Monthly arts and media column

Ian Hislop is a renowned satirist, most widely known for his appearances on the current affairs quiz programme Have I Got News For You and for editing Private Eye. He likes satire because he says that it is the ‘bringing to ridicule of vice, folly and humbug. All the negatives imply a set of positives’.

He was part of the Spitting Image team in the 1980s and went on as Private Eye editor to become the most sued man in English legal history because of the number of people (such as Robert Maxwell and Peter Sutcliffe) who took offence at the harsh comments published unashamedly in his magazine.

We may see other people as fair game, but we are easy candidates too, and are satirised by none other than Jesus, whose comment about the planks in our own eyes used humour to bring folly and humbug to light.

I read Hislop in a column a while ago saying that he was prepared to be rude about anyone, no matter what their background or credentials, apart from Jesus Christ. In Caroline Chartres’s book Why I am still an Anglican (2009), he said: ‘I've tried atheism and I can't stick at it: I keep having doubts. That probably sums up my position’.

Do-gooders

In his recent series about moral reformers (still available at time of publication on BBC iPlayer), Hislop highlights the efforts of many Christians, among others, who decided that it was their responsibility not to seek to line their own pockets but to make life better for the poor and downtrodden in society. The ‘do-gooders’ include William Wilberforce, with whom the series starts, as the ‘Godfather of all moral reformers’, Octavia Hill, provider of decent basic housing for the poor and the Birmingham preacher of the ‘civic gospel’, George Dawson, all of whom regarded it their purpose and duty before God to improve the society in which they lived for the benefit of others. In Hislop’s programme, Rowan Williams comments on the attitudes of these reformers: ‘They would all say that we ought to be be ashamed of ourselves, we are all answerable for the condition of our neighbours’.

Moral revolution

Hislop takes the phrase ‘do-gooder’ and, although he says himself that he is constantly tempted to make fun of them, he asks whether or not we would actually cope today without the changes that these people brought about for us. He identifies a moral revolution in the Victorian age that challenged the middle classes, in particular to step up to the task of making Britain a better place in which to live and that took the old-boy network away from the ruling classes. Before this, he says, there was little sense of ‘public service’ among MPs and the civil service, no welfare provision and a disregard for the rights of children or the poor, let alone animals. The basic expectations that people have today of MPs and public servants were not always recognised before these reforms. Ironically, the provision of decent housing, fair and safe working conditions and bug-free hospitals may have made people today so comfortable and dependent on welfare and state provision that they have stopped looking beyond themselves, seeing their own individual needs as more pressing than the needs of society as a whole.

Contemporary themes

These themes are startlingly contemporary. Richard Bacon asked Ian Hislop on Radio 5 live whether his programme was rather too in tune with the Big Society drive. Hislop said that he certainly wasn’t acting as a propaganda tool for the Conservatives — but if they, like him, had seen good things in moral reform of the past then that was great. The economic boom of the industrial revolution had seen big changes that brought added misery and suffering to the workers but this did not prevent Christians, others with moral convictions and philanthropists from directing their energy and compassion to victims of that economic situation. Today, very few people believe that they can make any difference in the way things are. People feel helpless in the face of globalised economies, multinational corporations, terrorism and the economic downturn. Rowan Williams comments that these Victorian reformers challenge us to think differently, to realise that small things are worth doing, to ask, ‘What little bit can I do where I am?’

Serving others in the church and beyond is a major Bible theme as we live out our forgiven status in Christ. Our service of Christ may mean that since we are the only one in our immediate community who knows the gospel, the most obvious need is for someone to talk about it. When Jesus asks his followers to help others, he talks about the spiritual reality of our ordinary actions, showing us that truly ‘doing good’ will always flow out of our love and affection for Jesus rather than out of love for ourselves. When believers ask how giving a small drink of water or clothing someone could possibly have any link to their relationship with Christ, Jesus says: ‘The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”’

Age of the do-gooder?

Do-gooders

Moral revolution

Contemporary themes

Eleanor Margesson

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