Michael Scott > David Brent

I agree with a lot of the high-minded things Mr. Gervais said in the piece. Shame he's completely full of crap.

He may trust his American readers not to be aware of the recent controversy in Britain over his casual and lazy abuse of the handicapped, and his refusal to reconsider when called on his behavior. But some of us are not unaware of this, and so while the distinction he makes between racist jokes and jokes that address racism would be entirely worthy coming from another source, coming from an unrecalcitrant offender who has recently engaged in exactly the sort of behavior he rightly criticizes it rings quite hollow indeed.

PS It is quite possible that the controversy in Britain was entirely deliberate, intended to attract attention to Gervais in advance of his new sitcom, his first without Stephen Merchant, which is all about how hilarious it is that Warwick Davis is short. Before his show's premiere was in the offing he wasn't on Twitter, and the first thing he did on Twitter was to attract attention by insulting people with Down's Syndrome.

too bad he isn't funny.

Gervais can be good at situational humor (even if it's not my bag), but he should never be allowed to get on stage and tell jokes. His stand-up is never, ever funny.

The people who thought he was high-larious at the Golden Globes just like seeing stars get their comeuppance. The jokes themselves were boring as shit.

Of course, Ricky Gervais is funny. Some of your favorite comedians find him to be funny. "I don't think Gervais is funny," is a perfectly reasonable thing to say. "Gervais isn't funny," is a ridiculous thing to say.

@5 you mean: "Some of your favorite comedians found him a rich and powerful ally"

The best you can say about him is he's bullying, faux-modest, wannabe comedian asshat.