Politics & Power Quote by Adrian Edmondson

Edmondson’s line is a neat act of self-defense that doubles as a mission statement: don’t mistake our targets for our allegiance. Coming out of the British alternative comedy boom that helped make his work on The Young Ones and Bottom feel like a cultural jailbreak, the claim isn’t that politics were absent. It’s that politics arrived through the side door, smuggled in under pratfalls, grotesques, and speed-drunk performances.

The intent is protective and slightly provocative. By insisting on being “strictly funny,” Edmondson sidesteps the tedious expectation that comedians issue policy briefs or declare themselves partisan mascots. It’s also a rebuke to critics who treat comedy like a coded ballot. He’s saying: we were trying to get a laugh so hard it cracked the room; if you found an ideology in the rubble, that’s partly on you.

The subtext is even sharper: “political” can be a trap word, especially in a media culture that polices tone. Once a comic act is labeled political, it’s judged by purity tests rather than punchlines. Edmondson flips the hierarchy. Funny becomes the discipline, the rigor, the standard that can justify any subject matter - class, hypocrisy, authority - without filing it under activism.

Context matters because alternative comedy was already a reaction against the old order: cozy club racism, lazy stereotypes, establishment manners. Saying “only strictly funny” is a way to claim autonomy while acknowledging that comedy, when it’s truly alive, inevitably bullies power and punctures respectable lies. The joke is the argument; the laugh is the vote.