Lucy Carne: Cancel culture should not ruin our sense of humour this Christmas

Crackers are a Christmas table staple, but thanks to cancel culture you won’t find many laughs with your paper hat this year.

As the daughter of a Ten Pound Pom, I’ve already celebrated Christmas.

Having got off the boat in Brisbane “because it was the last stop”, my mother knew no one.

The fellow passengers she befriended during those long months at sea became our honorary family in lieu of blood relatives far away in England.

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And so it’s our tradition to knock over a proper Christmas early before their annual pilgrimage back to M&S.

Of course no one is flying anywhere this year, but we stuck to the schedule.

Ten Pound Poms love Australian traditions, except at Christmas. Picture: supplied

Despite decades in Australia, they have a staunch commitment to a British Christmas.

I remember the looks of sacrilegious shock when I once dared suggest prawns be served. Mention pavlova and you risk being disowned.

Regardless of mercury and humidity, it’s the full Delia Smith regalia – chestnut stuffing, chipolatas, mashed swede and carrots, devils on horseback and a bread sauce recipe my mother claims has been handed down since Medieval times.

Britain’s culinary queen Delia Smith. Picture: supplied

Choir of King's College, Cambridge. Picture: supplied

After the incident known as the Great Fire of Caloundra, which involved a kitchen bench, two tea towels and a small child doused in a pyrotechnic explosion of flaming brandy, we swapped pud for less-perilous trifle.

Buble is banned. It’s King’s College Choir until the potent Jamie Oliver gin cocktails kick in and then it’s usually Traveling Wilburys or Rolling Stones. Loud. One year a concerned neighbour texted: “Is everything OK?? There’s someone standing in your garden shouting Roy Orbison songs.”

But rising in importance above all of that is the hallowed sanctity of our Christmas table: the cracker.

There is much annual deliberation over the quality of the snap and contents, particularly the jokes.

But if 2020 is to be remembered for hoarding toilet paper and lobsters, it’s also the year we lost our sense of humour.

TV’s Little Britain, Fawlty Towers, Chris Lilley and even Bluey were sanitised of what was deemed culturally inappropriate.

UK comedy Little Britain was a 2020 casualty of cancel culture. Picture: supplied

More than three in five Australians now believe cancel culture has stopped them sharing their opinions, according to a recent Mark McCrindle survey.

A News Corp poll last week of more than 7000 voters also found 97 per cent think “cancel culture has gone too far”.

And while cracker jokes have always been laughably lame, it seems they too have been subjected to censorship to ensure they do not offend.

Jokes must meet a myriad of 2020 criteria – and few appear to have passed the sensitivity test.

Instead, our crackers this year were a let-down of jovial failures.

Jokes about blondes, mothers-in-law and Eskimos are obviously out, as is the one about the dyslexic that walks into a bra.

Don’t expect to find many laughs with your paper hats. Picture: Absolutely Fabulous Christmas Special

At the rate that society has clutched at cancel culture, it won’t be long until all cracker jokes are deplatformed for good.

“What do you call a snowman in summer? A puddle” will be too triggering for Greta Thunberg cultists who believe Earth will end in 2030.

“Why did the turkey join a rock band? It already had the drumsticks” will be condemned by vegans.

Hailing from the land of Monty Python, Ab Fab and The Goodies, the Brits in my family rightfully feel they have claim to judge humour.

“What is this rubbish? I’ve got a joke …” my mother offered, as my husband and I leapt across the table to cover children’s ears.

“Why don’t witches wear knickers? So their brooms stick!”

But that is also deeply offensive, because men can be witches too.

Homeschoolers will be appalled by “did Rudolph go to school? No, he was elf-taught.”

“What do you get if you eat Christmas decorations? Tinsillitis” incites dangerous consumption of baubles.

Anti-vaxxers will be enraged by “why are Santa’s reindeer allowed to travel on Christmas Eve? They have herd immunity.”

Regardless of where you come from, Christmas crackers are a table staple. Picture: iStock

Anxiety-sufferers will feel targeted by “what lies at the bottom of the sea shivering? A nervous wreck.”

And “what does Santa do when his elves misbehave? He gives them the sack” is a breach of the Fair Work Act.

But in all seriousness, this Christmas should be a time for us to put aside our obsession with political correctness and rediscover our sense of fun. Humour heals. Laughter is the best medicine. Smile in the face of adversity.

To quote the greatest Pom of all, William Shakespeare, on the nourishment of jest: “Prepare for mirth, for mirth becomes a feast.”

And after the year we’ve all had, we certainly need a good laugh. Merry Christmas.