Ofcom on Dibley – Not in breach
Ofcom continues its run of brushing off complaints from the religiously “offended” by finding the Christmas episode of The Vicar of Dibley “not in breach” (.pdf download). It had received 66 complaints that
some of the material denigrated Christianity, that similar material would not have been used if another religion had been featured, and/or it was unsuitable for Christmas night, one of the biggest festivals in the Christian year.
Ofcom sensibly concluded that the overall message of the show was positive, that it was post-watershed, and that the comedy was in a long-established tradition of farcical sitcoms and “comedy vicars”. Here is an html version of the report if you are interested.
CRAC head Graham James the Bishop of Norwich, who thought the episode was “more offensive than springer”, won’t be pleased. Which is nice.
My wife and I,who are both atheists and human rights activists, watched and were greatly moved by the ‘offensive’ episode. As it happens, we work on human rights issues with a vicar who is one of the rare breed locally to resemble the ‘Dawn French model’ of clergy and restores our belief that Christians can actually act like human beings in spite of their belief system.
By comparison, every time I see or hear some prat like the Bishop of Norwich and his crac-head buddies spout off I lose this slender hope that religionists are capable of any sense or humanity!
It seems some of the complaints were about the questioning of the Christian faith. Are these complainants saying that Christianity should not even be questioned? Should the BBC only show Christianity as good and just? I say no way!
It’s good to see Ofcom are not caving in to the will of people with both a lack of sense of humour and a serious case of chip on the shoulder.