt very seventies (and, no, doing it ironically doesn’t help) but has society really moved on? Either from the seventies or naughties?
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The regulator showed people a number of clips of television as part of a study into audience expectations on potentially offensive content across linear TV and streaming services.
One sketch from Little Britain, originally broadcast in 2002 and available on iPlayer, shows David Walliams as university employee Linda Flint describing an Asian student, Kenneth Lao, over the phone to her manager.
The research participants, who were questioned by polling company Ipsos, viewed the content as “explicitly racist and outdated, and felt that society had moved on”, the report said.
Episodes of Little Britain, starring Walliams and Matt Lucas, have previously been removed from streaming services following criticism over the use of blackface in the show.
Once the content starts playing the following briefly appears at the top of the screen: “Maturity rating: 18 / language, sexual violence references, discrimination / Suitable for adults only.”
Other clips shown include those from the Channel 4 show The Handmaid’s Tale, Amazon Prime Video’s The Boys and Disney animation The Aristocats, which is on Disney+.
The original article contains 675 words, the summary contains 171 words. Saved 75%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
20yrs ago it was kinda funny. Now it really isn’t.
