Jimmy Carr Faces Boycott After Petition Passes 15,000 Signatures Over Holocaust Joke

Jimmy Carr is facing a boycott after over 15,000 people sign a petition calling for his Netflix show to be removed following a 'truly disturbing' joke.

In His Dark Materials, which landed on the streaming service on Christmas Day, Carr talks about travellers that were killed during the Holocaust.

Standing before a live audience, the 49-year-old said: "Strap in everyone, you ready?" Then he went on: "When people talk about the Holocaust, they talk about the tragedy and horror of six million Jewish lives being lost to the Nazi war machine.

"But they never mention the thousands of gypsies that were killed by the Nazis.

"No one ever talks about that because no one wants to talk... about the positives."

Now a petition, which was set up on ActionStorm, has been titled 'Jimmy Carr: The Genocide of Roma is Not a Laughing Matter'.

It goes on to explain: "Hundreds of thousands of Gypsies, Roma, and Traveller people were killed in the Holocaust. Roma people call it 'Porajmos', meaning 'the devouring'. 

Netflix

"Historians estimate that as much as 25-50 percent of the entire Romani and Sinti population of Europe were victims of genocide at the hands of the Nazis, a crime of almost unimaginable proportions.

"To this day, affected communities in the UK and across Europe still struggle to navigate this immense collective trauma and come to terms with the scale of grief and loss."

The creators of the petition indicates how they appreciate that comedy is 'subjective' but add that 'when punchlines are indistinguishable from the genuinely-held views of fascists and Neo-Nazis, a line has very clearly been crossed'.

They say it is 'not educational', writing: "We acknowledge that Jimmy Carr highlighted the widespread ignorance that exists with regard to non-Jewish victims of the holocaust, but it was nevertheless incredibly crass for him to claim his ‘joke’ therefore had an 'educational quality'.

Netflix

"If this was the case he would have used his considerable platform to raise awareness of Roma Holocaust Memorial Day to his 6.7m followers. To our knowledge, that has never happened. That speaks volumes."

Concluding the petition, they added: "There is no legitimate basis for this 'joke', and no positive to its inclusion which outweighs the profoundly negative impact it produces."

LADbible has reached out to Jimmy Carr and Netflix for comment.