FRANK DEVINE
A joke-fuelled jihad needs clever targeting and timing February 10, 2006 A WAR of ridicule on Islamic extremism is an excellent idea. Let's wage it. But when I was an editor, I would not have dreamed of publishing cartoons that depicted the prophet Mohammed as a suicide bomber. Would the violent response of Islamic zealots (and terrorists) to a Danish paper's doing this have tempted me, in the name of free speech and in anger, to reproduce the Danish caricatures, now widely available on the internet and reprinted by some newspapers? An equally resolute "no". Free speech becomes babble when exercised indiscriminately, even, or maybe especially, in Danish. Graffiti (counting the 12 Danish cartoons in that genre) is best left to lone rangers drawing on walls, both brick and cyber. The essence of humour lies in accurate targeting. I have no problem with a recent cartoon, whose provenance I have regrettably forgotten, showing a suicide bomber's drill sergeant addressing recruits: "Now pay attention. I'm only going to tell you this once." But deriding the core religious traditions of a billion people - and implicating all in the crimes and criminal intent of a few - abuses reason. Comedy requires high skills and is no job for the slovenly. One must, for example, heed Malcolm Muggeridge's warning that it is hardest to be funny about something that is intrinsically ridiculous. Take the Reuters photograph of three fighters of the Fatah movement's military wing, brandishing automatic weapons outside the Centre Cultural Francais de Gaza in hillbilly protest against French newspapers' reprinting the Danish cartoons. Before giving myself time to be terrorised, I giggled. Two heavies were masked by wraparound head-scarfs, the third by a kind of Darth Vader creation. They looked like idiots, as macho strutters usually do. (Isn't it women who cover their faces? Maybe these guys were girls.) How to construct comedy around such innately comic characters? It's a challenge but worth an effort. With Hollywood desperately seeking remakes, the Centre Cultural Francais de Gaza photograph might inspire Mel Brooks to revive the 1926 Broadway operetta Desert Song on film. Imagine Russell Crowe singing the war song of the marauding Riffs: Ho! So we sing as we are riding. Ho! It's time you best be hiding. It means the Riffs are abroad. Ho! That's the sound that comes to warn you. So, in the night and early morn you Know the Riffs will strike with a blow That brings you woe. On other fronts, Albert Brooks's new movie Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World sounds promising. A Palestinian Muslim stand-up comedian, Goffaq Yussef, deservedly earns an excellent living (abroad) with gags like: What do you say to an Arab woman with two black eyes? Nothing. You've already told her twice. Mummy, when Abdul blows himself up, can I have his room? Did you hear about the Muslim strip club? They have full facial nudity. How many Palestinians does it take to change a light bulb? None. Better to sit in the dark and blame Israel. Al-Jazeera should give Goffaq a prime-time show. Jews have built an impenetrable perimeter by making up their own Jewish jokes. Some self-righteously claim that Christians can take jokes about Jesus. But only some Christians are amused, up to a point, by some Jesus jokes. Few laughed at Andre Serrano's photograph Piss Christ when it was exhibited here. Norman Mailer gave excellent counsel when he observed, in a contemptuous review of an obscenely violent novel, that the more distasteful the subject matter the greater the demands on an artist's talent and integrity. Serrano fails the challenge. In contrast, the Monty Python movie, Life of Brian, which tells of an innocent Palestinian crucified between two thieves as a result of a botched investigation by Roman security police and a gross case of mistaken identity, left me limp with laughter. The envelope can be stretched tight in the right hands and extremist Islam provides constant opportunity for stylish mockery. Crimes charged against Saddam Hussein are too horrific to invite close scrutiny but the faux swaggering at his trial sends a nearly irresistible call for re-staging a music-hall melodrama, Woody Allen (with false beard) maybe starring. Big-noting indulgence in free speech by terrorists in hiding also provides great material: today the broom closet, tomorrow the world. The most recent media release by al-Qa'ida's No.2 man, Ayman al-Zawahiri, was a cup overflowing. "Bush, do you know where I am?" he demanded in a taunt, notably lacking a guidance system. Al-Zawahiri can find out where George Bush is any time he is daring enough to raise an aerial. Does this finger Bush as the mug? Let's press on with derision, keeping it cool and targeted, improving our aim by learning from the inadvertent example of a legendary Mesopotamian comedian: "Tell me, sir, what is the secret of your succ...?" "It's my timing." [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,18096149%255E31501,00.html Post message: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe : [EMAIL PROTECTED] List owner : [EMAIL PROTECTED] Homepage : http://proletar.8m.com/ Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/proletar/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
