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Tuesday Apr 03, 2007
No laughing matter
The point at which moderators intervene in a forum is frequently a matter of judgement rather than the simple application of rules. Comment posters tend to enjoy sailing close to the wind and testing the tolerance of whichever blog or board they use. I was briefly a mod on TheSite.org's boards a few years ago and found myself continually having to ask more experienced moderators whether certain comments were acceptable or not .(They almost always were.)
A forum or blog's owners are, of course, responsible for the comments posted by users; they have published them. So I was surprised to see The Guardian happy to allow numerous jokes about paedophilia in the comments about a column by Zoe Williams.
The column was defending Ryhs Ifans' right to tell such jokes so I suppose the moderators were put in a tricky position. It appears that some jokes were removed but I'm pretty sure none at all would have been allowed in the printed edition of the newspaper, so I wonder what the justification is for permitting them online.
Perhaps it's simply that people are more used to seeing uncensored material online and are prepared to tolerate it. There is also the question of intent. As Zoe Williams article about Rhys Ifans argues, no one thinks for a moment that he is in fact defending paedophilia - his point is to challenge the taboo. The same, presumably goes for the joke tellers among the commentors.
I'm not convinced though. Some taboos deserve to be challenged in jokes. Others, including paedophilia, surely deserve their taboo status. That's not to say the subject should not be discussed, or conventional wisdom challenged, but not as a gag. And certainly not one where the punchline is that sex with children is acceptable (which is how the jokes attached to The Guardian column work), however obviously ironic the teller is being.
Real satirists choose their targets carefully. Chris Morris, for example, mocked the media's hysterical and self-serving attitude towards paedophilia. That was a taboo worth breaking.
Posted by Tom Green ( 5:40 PM ) Link to this post Comments[0]