Anti-semites - the joke's on you

Iain Dale did not enjoy Borat, and for a creditable reason:

Some of the slapstick moments were worth a titter but the jewish scenes were a disgrace. There is enough anti-semitism in the world at the moment without providing the excuse for more. I do realise it is meant to be a comedy, but it really wasn't funny. Discuss.

Creditable, as I say, but not a view I share.

There has been a debate about this among Jews, with the US anti-defamation league attacking Sacha Baron Cohen. But I think (admittedly unscientifically, I haven't got a poll to hand) that the vast majority share my view. Borat is a vicious satire on anti-semitism.

I think East Europeans might have cause to be upset, but most Jews are laughing. Admittedly a little uncomfortably, since Borat's views are too close to those truly held by others for complete comfort, but laughing nevertheless.

Comments

[Daily Referendum]

Poor old Iain, I don't think he quite got it. Never mind, we all have different tastes. How he or others see Cohen's work as anti-semitism shows how touchy and overly PC we have become. We seem to look for the bad while ignoring the good.

[Ismael Klata]

I enjoyed the film, but I also found the anti-semitism scenes to be rather out-of-place. They seemed to lack cultural relevance, at least in this country, and I got the impression that the audience didn't quite know how to react. It might have been different had I watched the film among people who live and breathe Israel-Palestine, but my impression is that people here neither think that Jews behave particularly oddly, nor that Borat should have expected them to - so the jokes fell flat.

I imagine I might have felt much the same way about a film lampooning the ridiculousness of people who wear hats on their backsides. I'd recognise the form and see that the jokes looked like they ought to be funny - but I'd wonder who felt the need to make them, and why they needed to tell them to me.

[Iain Dale]

You are right. I don't think I got it at all. But was I alone?

[Sunny]

Borat is a vicious satire on anti-semitism.

Especially, given his Kazakh was apparently Yiddish, it was indeed meant to be a massive satire on anti-semitism. I loved it.

[Jerome]

His "Kazakh" was actually Hebrew, albeit somewhat accented.

I suspect Israeli Jewish audiences will have found that particularly entertaining.

[Tomáš Ruta]

What are you on about East Europeans? The Kazakhs are Asians, no Europeans!