33 thoughts on “The Parable of the Good Samaritan: as told to today’s college students”

  3. Very good. Lets hope no one of extreme sensitivity drives into the ditch or requires a safe room.

    1. I’m wondering the same thing as Niek. The audience (the college students?) seem to be very rational and not at all snowflakes nor are they feeling victimized.

      1. Agreed. The audience was right. Jesus was being an asshole.

        cr

          1. Part of the funny in this is applying modern tolerance to ancient characters. In the world Jesus came from, there was nothing resembling post Enlightenment tolerance. People could treat badly (spit on them, point fingers, abuse in many ways) anyone different: beggars, slaves, people with injuries, the diseased, foreigners, etc. So, while we may think Jesus was being an asshole, back then, he would have been being very enlightened.

          2. That is quite true however, in the context of the sketch, and compared with his disciples, he was being an asshole.

            (Besides, I like calling Jesus an asshole 😉

            Whichever author put that bit in the Bible was a liberal or an accommodationist, maybe even a communist. In today’s terms…

            cr

          3. Agree – I doubt that e.g. any Roman ever praised a good Carthaginan. Moreover, today’s media are still full of “Ah!” and “Oh!” stories about ordinary decency by people stereotyped as bad. E.g. I have just opened a Daily Mail piece about a white Louisiana cop named David Taylor who comforted a lost black boy and carried him until finding his mother. I have seen also multiple stories about good blacks and Muslims.

        1. 🙂

          The one at the rear is usually to be found trundling along the rural roads of Britain at 40mph with a tail of frustrated cars.

          The one in front still holds the diesel land speed record, I believe.

          cr

  7. A great sketch, but I even more marvel at the set design and lighting, which looks straight from a master’s painting.

    1. Or the props store room. They don’t throw all of this stuff away.

  8. Their Peep Show sitcom, is probably my favorite (it takes time to develop affection for the characters, but the comedy is right there from the start).

    I’ll have to give Mitchell and Webb a try. I do remember their brilliant skit about medical quackery.

    Thanks for the vid, already shared.

    Mike

  11. I love Mitchell and Webb. David Mitchell’s rants on YouTube are quite good too.

    I saw an episode of QI when he was ranting about something and Stephen Fry told him that he “missed his angry logic.”

  12. Man, that’s hilarious. But I do agree with those higher up who say that the audience reaction here was not unreasonable. Now if they had no-platformed Jesus for associating with tax collectors…

  13. How is that satire of hyper-offended political correctness? That’s satire in which Jesus is actually bigoted… that’s the joke. The joke isn’t that the people are being too touchy: it’s that Jesus is a bigot in the sketch. Come on Prof. Coyne!

    1. Any time you find yourself tempted to use the phrase “The joke isn’t…”, you might want to pause and think a bit longer. Humor, as you may or may not have noticed, is often multi-pronged and does not have clear cut good guys and bad guys.

      This clip is a near perfect rendition of political correctness as seen today. Jesus is trying to make a good point. He brings with him, however, his own preconceptions and intellectual flaws. The audience, convinced of their own righteousness, focus only on his flaws, while persistently, and seemingly willfully, missing his point.

      Anyone who has watched, say, Sam Harris’ treatment at the hands of “enlightened” leftists can’t help but see the parallel.

      I can’t believe I’m actually having to explain this.

      1. No. It really is just about turning the whole Good Samaritan episode on its head. The audience are the good guys and Jesus is the racist. “Sammy lovers” is clearly intended as a parody of a racist remark.

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