In Novemeber 2008, at the age of 45, my Dad was diagnosed with Early Onset Parkinson's Disease. I was at my first term, first year of Uni and my parents chose, wisely, not to tell me until i came home for Christmas- I knew something was up and kept berating them but they just said they were missing me, and I believed them. I mean, i didn't really believe them, but i think it was just easier at the time to pretend that it was something as harmless as missing me that was upsetting them.
When they did tell me it pretty much knocked me for six. I don't even think devastated really covers it- My dad is my hero, my rock and one of the most important people in my life. He's my best friend, and always has been- I'm like the epitome of a daddy's girl!! So news like this, that someone as incredible and perfect as my dad was now ill with a not only terrible but slow and thus far incurable disease...I couldn't really fathom it. I couldn't think of anyone who deserved it less, not that i would wish illness onto anyone, not matter how cruel or horrific they may be. But my dad?he's all that's good in the world. the most caring and trustworthy man you could ever come across, and it literally made no sense to me. It still doesn't if i'm honest and as much as i hate to admit it i try to forget about it a lot of the time.
It's not easy to- it's sometimes obvious that my dad is unwell. His speech can be hard to understand sometimes, especially over the phone, and his walking is ok, if a little stumbly and shuffly. He's very slow moving, but then again my dad was always a dawdler, and my ma sometimes jokes that he can't blame the Parkinson's for that!
But that's pretty much the only time we ever make jokes about it. and when i say we make jokes, everyone kinda smiles a little and then it gets a little quiet before either my dad says 'eh, i'm alright' or someone changes the subject by reminding us of something cute Eli has said. As a family we don't really joke about it- there's not really much to joke about. Parkinson's disease at any age is horrible, but for my dad who has yet to even turn 50 it's kinda messed up. He's on a series of medicine's that make him unwell and sometimes throw an emotional curveball, and he used to have physio and speech therapy but it became too demanding and there just wasn't time. Our neighbour across the road suffers from Parkinson's Disease, but he is considerably older than my dad; however i look at him, and he's had the disease far longer than my dad, and it scares me. Parkinson's is a nasty, nasty illness- it's degenerative which means as my dad gets older it'll get worse, and as yet there's no cure. It affects the central nervous system, and although is not considered fatal, people with it are more likely to catch virus's, other illnesses and as well as thought and communication becoming compromised, there's a big possibility of my dad ending up in a wheelchair. So when it comes to humour we have very little.
A few weeks after i had found out we were watching 'Live at the Apollo'. Frankie Boyle was performing and made a joke which involved a sufferer of Parkinson's disease. We all laughed, except from mum, who became quite upset. At the time of us finding out me and my brother and sister didn't really know the extent to which dad was ill- i certainly knew very VERY little on the illness and dad had told us repeatedly that he was going to be fine. Only mum knew that actually dad's illness wasn't 'fine' and that it wasn't something to joke about. I've now learnt, the hard way, just how hard it is now to laugh about something i may have chuckled over years ago.
Piers Morgan wrote in his article in live magazine that Jimmy Carr had made a joke stating that when he wished Piers Morgan would get Parkinson's, he didn't mean his job. even reading it stung a little. Morgan then went on to discuss the Frankie Boyle issue, where Boyle had made jokes about suffers of Down's Syndrome, and then gone on to mock the parents of a suffer upon finding out. Having read the Boyle story last week and been horrified at the treatment these people received from Boyle I couldn't help but get upset.
Carr was wishing, admittedly jokingly, that someone would get Parkinson's. But it annoyed me because I spend pretty much every waking moment wishing my dad didn't have it, that the damn illness didn't even exist, and yet here was a man who thought it was funny to use an illness that people have no choice over whatsoever to make quick quips, insincere digs. There's nothing insincere about Parkinson's Disease, it happens to people, and it's real. scarily real.
And to Boyle, for harassing those poor parents who, if i read correctly, went out of their way not to disturb his show and tried to deter attention from themselves, i can only say i hope you're happy with the money you made from the tour. You managed to get a few cheap laughs, so congratulations.
I can't sit here all high and mighty- chances are if i didn't know the pain of someone i love suffering from an incurable and uncontrollable disease i probably would've laughed in shock and then forgotten about it. But i do, so i didn't.
I think it's about time these comedians- who influence so many people these days, especially young people- took it upon themselves to write more original jokes and stopped relying of the unfortunate aspects of other people's lives and uncontrollable and undeserved suffering of others for cheap laughs and quips. Russel Howard does an amazing job every week of taking ordinary news stories and making them funnier. Jason Manford talks on his family life, and manages to create observational humour without insulting anyone. The ABSOLUTE PINNACLES OF COMEDY, Morecombe and Wise, relied on clever writing and fantastic improv in order to create hilarity. I think the time has come for comedians to earn their comedic stripes again- How easy is it to point at a bald man and make a bald joke, an overweight woman and make a fat joke? we hear those kind of easy and dispensable chuckles at the pub quiz or in the highstreet from ignorant yobbos who know no better- you earn money to make people laugh, so do it credibly!! I want to hear original wit, not expendable. Make me laugh because it's funny, not because it's so shocking i don't know what else to do with myself! The more people try to shock us the higher the boundaries of shock will rise- and I really REALLY don't want to see comedic value sink any lower than it already has.
So come on, funny blokes. Get your act together, and stop choosing the low road.
xXx
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