The Shows Removed from Streaming Services

With Black Lives Matter protests taking place across the UK and America, change was inevitably on it’s way. Alongside the removal of statues memorialising slave traders, comes the removal of shows deemed inappropriate, from streaming sites.

Little Britain was the first to be pulled, from iPlayer, Britbox and Netflix, because ‘times have changed’. Come Fly With Me, a similar series, also starring David Walliams and Matt Lucas, has also been removed. Both shows featured the white actors wearing make up, to present themselves as different races, along with a slew of clearly racist jokes.

Netflix followed up by removing The League of Gentlemen, due to the character Papa Lazarou, who was described as a ‘blacked-up ringmaster who calls everybody Dave’. The shows creator Reece Shearsmith has always denied the character was a representation of a black man.

The Mighty Boosh has also been removed by Netflix, apparently due to the Spirit of Jazz, played by Noel Fielding. Few have mentioned the arguably more inappropriate character of Rudi Van Disarzio, the jazz fusion guitarist played by Julian Barratt, complete with brown painted face, huge hair, and a door in his head, due to him being so enlightened.

Many have argued that they should be able to make their own choices as to what to watch, but for many its clear that shows with characters like these, normalise racism. It makes racists who watch it, feel like its okay for them to be like that, and thats not okay.

Although it should be recognised that these shows were made in a different time, and the actors, writers, and others involved likely had no ill intentions or racist feelings behind them, it still needs to be understood as being inappropriate in this day and age, especially with current protests and movements.

Removing them from streaming sites doesn’t make them unavailable, there will always be ways to download or buy these shows, but by making them more difficult to access, they’re less likely to offer racists a feeling of understanding or acceptance, and thats why they’ve been removed.