The satire bust
arrived when politics became its own punchline. It is hard to say anything funny about Liz Truss’s 49 days in office. Satire has always been portrayed as futile. In 1961, Cook launched a comedy club in the vein of “those wonderful Berlin cabarets which did so much to stop the rise of Hitler”. Jonathan Coe, an author, argued satire is actively harmful, breeding cynicism about politics and helping lift up those it should bring down.
Satire is useful when politicians contain hidden depths. Mr Johnson did not. But the current crop do. Sir Keir Starmer is seen as a dullard, when he is ruthlessly cynical. Mr Sunak is portrayed as a mere technocrat when he is the most right-wing occupant of Downing Street since Margaret Thatcher and a stunning success of British multiculturalism. Each attracts an oddly deferential tone from commentators, who label them “grown ups”, much as few mocked Macmillan before “Beyond The Fringe”.
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