Australians decide satire is no joke (News Feature)

By Sid Astbury Jul 29, 2009, 7:49 GMT

   Sydney - Prime Minister Kevin Rudd is among many viewers delighted that Wednesday's episode of The Chaser's War on Everything is the last in a satirical comedy series that has exposed the limits of the Australian sense of humour.

   Rudd, whose sunny smile is a staple of breakfast television on the commercial channels, has berated taxpayer-funded broadcaster ABC for a prime-time show he lacerates as 'absolutely beyond the pale.'

   The Chaser team raised a laugh around the world in 2007 when their fake motorcade carrying a fake Osama bin Laden breached then-president George W Bush's security cordon when he was in Sydney attending a regional meeting.

   The first episode in what proved their third and final season earlier this year garnered a massive audience and saw the concept franchised abroad.

   But a row over a skit that satirized the Make-a-Wish Foundation for terminally ill children lost them a third of their audience and led to the sacking of ABC's head of comedy.

   Amanda Duthie's mistake was to have approved a sketch that ended with the punchline 'Why go to any trouble when they're going to die anyway?'

   The ABC received thousands of calls from viewers upset by a skit that centred on a pretend Making a Realistic Wish Foundation that only made cheap-and-easy dreams come true.

   'The segment shouldn't have been broadcast,' ABC managing director Mark Scott said when ushering Duthie out the door. 'We recognize that it caused unnecessary and unreasonable hurt and offence to our viewers and the broader community and we have apologized for this.'

   Those arguing that satire was not possible without causing offence to someone were drowned out by calls for The Chaser to be taken off the air.

   'Controversy does not equal comedy, especially when a charity or terminally ill child are being parodied,' the Bendigo Advertiser thundered in an editorial. 'How and why this could be viewed as comedy is beyond the rationale of your average television viewer.'

   Psychologist Janet Hall said The Chaser drowned because it tried to swim against a current of feel-good television shows that provided an antidote to grim news of wars and pestilence, global warming and financial disaster.

   'We're finally open to enjoying watching people we like achieving things we would like to do, instead of being voyeurs for people we don't much like making fools of themselves,' she said.

   Ten Network programming chief David Mott put things more simply when he said 'nasty television' and 'inspirational formats' were in.

   Some are depressed that Australians couldn't take the dark humour of The Chaser. Even relatively anodyne sketches were catching a raw nerve.

   A sketch depicting guide dogs being used to get drunks home safely fell foul of charity workers.

   'In doing this skit, the Chasers have not only offended and degraded the work and dedication of guide dog schools around the world, but also the courage and commitment shown every day by the many clients who use a guide dog,' Guide Dogs Queensland chief executive Chris Laine said.

   Even a lottery company complained that its patrons were being made fun of when The Chaser ran the results of a fictitious lottery draw, which the Lotto Association claimed 'may have caused undue distress to many viewers.'

   Chas Licciardello, one of the five Chaser comedians, said the controversies had taken their toll on the team.

   'You do feel at times like you can't win,' he said. 'You do feel at times if you watch what you do you are not pushing it far enough anymore but if you don't then there is a new low.'