Stand-up comedy has the ability to cast anything, from traffic jams to politics, in an entirely new light. It is like a new pair of glasses that helps us see the world in a novel way. The best of it challenges our suppositions and deconstructs our prejudices. The most impressive comedians use their powerful voices to change how we look at our society and ourselves.
But when it comes to religion, contemporary stand-ups are not giving us this new perspective. They endlessly ridicule tired stereotypes of religion, but fail to turn their critical attention to secularism, atheism or liberalism. And that is problematic. Because when comedians mock the faults of a standardised "other" they leave their own assumptions, ignorance and flaws untouched. They just reinforce our world view, rather than critically engaging with it. They are not giving us a fresh pair of glasses, but returning some old and dusty spectacles that we have had for years.
This lack of self-reflection must be the only way to explain their tedious repetition of generic, flat-pack criticisms. I might have doubled Richard Dawkins's profits by now if I had bought a copy of The God Delusion every time I had heard that Christian holidays were actually pagan hangovers, that the idea of a loving god is incompatible with the existence of evil and suffering, or that dinosaurs disprove intelligent design.
Just off the top of my head I can think of six routines – by Eddie Izzard, Dara O Briain, Frankie Boyle, Ricky Gervais, Robin Ince and Stewart Lee – in which I have been gleefully told how stupid creationists are. But they are not the only caricature. Catholics are obsessed with money and pomp and, of course, they are all paedophiles.
"I'm a lapsed Catholic … Don't get me wrong I still respect the pope. I like to think of him as king of the paedos." (Jimmy Carr)
Evangelicals are credulous, Mormons are polygamous and Anglicans are pushovers. Worst of all, Muslims are violent, oppressive and backward.
"Muslims, listen up my bearded and veily friends. Calm down, stop blowing stuff up." (Marcus Brigstocke)
But somehow even more depressing are the crudely generalised statements about "religious people" as a whole. Religious people are divisive. They are violent.
"All of them claim to be peaceful. Yeah, peaceful right up to the point where someone takes something they claim is theirs, or says the wrong thing or looks at them funny." (Marcus Brigstocke)
They are pathetic fools. They are stupid – if not deranged.
"Religion's just what we thought before we understood what mental illness was." (Frankie Boyle)
In sum, religious people are just wrong.
"Let me just say if there are any people of faith in here this evening, and there might be, let me just say, you're an idiot." (Ross Noble)
Laughing at religious people and doctrines for being mad, bad and dangerous gives us the comfort of thinking that, unlike them, we are sane, good and peaceful. Good stand-up makes us question ourselves: but the contemporary ridicule of religion fails to do that. Instead, it just narcissistically affirms that we were right all along. It is not edgy, original or insightful. One might even be tempted to call it preaching to the converted. And with that in mind, the last word goes to a stand-up who is still doing his job properly:
"And we all think we're very rational and very secular, but we make gods all the time." (Dylan Moran)