* READ MORE: ‘After Life’ season three review: Ricky Gervais’ humanist hit goes out on a high
Armageddon, which will air on Netflix on Christmas Day, features a joke about Gervais being busy making videos for terminally ill children for the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
The Office UK star shared that he makes the videos only on request, saying he doesn’t burst into hospitals and go, ‘Wake up baldy’”.
He then added that he starts his videos to the children saying: “Why didn’t you wish to get better? What, you fucking ret***ed* as well?”
Although he clarified that he was making a joke, many viewers were outraged at the sneak-peak of the one-hour comedy special, for which Gervais has already put out a warning, saying he discusses “sex, death, paedophilia, race, religion, disability, free speech, global warming, the holocaust, and Elton John’ in Armageddon,” adding that “if they [the audience] don’t approve of jokes about any of these things, then please don’t watch.”
One viewer, who is a parent of a child who has suffered from cancer, launched a petition asking Netflix to remove the skit. The petition called Gervais “not only distasteful but also heartless” and criticised the “derogatory language” he used.
It also posed the question of “how a writer or anyone at Netflix could green light such appalling content”.
Now, Gervais has responded to the petition, telling BBC Radio 5 Live: “I’m literally saying in the joke that I don’t do that. But people have a reaction. They don’t analyse it. They feel something – that’s what offence is. It’s a feeling. That’s why ‘I’m offended’ is quite meaningless. What do you want me to change?”
He then shared that he believes “99 per cent of it” to be “faux offence”. He explained: “They’re not really offended. They just want to be heard.”
“Of all the millions of people that watched it and loved it, only a few don’t like it,” he continued. “If I give them special attention and try and placate them, I’ve annoyed the other millions of people that got the joke. They go, ‘No, you’ve ruined it for us!’”
He added: “I’ve got a duty to the people that like it and get it. I wouldn’t sit down with a heckler would I? If I’m playing to 20,000 people, I wouldn’t stop the show and explain to them. I ignore them.”
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