Last week I posted a recurring sketch by Harry Enfield and Chums about a gormless upper class English character called Tim Nice-But-Dim. Yet parodying the upper class in Britain has always been part of British comedy and this next clip is a classic example taken from the comedy group Monty Python. Monty Python is a bit of an acquired taste and I can imagine that some will not enjoy this sketch although I think it gets better as the skit progresses.

I grew up in Australia and when I first moved to the UK just shy of 30 years ago I used to think that the Australian view of the British being in the grips of a class system was over-stated. Sadly however, I have come to realise the sad truth that the British class system, while being completely anachronistic for the 21^st century, is still very much alive and well. The most disturbing modern incarnation of it at present is the current Tory party under Alexander Boris Pfeffel Johnson who single-handedly has brought into sharp focus all that is wrong with a system that allows some of the most intellectually and, more importantly, morally challenged individuals into the heart of government where their actions make the majority of folk poorer and where horrendous policies are enacted to appeal to the darker demons of our nature including xenophobia and racism.

One Youtube comment under this clip which brought a wry smile to my face was the following It's interesting how as time passed, this marvellous sport has developed into something that the entire world gets pure entertainment value from and has been renamed to 'British Government'.

So going back again into the early 70s here is another classic sketch from Morecambe and Wise. I must confess it is quite interesting looking back at the comedy of the seventies because it clearly demonstrates how humour is very generation and time specific. Morecambe and Wise were considered comic geniuses of their time but in some ways this sketch now appears almost quaint in its lack of parodic sophistication compared with more modern work that I have recently cited.

Of course as I have looked back at some of the old comics from the seventies, much of it would now be considered highly offensive. For example, there was a driving instructor sketch by Dick Emery which while it had some funny moments, also had moments that I would no longer find funny and which many would probably find offensive. To me this demonstrates how our sense of humour is deeply influenced by what our society considers to be inside the moral zeitgeist of acceptability for a particular generation.

I live in a house with 3 women (two daughters and one wife) so Strictly come dancing is a weekly fixture. While I have tried to get into the show, I only find it mildly entertaining so tend to watch the show very occasionally. However, whenever I do watch it, I am always struck by lots of very young pretty woman and hunky blokes spending hours together in close physical contact. It therefore has never surprised me that dancing couples not too infrequently end up in some form of short or long term physical (and or romantic) relationship. I guess it was only a matter of time before a comedy group would also pick up this truth and run with it in a funny sketch. Nice also to see Michael Spicer (the room next door) making a guest appearance in this sketch.

Last week I cited a Mash report sketch which contained an appearance from Michael Spicer who has his own Youtube series called the Room Next Door. The premise of this comedy is he is pretending to be a hidden media advisor speaking into the earpiece of hapless politicians to help them get through their interviews. Probably one of the most hapless politician of all time is the former Prime Minister of the UK whose tenure lasted all of 45 days after she managed to crash UK Sterling and the economy. In this sketch, Spicer is trying to navigate Truss through an interview with Laura Kuenssberg which of course, as with all Truss interviews, did not go at all well even though she did try to throw her Chancellor under the bus ("it was all Qwasi's fault!").

In week 23 I posted some material from the series the IT crowd which was a brilliant series that screened in the naughties. Although all the episodes were very funny, two that were exceptionally good were "Are we not men?" (a nice reference to Devo there) and "The work outing". I have already cited the first bit of the work outing in September last year so now it is time for the next instalment. For the context of where this sketch starts, click here to watch part I.

Time for another Mash Report sketch. This one is having a dig at Londoners in terms of their unfriendliness. The final line in the sketch however equalises the diss by having a laugh at Northerners who are subject to "Headbutting when cornered".

One of my favourite shows on TV in the 80s was Alas Smith and Jones. Thankfully I also had the pleasure of seeing them in concert when they toured Australia. This sketch goes all the way back to when the Channel Tunnel was under construction and is a classic dig at two particular weaknesses in English culture: 1) poor upper management and 2) terrible workmanship. Sadly if you spend any time living in the UK you will experience both. While there are great trades people in the UK they are sadly not in the majority. Rather a sizeable number are absolute cowboys who do terrible work if they ever complete it in the first place.

Likewise the standard of British management in my experience can also be pretty poor. I have now worked in universities and for both small and large companies and for some mysterious reason the more dysfunctional and incompetent a person is the more likely it seems that they will end up rising to a very senior position. I guess this phenomenon is so common that academics have even tried to give it a name. The Peter Principle was first proposed in 1969 in a semi-satirical book by Laurence Peter and Raymond Hull and was actually based on Peter's research into the operations of hierarchical organizations. Yet I think the modified version of this principle, first proposed by the author of the Dilbert cartoons (Scott Adams) is even closer to the truth. The Peter principle states that individuals in an organisation are promoted to the point where they reach a level of incompetence that prevents them from being promoted further while the Dilbert principle goes one step further stating that individuals are promoted because of their incompetence.