Tag Archives: The Rubberbandits

Ryan Tubridy interviewing Stefanie Preissner, Michael Harding and Blindboy Boatclub, of The Rubberbandits, on the Late Late Show on January 6; from the BAI’s most recent report on complaint decisions

This afternoon.

The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) has announced its most recent decisions concerning complaints from the public.

It reviewed and rejected 11 complaints it received about Blindboy Boatclub, of The Rubberbandits, referring to the eucharist as “haunted bread” and Stefanie Preissner saying how, as a child, the eucharist being described as body and blood conjured up images of cannibalism, on the Late Late Show in January.

In reference to one of the complaints, the BAI decided:

The Committee noted the discussion as a whole. In this respect, the comments that were deemed by the complainant to be offensive were articulated as part of a broad conversation on faith, which arose from the presenter asking the panellists about the manner in which they spent the Christmas period.

The first contributor, Mr. Michael Harding, outlined how he shied away from the traditional Christmas dinner and instead ate Indian food. He noted his fondness for Diwali, the Indian festival of lights and commented on the beauty of this festival.

The conversation turned to Mr. David Cambers of The Rubberbandits who detailed his Christmas celebrations in a surrealist manner that is the hallmark of the artistic/comedy act of which he is one member.

Finally, Ms. Stefanie Preissner spoke about her disillusionment with the commercial nature of Christmas festivities. The conversation then progressed to a discussion about the Catholic belief and practice, in terms of the decline of vocations and the rise and impact of secularisation on Irish life and faith, the issue of how young people have responded to a decline in traditional Catholic faith and practices and the question of where they can find spiritual ‘refuge’, if at all or indeed if even necessary.

It was at this point in the programme that one of the contributors also featured made reference to The Eucharist as ‘haunted bread’.

While not agreeing with the contention by the broadcaster that this panellist was speaking for his generation, the Committee considered it legitimate for a panellist to articulate their own personal views. In this instance, his views dealt with a religious tenet which rests on a belief in the real presence of Jesus Christ in The Eucharist, a belief which may be difficult to reconcile for those who hold other religious beliefs or or no religious belief and one which the panellist did not appear to hold.

At that point in the programme, the other contributors reflected on this topic. Ms. Preissner spoke about how, as a child, The Eucharist being described as the body and blood of Christ conjured up images of cannibalism.

Mr. Harding spoke about how, over time, the belief in Transubstantiation has for some become difficult to understand, either for those who may only value the empirical or those who value only their own perspective regardless of facts.

Mr. Harding also spoke about the value of belief once it is not a belief that is imposed on others. Learning that Mr. Harding was a former priest, Mr. Chambers apologised for any offence that his description of The Eucharist may have caused him.

The Committee did not agree with the view of the complainant that Ms. Preissner was equating The Eucharist with cannibalism as it was clear that she was describing her thoughts as a child.

Regarding the comments by Mr. Chambers, the Committee considered his comments an expression of his own views rather than a comment on the views of others and did not agree that they were intended to mock the faith of others.

Regarding the view of the complainant that a reference to the attendance at Christmas midnight mass of people who are ‘half-cut’ with drink as being offensive; the Committee considered this a humorous reference to what may, on occasion, have been the experience of some parishioners at Christmas.

Read the complaints and decisions in full here

Previously: Maligning The Host

McSavage

Comedian David McSavage

The Irish Sun reports:

The Savage Eye star [David McSavage] is due to appear in court later this month over an unpaid TV licence.

But he is refusing to pay the €160 bill in protest at what he views as the national broadcaster’s laughable taste in humour.

Yesterday Dave told the Irish Sun he was left gobsmacked at how his Savage Eye 1916 Special was turned down after watching rival sketch shows by the Irish Pictorial Weekly team and The Rubberbandits.

And he reserved special scorn for the take-off skits wheeled out in The Mario Rosenstock Show.

Dave said: “RTE didn’t commission my Savage Eye special because they were too scared and we might have done something funny.

“Instead they hired Irish Pictorial Weekly to do a 1916 which ended up being derivative of the Savage Eye, it was awful.”

The 49-year-old, whose Savage Eye follow-up series Poor Me And The Bastards has also been rejected by Montrose bosses, was no less scathing about another irreverent retelling of the Rising from Limerick’s favourite hip-hop jokers.

He said: “The Rubberbandits are now as mainstream as Ryan Tubridy. They used to be quirky and bent, but I thought that their 1916 special was awful. And as for the last series by Mario Rosenstock? I’m willing to go to prison for that.

Jaykers.

UPDATE:

On Broadsheet’s Facebook page

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Dave McSavage says: ‘RTE comedy is so bad, I won’t pay license fee even if I have to go to jail’ (Ken Sweeney, The Irish Sun)

Pic: Click

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My generation can’t afford houses, my generation can’t afford to have children, my generation are either leaving the country or jumping in rivers, that’s my generation, man. My generation is dealing with neo-liberalism, economic policies that are similar enough to the economic liberalism at the time of the famine. It’s a laissez-faire system where the resources of the country are being sold for private interests and our generation, my generation, is screwed.”

“The lads that were in 1916, they were the same age as my generation, they were from the ages of 18 up to their mid-thirties, do you know what I’m saying? So my generation is looking at them, going, ‘yeah they had it incredibly hard’ and obviously we have it hard as well, is that what we don’t have, my generation, we don’t have the idealism that they had because that was a time of idealism.”

At the time of 1916, with World War 1, you just had the industrial revolution, you had the enlightenment, you had all of that, that was a time of idealism, we don’t have that, we’re gone past postmodernism, we’ve just got despair and confusion.”

Blindboy Boatclub, from The Rubberbandits, speaking on The Late Late Show last Friday – striking a chord with many on social media.

Further to Blindboy’s appearance (above), Denise McGrath, from Carrick-on-Suir, Co. Tipperary, wrote into The Ryan Tubridy Show on RTÉ Radio One this morning praising Blindboy’s observations.

The 24-year-old, who’s been working in the local SuperValu since she was 16, then spoke with Ryan on the show this morning.

She said:

“[Blindboy] just cut straight to it. A lot of people fluff around and, as he said, my generation, they’re either jumping on planes or jumping off bridges. It’s true, it’s grim. But it is the life of the younger generation at the minute…I would love to have my dream job…I would love to be an English teacher. There’s a glass ceiling that we can’t get through…Our generation, we’re sidled with the USC charge, you’re sidled with extra taxes – to chip away at the debt that was incurred by the generation above us, the politicians who are supposed to be in charge of our country…They’re the ones who are going ‘oh we need the younger generation to vote for us’ but what are they going to do for the younger generation?

Listen back to The Ryan Tubridy Show here

Thanks Lynne

Meanwhile…

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David O’Carroll, at Temple Bar-based design agency Miller87, writes:

Blind boy’s mini speech about our generation struck a chord with us as everyone in our office is between 24 – 30…We were talking about it for quite a while so we said we’d create a little Illustration (above) as we were inspired by Blindboy’s honesty and directness.