Were the satirical targets of the Noughties the uneducated working class?
In an article for BBC online this week, John O’Farrell, a leading scriptwriter for the Eighties British satirical puppet show Spitting Image, claimed they were. From a brief overview of the comedy stars of the past decade, it would seem O’Farrell has a point. For instance, Little Britain’s Vicki Pollard and Catherine Tate’s Lauren the Schoolgirl both became popular bywords for thick, council-estate slags, whilst politicians like current London mayor Boris Johnson used appearances on the satirical panel show Have I Got News For You to kickstart, rather than ruin, their careers. While Tony Blair took the country to war, O’Farrell charges, the British public were busy laughing at the poor. On the satire point, however, the former Labour activist O’Farrell (who admits that he’s written jokes for politicians as well as against them) is perhaps misplaced. As entertaining a puppet show as Spitting Image was, it was hardly the establishment-baiting Swiftian critique it has been elevated to. Sp
