Seething David Lammy calls on Netflix to 'abandon' Jimmy Carr over Holocaust joke

5 February 2022, 19:26

David Lammy's furious reaction to Jimmy Carr's Gypsy joke

This was David Lammy's furious address to comedian Jimmy Carr over the controversial joke about Travellers and the Holocaust contained in his recent Netflix special.

Mr Carr, 49, opens his Netflix special His Dark Material – which aired on Christmas Day - with a "trigger warning" to the audience and Netflix described it as containing "career enders".

A widely-shared clip from the show shows the comedian talking about "six million Jewish lives being lost" before making a disparaging remark about the deaths of thousands of Gypsies under the Nazi regime.

David Lammy read Jimmy Carr's 'joke': "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 Nazi's. No one ever wants to talk about that because no one wants to talk about the positives."

David then asked listeners to "imagine if" if the word "Gypsies" was swapped for "LGBTQ", "disabled", or "blacks".

"Why is it acceptable?" David asked.

"There are only 300,000 Roma traveller Gypsy people in this country, it's a small minority group, it's a poor minority group, and it's a group - yes - who are transient, move around, have a different way of life, so it's an easy group to judge."

Read more: Head Gypsy: Jimmy Carr's Holocaust joke 'struck fear into my heart'

Addressing Jimmy Carr directly, David fumed: "It's not a joke, people died, they were murdered, they were gassed. This is how prejudice starts.

"Positives? What's positive about murder? So that you can make money on Netflix you shyster! It's a disgrace Jimmy Carr, it's not funny.

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"I'm using my freedom of speech to tell you it's not funny, because you're not a minority Jimmy Carr!

"I've got a platform, so I'm standing up to you. That was cruel, it was wicked, it was mean, it was done for a small laugh."

David concluded: "Netflix should take down that clip, cut it out of Jimmy Carr, or abandon him altogether in my view."

Not-for-profit organisation the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust shared a statement on Twitter from their CEO Olivia Marks-Woldman who said she was "horrified" to hear "gales of laughter" following Carr's remarks.

Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, said: "These comments from Jimmy Carr are beyond tasteless.

"The targeting of Roma and Sinti during the Holocaust is no laughing matter. Deeply offensive. I also don't understand how this was aired @netflix."

A representative for Carr has been contacted for comment.

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