Comedian Jimmy Carr is facing backlash over an “abhorrent” and “disturbing” joke about the Holocaust in his Netflix special His Dark Material. Towards the end of the program, which arrived on the streaming platform Christmas Day, Carr commented on the deaths of thousands of Gypsies at the hands of the Nazis, deaths that he called a “positive” aspect of the Holocaust.
Kicking off the so-called joke, which followed a 2006 joke Carr made about Gypsy women, by admitting “should be a career-ender” and advising the audience to “strap in,” Carr began, “when people talk about the Holocaust, they talk about the tragedy and horror of six million Jewish lives being lost to the Nazi war machine. But they never mention the thousands of gypsies that were killed by the Nazis.” Carr told the crowd that “no one ever talks about that because no one wants to talk about the positives.” Carr went on to defend his remarks as a “good joke,” explaining that it was “f-ing funny,” “edgy as all hell,” and had an “educational quality.”
Videos by PopCulture.com
“It’s a joke about the worst thing that’s ever happened in human history, and people say ‘never forget,’ well this is how I remember. I keep bringing it up,” he said. “Third reason that’s a good joke is ’cause there is an educational quality. Like everyone in the room knows six million Jewish people lost their lives to the Nazis during World War II. But a lot of people don’t know, because it’s not really taught in our schools, that the Nazis also killed, in their thousands, Gypsies, homosexuals, disabled people and Jehovah’s Witnesses.”
Although the comedy special was released more than a month ago, the joke widely went overlooked until a Facebook user shared the scene in question on Thursday, Feb. 2, immediately sparking widespread condemnation of Carr and the Netflix special. Commenting on the post, one person said it was “an absolute disgrace,” with somebody else calling to “disgusting.” Others slammed the segment as “abhorrent.” On Twitter, somebody wrote that “referring to the near-annihilation of the Roma as one of the ‘positives’ of the Nazi Holocaust isn’t a joke. It’s the same genocidal racism that generates holocausts.” The segment also prompted a response from The Traveller Movement, a national charity that challenges discrimination against Irish Travellers, English Romany Gypsies and Roma, the group labelling the joke “truly disturbing” and one that “goes way beyond humor.”
At this time, it does not appear that Carr has responded to the backlash. Netflix also doesn’t appear to have issued a response. The controversy surrounding Carr comes just days after Whoopi Goldberg was suspended from ABC’s The View following comments she made on-air about the Holocaust. Goldberg apologized for her remarks shortly after the on-air segment.
