Thursday, August 15, 2013

Their unoriginal ABC

Wednesday is giggle night at the ABC, as opposed to Monday, when serious contemplation of the nation's affairs begins with 7.30, gathers momentum through Four Corners, accelerates past Media Watch and reaches its prolonged and soggy climax in Q&A, with Lateline always there to buff the afterglow of an entire evening's lefty lovefest. That you are more likely at the week's dawn to laugh, if that word can  be stretched to include the snort and scoff,  than atop its hump, when premeditated comedy is said to be on air, is further proof of the national broadcaster's general inability to fulfill its brief. It can't be that difficult to report honestly, and assembling a few titter-worthy gags would seem to be even less of a challenge. For example:

Knock, knock!
Who's there?
Fact Check
Fact Check who?
Only the Coalition, silly!

See, this joking business is fun and easy, but alas, quite beyond your average ABC humourist if Wednesday Night Fever is any indication. Amongst its other Labor-ed moments, and there were many, many of those, the show devoted a short segment to a pair of Kiwi inverts discussing their pending union. What fun! Thick accents, beanies, beer cans on the coffee table, moron grins and inbred absurdities. You can view the segment by going here and skipping through to the 15.50 mark of the video. The skit's protagonists and their set are freeze-framed below.

Now observe two other characters, Bob and Doug McKenzie, who hailed from Canada and appeared on American TV several decades ago. Notice any similarities?

Actually, there is one big difference.

Bob and Doug were put to air by a commercial network intent on amusing viewers, selling advertising time and making money. By contrast, their apishly copied Kiwi counterparts represent the ABC's primary mission, which is to spend public money without a concomitant obligation to produce a measurable return.

That must be why the McKenzie brothers are funny and the Kiwi couple anything but.


  1. Funny as a hatful of arseholes. That tends to happen when you set out to write propaganda and ban laughing at stuff that's actually funny, like turd burglars pretending to be married. Never in history has so much humour been murdered by political zealots who can't laugh at themselves. It's almost guaranteed when the government gives out free money to its useful idiots.

  2. missed out on a bonus half hour of the Leftist jamboree on Monday nights. It kicks off at 1900 hours with what passes for News, cobbled together by operatives wearing either red or green glasses.

  3. As long as Australian "comedy" is captive of the pravdaverse of the ALPBC and its commercial spinoffs, Australian "comedians" will all fit neatly on the same postage stamp that also lists the names of all the hilarious Soviet and Chinese comics.

  4. Actually, Doug & Bob stems from an old Monty Python sketch; "Doug & Bob are Metropolitan policemen with a difference. Doug likes nothing better than to slip into little cocktail frocks, while Bob bouffants his hair for a night on duty".

  5. Oh Dear, The Australian Bureau for Correctness seems to have misplaced it's charter.

  6. As a kiwi naturalised aussie I don't mind being the butt of sheep shagger jokes. I know the saffers reckon it is the aussies that are the sheep shaggers anyway.
    Also anything that takes the mickie out of gay "marriage" is ok with me.
    But aussie humour died the day Strop and Hoges hung up their footy boots and Delvine became a urban mum.

  7. The prior Chaser show spent a long time on Tony's stop-the-boats campaigning. I could only think with the public for the most part having woken up to the scam of asylum-seeking it was unlikely to have put a scratch on TA. In fact hearing TA again repeating his strong intent to act would only help the LNP.

    Don't forget more jokes about Clive Palmer being overweight, ha ha ha, ho ho ho. #sexappeal #TheirABC

  8. How about Auntie Jack ? Sent up the 70's counterculture rotten. Kev Kevana the switched on butcher "Peace Meat freaks". Auntie Jack as the RSM in the bootcamp for homosexuals. Even Roy and HG, back in the day, were flinging the odd cat.

  9. Too fucking right, I hate anything that humanises the homos. Left wing hippy bullshit. Any of yous want a wristy?

    1. You forgot the "Sarc" tag Nonny. If you are fair dinkum I can introduce you to a couple of 6 foot plus Rugby players who just happen to be gay and would love to discuss your opinions with you.

  10. The Old and Unimproved DaveAugust 15, 2013 at 5:55 PM

    Two ABC comedians walk into a bar.

    Hardly surprising, given that they set it so low...

  11. Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.August 16, 2013 at 5:59 AM

    Watching this on Irish TV, Prof: Fleadh Cheoil na hÉireann 2013. The Irish take their singing seriously, with accordians, harps, lutes, guitars... a long, long way away from bad comedy nites on the ABC in all of their derivative awfulness. Tomorrow after sightseeing we are off out for some Craic, once Da Hairy Ape shows me the head, severed by Cromwell, of Sir Oliver Plunkett, removed from his body in 1681 and still on public display near the Boyne. Fun times. If Oireland didn't exist you'd have to invent it, he tells me expansively, mired in Guinness, happy to be home again in the Auld Land.