Is Censorship Really the Right Way Forward?

by Nicholas Lemieux

In light of the recent Black Lives Matter protests, an immense sense of urgency has understandably overtaken much of the entertainment industry in an effort to improve representation of black and minority ethnic people. Whilst a strong idea in principle, especially given how recent events have highlighted the sheer levels of inequality still present within society, I personally cannot help but question whether the decision of outright erasing old TV shows and movies from various online services on the basis of their outdated and offensive content is truly the right way to go about things.

Admittedly, it is fairly understandable as to why there would be outrage against the offensive content present in programmes such as Little Britain, prominently featuring white actors playing ethnic people and exaggerating their perceived attributes to a stereotypical degree. It is a product of its time after all and series creator Matt Lucas in fact issued an apology three years ago for its depiction of minority groups, admitting if he had the chance to remake the show he would avoid making such jokes in light of the upset caused. 

However, I can’t help but feel cynical with the BBC’s decision to completely remove the programme from all its services. In my opinion, the decision feels as if it has an element of hiding from their perceived mistakes instead of outright addressing them. After all, their statement for removing it for its outdated comedy seems rather bizarre given how just weeks before they were comfortably advertising new sketches of Little Britain for its highly publicised Big Night-In event. Shocking how much of a change in heart the BBC had in such a short amount of time...

Arguably, outright erasing existence has only resulted in the Streisand effect and drawn more attention to the show, as is evident from its recent spike in sales from EBay. If the BBC wanted to firmly address criticisms of the show’s perceived racist content, why not just simply add a disclaimer or warning to the programme to give people the choice of whether or not they want to watch it in the first place, as well as make it clear that the purpose of these shows is not to deliberately raise hate against ethnicities? Other companies have done so for their own products, such as Warner Bros. with their DVD releases of old outdated Looney Tunes. Those decisions have raised little controversy, so why not just do the same here?

Ignoring the context of these TV shows and just blindly labelling them as racist is also incredibly problematic. Shows such as Come Fly With Me and Fawlty Towers, which have also come under fire,  are intentionally about bigoted and self-centred people with the entire narrative being that these characters are so out-of –touch and horrible that we can freely mock them for their well-deserved humiliation.  Sure, these shows cover racist situations but they do not in any way herald the racist actions of their characters who themselves are the intended butt of the joke. The racist immigration officer of Come Fly With Me for example loses his job for his offensive behaviour by the end of the series and the entire purpose of the Major’s racist jokes, as summarised by John Cleese himself, is to mock the character for his outdated, ridiculous views.  The fact that UKTV themselves quickly reinstated the episode of Fawlty Towers within a matter of days after the uproar, with a warning added for offensive language, highlights just how poorly thought out their decision was. If they had just elected to go with the warning in the first place, this entire controversy wouldn’t have broken out at all.

Perhaps the most frustrating incident for me has been Netflix’s removal of several select episodes of the sitcom It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia from its streaming service which involved scenes of the main characters wearing blackface and brownface. As with the examples before, it’s made abundantly clear by the writers that this entire situation is satire with the main characters being objectively bad people. There are countless moments throughout the episodes in which these characters are called out for their offensive actions and humiliated for their bigotry, driving home how this sort of behaviour is clearly wrong and shouldn’t be glorified. At no point do they try to make the blackface itself funny as the whole purpose of the show is to portray the worst of the worst that people can act like, characters we are meant to feel comfortable rooting against. You’re laughing at these stupid racists for dressing up in blackface, not at the black people who are being represented in such a grotesque manner. It’s similar to the recent criticisms people have had about Robert Downey Jr. in Tropic Thunder. It could be argued that banning these programmes derails the entire message of Black Lives Matter as the purpose of these shows and their jokes is to call out those same bigoted people for their old-fashioned ways. Completely erasing them from the public eye just defeats their entire purpose in spreading a progressive message.   

Ultimately, although with good intentions, I just don’t think that censoring these shows is truly the right way forward. If anything, it undermines the entire movement it is supposed to support and removing these shows, regardless of their context and intentions, makes it come across as an arbitrary hollow gesture that means these companies don’t have to put any real work into combating actual instances of racial discrimination. Add a disclaimer if you want to avoid causing any offence but constantly going around removing these shows sends across the wrong message, blurs lines and detracts from the possibility of any actual change coming about from this very real movement to put an end to racial injustice.