In which the pond subjects Paul Monk to some mockery and caricature ...

Four Lions is a 2010 British black comedy, which makes a joke of radicalised Pom Muslim men aspiring to be suicide bombers ...

It's edgy enough, some liked it, some didn't, and according to Box Office Mojo, it did a grand $304,616 in business down under ...

Possibly Paul Monk was amongst the many who didn't bother to head along to a nearby theatre during its short run ...

Of course it's easy enough to find films where the villains are middle eastern and in terminal fanatical shape, from the Palestinian terrorists in the 1977 Black Sunday, the Crimson Jihad in the 1994 True Lies, through many others to the sort of routine nonsense on view in the 2016 London Has Fallen, via Olympus Has Fallen, with the wicked Aamir Barkawi taking over from the North Koreans ...

As usual, there's a wiki listicle of films featuring terrorism to help out the Greg Hunts of the world (watch out for crazed walri wanting to take down the White House).

Of course in most of these films, the villains are subject to mockery, caricature, stereotypes and are blessed with the usual verbosity of delusional fanatics who just want to shout "look, ma, top of the world" endlessly before the delay in doing their villainy results in them getting blown up or taken out ...

Hollywood has always needed villains, and while Islamics are only one rich strand, still the action films of the world have made a speciality of demonising the fundies.

Now the pond has always thought there was a great comedy action picture to be made down under and thought of pitching it as Tropic Thunder...

Unfortunately, the title has been taken, and the HUNsters showed a lamentable lack of satirical skill with their splash...

The Cape Crusaders?

Crusaders? Does anyone remember the actual Crusaders?

Oh come on, surely the Cape Jihadist Wombats would be a better starting point. Maybe we should kick it around a little more, The Five Jihadist Jumbucks, or Jihadists Travelling North with Rumpole?

None of this is original. Stand-up comics and Jihad! The Musical and such like have contributed to a wiki on Jihad Satire ...

The reason that the pond never worries too much about the Islamics is because they only make up a couple of per cent of the population, and after a few jokes about men scoring virgins in heaven, the well runs dry.

But it pays to be aware of the sort of comedy that does the rounds, Hussain Rahman being a local example ...a man who offers jihadists grooming tips for their facial hair can't be all bad ...

Hussain can spear his own Muslim identity and the brutal stereotypes that form around it all in one breath. Take this bit from the 2015 Sydney Comedy festival: “Just because I’m Muslim doesn’t mean I support Isis, you idiot ... some of us like al-Qaida”. (from a Graudian profile here).

All of which makes the pond wonder which planet Paul Monk is on, and whether it's the same one as the pond's ...

Well for a start, you don't seek permission to josh Muslims. This can be tricky, given the way certain barking mad Islamic fundamentalists can be prickly and inclined to massacre cartoonists - fuck 'em - but dragging 18C into this brew, citing the Islamics as the trickiest part of the exercise, entirely misses the point.

What about the Jews and their running of international banks and the entire monetary system and their determination to bring down the Donald so Hillary can rule for them?

Yes, you have to step lightly when making jokes about the Jews, and let's not get on to the spoons and the forks buried in the back yard.

Worse, it seems clear enough that Monk hasn't actually seen The Book of Mormon, which in its own way, is very affectionate towards the crazy, wacky objects of its very mild satire.

The pond emerged (yes, yes, we saw it on Broadway, don'tchaknow) quite fond of anyone barking mad enough to believe the nonsense of the gold tablets and all that jazz, and wiser elders realise it's a great marketing job ...

So generally it’s a good thing for Mormons? 
Yes. People will become more aware that we’re a Christian church, that we’re not a cult and that we don’t force our views on anyone, but that we’re happy to share them with those who are interested. (VICE here).

More to the point, the pond was wondering why Monk hadn't mentioned Four Lions and suggested that a few more films along this line might be a good thing.

Heck he might fund the pond's We are the five jihadist 'roos travelling north ...

Never mind, Monk likes to describe himself as a "public intellectual" who has been praised by Bob Carr, and the pond can't match that sort of satirical comedy styling ... and as usual, because this is the lizard Oz, the rest of his piece is just a standard bit of Muslim bashing ... full of the usual 'clash of civilisations' fear and loathing ...

You'd think that a public intellectual would understand that dignity and good humour don't go together.

Pratfalls and indignities are the grist to the comedy mill. It can take many forms and be violent. Charlie was an expert jihadist against the big boys:

Or this from the aforementioned Hussain:

Recently a Twitter user accused him of being a terrorist and following “the religion of Pisslam”. Hussain says such interactions rapidly devolve into flame wars, in which the winner is “the person who gets blocked first”. He decided to try something new, replying: “I love you, bro.” “No you don’t,” the guy wrote back. Hussain insisted he did and found a photo of the guy and his wife and photoshopped his own face on to the wife’s. He was blocked straight away. 

He used this tactic again with another internet hater – photoshopping his face on to that of the man’s wife – however this time found he was not immediately blocked. “I said, shit! That’s my A game. I’ve got nowhere to go.” 

The man, who appeared to belong to the far-right movement United Patriots Front, accused Hussain of trying to convert him to Islam and being an “extremist Muslim masquerading as a moderate Muslim”. Hussain denied this and wrote: “You’re an extremist Australian masquerading as my future husband.” He reposted the photoshopped photo of the troll and Hussain in matrimonial bliss.

Yes, that's how to deal with prejudice and intimidation.

And now since we're talking of black humour, it's time for the pond to catch up with the students ... the pond can testify for a fact that the latest edition has gone off like a rocket and is hard to find on campus ...

Oh isn't that Devine appearance just too cute ...

They've been on fire of late ... and the pond loves to check their twitter feed, if only because their twittering irritates the reptiles so ...

And you can use twitter for fact-checking too ...