The Slipped Disc daily comfort zone (104): Sunday special – is your sin original?

V.Lind says:

Now, can you imagine ANY other religion to which you could subject to a similar satire without, at the VERY least, being accused of being anti some group or other, leading to demonstrations, campaigns, lawsuits, job losses or much, much worse?

I am a Catholic from a practising family. This was still making the rounds when I was a student in a secular college and like all Tom Lehrer’s songs was very popular. Including very much with me, and my family when I took it home. My Dad got a great chuckle out of it — a man who, even when old and frail and too ill to go out still read the Mass every Sunday in his treasured missal.

We had something sorely lacking these days — a sense of humour that was comprehensive enough to include laughing at ourselves.

We could use Tom Lehrer these days but not only he, in his 90s, but anyone who might have been cut from his cloth would find a cold welcome, and on the college campuses on which he made his reputation he would be no-platformed. Satire is dead.

So thanks for this — my Sunday afternoon’s entertainment will kick off with the Copenhagen concert!