Groundbreaking Material

I was listening to Sarah Silverman on Q earlier this morning. She noted that her brand of humour draws its inspiration from her swearing when she was a toddler. She said her dad used to teach her swear words for the fun of it and all others would react positively and laugh when she mouthed them. As she grew up it's her gender that took that toddler’s place – extrapolating a little here. It's somewhat shocking for a man to do/say ‘those’ things, but it’s outrageous when it’s a woman (outrageously funny, too, quite often). Her approach to political humour is often to assume the bigoted ignoramus and make exaggerated arguments for/against something ('uncle' Ruckus from The Boondocks is a good archetype). It is subversive but more importantly it avoids the self righteous tone that could subdue the critique's potency.

Meanwhile comedians in Tamil television continue to do groundbreaking material by impersonating 'Rajini sir' and 'Kamal sir'.