In recent years the internet has given rise to a whole host of cultural phenomena: hot takes, avocado appreciation to the point of parody and a brand new layer to the politics of offence. David Baddiel, who describes his own first avocado experience as an “epiphany”, is pretty active on Twitter and no stranger to the social media platform’s social justice warriors. The comedian’s latest show, My Family: not the sitcom, centres around his late mother’s long-lasting affair with a fellow golf memorabilia collector and also features a supporting role from his father’s battle with Pick’s disease, a form of dementia.
Baddiel, though, has been told that dementia should be off limits for jokes, with a great many Twitter users shaming him for, in their eyes at least, marketing the condition. Is this a sign, then, that Britain has become too sensitive? Backstage at the West End’s Playhouse Theatre on the day after his birthday, Baddiel strokes a beard that is 53 shades of grey. He says wearily: “It wouldn’t just be Britain; cultural argument is no longer restricted to one place, because it happens online. Online defines this discussion about offence because that is where people are now and want to make their own sense of offence felt. And that’s where the policing of comedy, and I suppose any form of public discourse, goes on. I think outrage is a way of building identity, because outrage and anger are ways of turning up the volume on who you are. People want identity and that’s ultimately what Facebook, Twitter or whatever, is about. It’s a way of letting people raise their own little flag of self.”
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