Stand-up comedian Jimmy Carr has spoken about the media furore that followed his joke about armed forces amputees.Carr told the joke during a live show and says he took the resulting criticism to heart.
He told BBC Newsbeat: "I really took it to heart. I spend a lot of time reading the papers and writing jokes about things that are in the papers ad you sort of think it's all fun in the tabloids.
"I'm a huge supporter of our troops and it felt terrible. When people come to see me live, they know what kind of jokes I do. They know I'm going to be very, very edgy and I'm going to be saying things that are perceived as unsayable on television or radio.
"Suddenly radio stations and newspapers were phoning up people that weren't at the gig, who had lost family members in a war and telling them the joke and I just felt horrible, as you would."
But it wasn't all backlash according to Jimmy, who has visited rehabilitation centres at Selly Oak and Headley Court.
He added: "Lots of people are the victims of jokes, that's the way they work in my show. I think it was taken out of context. I've had a huge amount of support from guys in the armed forces.
"There's things like Twitter now, where it feels like if you get a hard time from the papers there is a direct line. That was really heartening because a lot of guys that I've met in the armed forces find that sort of thing very funny, it's a very dark sense of humour."
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Nov 5th 2009 4:39AM
Monika commented:
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Nov 6th 2009 11:32AM
jez commented:
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Nov 5th 2009 6:45PM
Emma commented:
People are just different, I had a boyfriend who made really sad jokes about people, one in particular about a guys dad I know who had no thumbs, I thought it was terrible and was totally inapropriate, but thinking back and thinking about Jimmy Carr, I realised even normal people joke about things they shouldn't, yet a certain majority of people think it's hillarious, I think Jimmys humour and this type of joke, it is like a double whammy, it is kind of funny and it's like a shock that he would joke about such a thing, although he means no real disrespect to the amputeees of the armed forces, I like Jimmy Carr and I thihnk it would bhe a shame that this joke messed his carreer up.
An example...People make jokes about religion, yet a lot of people takle religion seriously too, it's no joke to them, but like Jimmy Carrs joke, a certain majority laff at religious jokes.
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