I wouldn’t have put Jimmy Carr anywhere near a show like this (Picture: Thomas M Jackson/Getty Images)
Just over a decade ago, an episode of Black Mirror, set in a dystopian future, featured a new and extreme form of TV.
In it, citizens work for ‘merits’, which they can exchange for a ticket to appear on a competition show called Hot Shot. Abi, who enters the competition, doesn’t impress judges but ends up on a pornography station. It was glitzy, soulless and exploitative.
A decade on and a new show featuring the artwork of Adolf Hitler has, for me, brought that dismal vision of broadcasting closer to reality.
It was confirmed on Thursday that Channel 4, which, ironically, first showed that episode of Black Mirror, has bought artworks from ‘problematic’ artists, including Rolf Harris and Adolf Hitler.
The purchases are in aid of a new show, Art Trouble, in which a studio audience will decide whether Jimmy Carr – recently in the news for making an offensive joke that targeted the Traveller community – should destroy the works .
Apparently this would be done with a flamethrower for some paintings, and with other tools in the case of Hitler.
As I see it, the show has it all backwards. It starts with the need to make money through viewership, finds a tacky stunt, hangs on it a supposedly intellectual frame, and gives not a damn for those impacted.
The aim of this show, supposedly, is to discuss whether works of art can be separated from their creator.
But make no mistake - this is about shock, about advertising revenue, about baiting viewers by grabbing their attention.
And how does Channel 4 seek to gain their attention?
By appealing to the lowest common denominator – those with the attention span of a TikTok video who will enjoy clips of Carr burning stuff – and insulting its audience by taking a serious policy debate and turning it into a game and trivialising an important discussion about whether art and artist are forever intertwined.
It’s desperate.
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A bad taste and juvenile stunt that highlights an important issue but then immediately obscures it with a veneer of cheap gimmicks.
At this point I should say that I am a comedy fan, and in many ways a free speech fundamentalist.
I understand why comedians must push boundaries, but I wouldn’t have put Jimmy Carr anywhere near a show like this on Channel 4.
Having freedom of speech and understanding the need for edgy comedy doesn’t mean an offensive comedian deserves a major platform.
Either way, in this case arguments about freedom of expression and views on intrinsic artistic value are frankly window dressing for what the programme is really about, with C4 Programming Director Ian Katz admitting ‘There’s no argument that it is significantly harder to cut through to a big audience these days.’
He suggests the approach to such content is ‘probably not rational or commercial’ – and he’s certainly right about the former.
It would be all too easy to lose sight of the victims of the evildoers in this, but that is where any discussion of an issue as fraught as this should begin, not with a TV channel’s bottom line.
I’m going to assume the show’s audience will presumably not feature a group of Holocaust survivors to speak about the horrors of Hitler, or relatives of those abused by the predatory males whose work the show platforms.
Can you imagine the ignominy of having your abuser’s merit as an artist be discussed on TV sandwiched in between cat food adverts?
That’s not to say any and all discussion isn’t valid.
Public debate continues about statues celebrating those involved in the slave trade, and indeed of the Judensau – Jews in obscene contact with a pig – across Europe.
Indeed, one of the ancestors of Eric Gill, a renowned sculptor but also a sexual predator who abused his own daughters, made the case powerfully about how they view his legacy should be treated. A thoughtful piece by someone taking time to consider it and receiving no benefit.
I wouldn’t have put Jimmy Carr anywhere near a show like this on Channel 4. (Picture: Getty Images)
I personally think there is merit in appropriately contextualised historic statues, but I’d sooner not explain this to a comedian as he thumbs a hammer, wondering whether my lived experience will be turned into fodder for a gameshow.
And this is not historic – antisemitism continues to live on, there are estimated to be two antisemitic tweets for every Jew in the UK per year.
We are fighting an uphill battle, one made worse, not better, by this kind of quasi-intellectualised nonsense, conceived by people sitting round a meeting desk getting carried away with themselves.
The show is created for entertainment. It derives such entertainment from tragedy, flaunting victims’ trauma in front of their eyes.
It sensationalises what is a serious issue, and with Katz saying that Hitler’s work would be ‘appropriately’ disposed of rather than hang in the C4 offices, it’s clear he understands the potential for harm but apparently, it simply doesn’t matter as much as cheap shock value.
Hitler was a genocidal racist.
He oversaw the deaths of millions of Jews and others.
People have poked fun at him over years, and rightly so, but reframing him as an artist in a world where there is diminishing knowledge and understanding of the Holocaust is irresponsible.
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The best thing that could happen to this programme is for it to suffer the ratings battering it deserves, fading into obscurity.
It is crass and irresponsible.
Channel 4 might need more viewers, but it won’t find them like this.
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It’s desperate.