Dr
Paul Darke's
OUCH
Pod-cast Presented by Liz Carr
Review
prepared for BBC RADIO
4's You and Yours
Disability on the BBC has finally entered the
21st Century with BBC's Disability Web site Ouch's first
of 6 Pod-casts. This innovation is much more than just
a technical innovation. It is
a bold cultural step-forward that puts the BBC as far from the tradition of
Does He Take Sugar as they have ever been.
The BBC – on TV and Radio – have,
in the past, tried to confront disability head-on - one thinks of the sit-com
pilot Inmates by Nabil Shaban - or even Radio 4's short-lived disability equivalent
to Goodness Gracious Me: Yes Sir I Can Boogie - or Channel 4 / Ash Attalla's highly dubious wreck Freak
Out. The pod-cast – like Ouch itself – has its
successful and less successful parts.
The presenters, in the main, are excellent: especially Liz Carr with
her gentler sardonic wit. Matt
Fraser, on the hand, though stronger in presence is a little worthy and self-conscious. As when Liz objects to knickers marks
whilst Matt objects to Homophobia. Lighten
up Matt and let Liz say a little bit more!
But the pod-cast encapsulates a series dilemma for disability
comedy: when is it OK to laugh at disability. The Vegetable, Vegetable, Vegetable
game – where the presenters try to guess the impairment of guest telephone
caller who can only say yes or no – though funny will offend some.
It seems to be in contradiction to the subsequent interview about Tourettes
with John Davidson about people laughing at his impairment.
But it is not – each item complements one another by showing
the complexity of the lives of disabled people through the process of highlighting
such a contradiction: I can call myself a cripple or spaz but you cannot.
It is a dilemma with no conclusive answer other than
to accept, as I do, that disabled people – like any other minorities
- can laugh at themselves but ordinary folks cannot: why? Well, because only the disabled themselves
can truly know the nuisances of the experience of discrimination and marginalization
and, as such – if done by an expert like Liz Carr – can makes
any joke about themselves have a depth that a non-disabled comedian could
never give it. The Vegetable
Vegetable Vegetable game, for example, to many a disabled listener is
as much about the everyday experience all disabled people face of being asked
by the non-disabled: "What's Wrong With You".
It has a greater depth. But,
you do have to be open and aware to laugh at yourself to find such comedy
funny. Some will always object
to laughs about themselves or others but, if done well, such comedy can be
as liberating as a decade of equality training.
On the broader issue of whether or not disability should
be ghettoized in disability specific arena such as Ouch or mainstreamed
I would argue that it should be both: it is not case of either / or. The BBC in particular is big
enough to cater to the complexity of the disabled audience as much as any
other group. The population
numbers would warrant us – the disabled - our own channel over an Asian
channel, for example, yet the BBC have an Asian channel. Why!
Goodness Gracious Me
is a good example of how a single show - done well - bought a minority out
of the closet and into the mainstream: changing the way Asian culture is seen.
Any ghettoized program runs the risk of being tokenistic.
It success is often more about the will and desire behind such an idea
rather than the strength of the idea itself: it was there for Goodness
Gracious Me.
Ouch, by allowing the
nurturing of disability talent in disability specific shows - can do the same
for disabled people in the mainstream.
Will it? That is up to other people.