Patrick Condell (born 23 November 1949) is a British writer, polemicist, and former

stand-up comedian Stand-up comedy is a comedic performance to a live audience in which the performer addresses the audience directly from the stage. The performer is known as a comedian, a comic or a stand-up. Stand-up comedy consists of one-liners, stories, ...

. In his early career, he wrote and performed in

alternative comedy Alternative comedy is a term coined in the 1980s for a style of comedy that makes a conscious break with the mainstream comedic style of an era. The phrase has had different connotations in different contexts: in the UK, it was used to describe ...

shows during the 1980s and 1990s in London, winning the

Time Out Comedy Award The Time Out Comedy Awards were bestowed upon the comedy community by the London listings magazine ''Time Out''. They ran from 1991 to 2006, and include many well-known comedians as past winners: Eddie Izzard, Noel Fielding and Jimmy Carr. It is n ...

in 1991. He was also a regular panelist on

BBC Radio 1 BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It specialises in modern popular music and current chart hits throughout the day. The station provides alternative genres at night, including electronica, dance, ...

's ''Loose Talk'' programme. In early 2007 he began uploading to the

internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...

short filmed

monologue In theatre, a monologue (from el, μονόλογος, from μόνος ''mónos'', "alone, solitary" and λόγος ''lógos'', "speech") is a speech presented by a single character, most often to express their thoughts aloud, though sometimes a ...

polemic Polemic () is contentious rhetoric intended to support a specific position by forthright claims and to undermine the opposing position. The practice of such argumentation is called ''polemics'', which are seen in arguments on controversial topics ...

s primarily about religious authority,

authoritarianism Authoritarianism is a political system characterized by the rejection of political plurality, the use of strong central power to preserve the political ''status quo'', and reductions in the rule of law, separation of powers, and democratic vo ...

in government and

left-wing politics Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in ...

, and the societal effects of Muslim immigration into Europe, which have featured on the front pages of websites such as

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second most ...

and LiveLeak. They have also been published on DVD, and also as a book of video transcripts. As of June 2017, Condell's YouTube channel has over a third of a million subscribers, with over 70 million views.

Early life

Condell was born in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

on 23 November 1949. He was raised in England as a Catholic. His father was a compulsive gambler working in a betting shop until he was sent to prison for stealing money; he subsequently died of

leukaemia Leukemia ( also spelled leukaemia and pronounced ) is a group of blood cancers that usually begin in the bone marrow and result in high numbers of abnormal blood cells. These blood cells are not fully developed and are called ''blasts'' or ...

. The Condell family in consequence was impoverished, moving repeatedly from home to home. Condell was educated in several different

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britai ...

schools in

South London South London is the southern part of London, England, south of the River Thames. The region consists of the boroughs, in whole or in part, of Bexley, Bromley, Croydon, Greenwich, Kingston, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Richmond, Southwark, ...

, saying of this time, "I found myself segregated in assembly and shunted into another room while everyone said their morning prayers. The whole pantomime seemed hollow to me even then. Once you become aware of the gulf between what people profess to believe and how they actually behave, it's hard to take any of it seriously." Condell left school at 16. His first job was as a dish-washer in the revolving restaurant on top of the Post Office Tower, now known as the BT Tower in London, for five shillings an hour. He became a

vegetarian Vegetarianism is the practice of abstaining from the consumption of meat ( red meat, poultry, seafood, insects, and the flesh of any other animal). It may also include abstaining from eating all by-products of animal slaughter. Vegetaria ...

in 1976 after watching a deer being butchered. Condell did a number of jobs including working in a furniture warehouse, as a welder at the

Ford Transit The Ford Transit is a family of light commercial vehicles manufactured by the Ford Motor Company since 1965, primarily as a cargo van, but also available in other configurations including a large passenger van (marketed as the Ford Tourneo i ...

plant in

Southampton Southampton () is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city in the ceremonial county of Hampshire in southern England. It is located approximately south-west of London and west of Portsmouth. The city forms part of the South Hampshire, S ...

, as an office clerk for a shipping company, volunteering on a

kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

and then doing six years of logging in Canada.

Comedy

After moving back to the United Kingdom from Canada, Condell performed

shows during the 1980s and 1990s. His first performance on stage was at the age of 32 in a comedy sketch called ''Mountbatten's Plimsoll''. He also wrote poetry and appeared in the ''Poetry Olympics'' at the Young Vic Theatre in 1982, which led to a job writing weekly poems for the ''

Time Out Time-out, Time Out, or timeout may refer to: Time * Time-out (sport), in various sports, a break in play, called by a team * Television timeout, a break in sporting action so that a commercial break may be taken * Timeout (computing), an enginee ...

'' magazine. Condell was described at the time as "a manic gimlet-eyed, crop-haired poet" in ''Drama: The Quarterly Theatre Review book''. He then performed on the London alternative comedy circuit for several years (originally under the name Eddie Zibin). He also performed at the Tunnel Club, next to the

Blackwall Tunnel The Blackwall Tunnel is a pair of road tunnels underneath the River Thames in east London, England, linking the London Borough of Tower Hamlets with the Royal Borough of Greenwich, and part of the A102 road. The northern portal lies just south ...

, where he describes the audience as a "nightmare;" bottles and glasses were thrown at him, and one person attempted to cut the

microphone A microphone, colloquially called a mic or mike (), is a transducer that converts sound into an electrical signal. Microphones are used in many applications such as telephones, hearing aids, public address systems for concert halls and pub ...

lead with a pair of garden shears. Condell was a performer at The Comedy Store in the Cutting Edge team, with whom he performed at the

Edinburgh Fringe The Edinburgh Festival Fringe (also referred to as The Fringe, Edinburgh Fringe, or Edinburgh Fringe Festival) is the world's largest arts and media festival, which in 2019 spanned 25 days and featured more than 59,600 performances of 3,841 dif ...

in 1991. That year Condell was the winner of a ''

''. From 1991 to 1994 Condell was a regular panellist on BBC Radio 1's ''Loose Talk''. During the mid-1990s, he was performing over 200 times a year. Due to the late nights and regular travelling he decided to start writing for other comedians, while still doing the occasional performance. In 1991 he performed comedy sketches with other comedians at the

Duke of York's Theatre The Duke of York's Theatre is a West End theatre in St Martin's Lane, in the City of Westminster, London. It was built for Frank Wyatt and his wife, Violet Melnotte, who retained ownership of the theatre until her death in 1935. Designed by t ...

in a show put on to raise funds for

Amnesty Amnesty (from the Ancient Greek ἀμνηστία, ''amnestia'', "forgetfulness, passing over") is defined as "A pardon extended by the government to a group or class of people, usually for a political offense; the act of a sovereign power offic ...

. Condell's 1996 play ''Barry Sorts It Out'' was given a negative review in the ''

Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and published digitally that focuses on business and economic current affairs. Based in London, England, the paper is owned by a Japanese holding company, Nikke ...

'', which described it as "a sordid East End comedy" which "repeats ''ad nauseam'' the same gag." The reviewer concluded that it is "a play with all the bite of a set of joke-shop fangs." His 2006 stand-up show ''Faith Hope and Sanity'', subtitled "A Few Jokes About Religion Before It Kills Us All," was a platform for his comedy and atheist beliefs. "This is the first time I've set out to write a show in order to say something, rather than just as a vehicle for stand-up" he said of the show. He performed the show at London's Etcetera Theatre. ''Chortle'' gave Condell's 2006 show a negative review, noting that Condell is covering familiar territory but "is not quite up to the job," and observing that Condell's material was delivered "with very little variation in pace or tone, ... with the feel of a lecture" and "no structure, no building up to a passionate, climactic conclusion, no ebb and flow of storytelling." ''Chortle'' concluded that "Condell is still going through the motions."

Online videos and politics

Condell had posted more than 100 video monologues on various video sites as of August 2011, which together had notched up over 35 million hits, Eight of his videos are in the top hundred most commented on videos in the UK. Most of his YouTube videos chastise Islam and Western appeasement of Islam. His videos have caused Condell to receive hundreds of death threats but also a significant amount of support. Condell has spoken favourably of Dutch politician Geert Wilders and has described the

Qur'an The Quran (, ; Standard Arabic: , Quranic Arabic: , , 'the recitation'), also romanized Qur'an or Koran, is the central religious text of Islam, believed by Muslims to be a revelation from God. It is organized in 114 chapters (pl.: , si ...

as hate speech. Condell has been described as part of the

counter-jihad Counter-jihad, also spelled counterjihad and known as the counter-jihad movement, is a self-titled political current loosely consisting of authors, bloggers, think tanks, street movements and campaign organisations all linked by apocalyptic bel ...

movement. Condell's first video, uploaded to YouTube on 8 February 2007 was his participation in The Blasphemy Challenge, an Internet-based project which aims to get

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

s to declare themselves. The challenge asks atheists to submit videos to the website YouTube, in which they record themselves blaspheming or denying the existence of the

Holy Spirit In Judaism, the Holy Spirit is the divine force, quality, and influence of God over the Universe or over his creatures. In Nicene Christianity, the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost is the third person of the Trinity. In Islam, the Holy Spirit acts ...

Atheism

Richard Dawkins, author of ''

The God Delusion ''The God Delusion'' is a 2006 book by British evolutionary biologist, ethologist Richard Dawkins, a professorial fellow at New College, Oxford and, at the time of publication, the Charles Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science ...

'', said of Condell that "Pat Condell is unique. Nobody can match his extraordinary blend of suavity and savagery. With his articulate intelligence he runs rings around the religious wingnuts that are the targets of his merciless humour. Thank goodness he is on our side". In 2008, Dawkins's website released a collection of Condell's monologues on DVD, titled ''Pat Condell: Anthology''. In 2007, he was criticised by Christian author

Dinesh D'Souza Dinesh Joseph D'Souza (; born April 25, 1961) is an Indian-American right-wing political commentator, author, filmmaker, and conspiracy theorist. He has written over a dozen books, several of them ''New York Times'' best-sellers. In 2012, D' ...

on '' AOL News'', who said "If the televangelists are guilty of producing some simple-minded, self-righteous Christians, then the atheist authors are guilty of producing self-congratulatory buffoons like Condell." The book ''Raising Freethinkers: A Practical Guide for Parenting Beyond Belief'', describes Condell as "breathtakingly intelligent, articulate, uncompromising, and funny". ''

The New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. ...

'' described Condell as a "smug atheist". Condell is a member of the

National Secular Society The National Secular Society (NSS) is a British campaigning organisation that promotes secularism and the separation of church and state. It holds that no one should gain advantage or disadvantage because of their religion or lack of it. It was ...

''No Mosque at Ground Zero''

Condell opposed the development of Park51, near the site of 11 September 2001

World Trade Center attack In its most general sense, the term "world" refers to the totality of entities, to the whole of reality or to everything that is. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the wor ...

, in lower Manhattan. On 4 June 2010, he released a video titled "No Mosque at Ground Zero", in which he said that it was representative of Islamic triumphalism and that the United States would soon be on the verge of Islamization and have its freedoms trimmed, as he said Europe has. Additionally, Condell cast doubt over the funding of the community centre, and claimed that Islam would have been banned in the civilised world if it wasn't a religion. He compared the system of Sharia and the Muslims who endorse it to

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

''The Trouble with Islam'' reaction

Condell also received criticism after links to his monologue titled ''The Trouble with Islam'' were circulated to commissioners in the California city of Berkeley's Peace and Justice Commission. Condell said in the video that Islam is "a religion of war", that "Muslim women in Britain who cover their faces are mentally ill", though in some parts of the world women have no choice but to cover their face, as they are "governed...by primitive pigs whose only achievement in life is to be born with a penis in one hand and a

in the other". Commissioner Elliot Cohen described Condell's comments as "insulting, degenerating and racist". Condell then accused Cohen of being "motivated by his own narrow personal and political agenda which has nothing to do with ondellor the video clip". The video was initially sent to them by fellow Peace and Justice Commissioner Jonathan Wornick, who said it "tries to expose intolerance in the

Muslim world The terms Muslim world and Islamic world commonly refer to the Islamic community, which is also known as the Ummah. This consists of all those who adhere to the religious beliefs and laws of Islam or to societies in which Islam is practiced. In ...

", such as "the intolerance of radical Islamists who say if you insult Allah, you should have your head cut off". Condell said that its popularity proves "there is an enthusiastic audience for comedy ideas and opinions which are routinely censored out of existence in the UK’s mainstream media, thanks to misguided

political correctness ''Political correctness'' (adjectivally: ''politically correct''; commonly abbreviated ''PC'') is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in socie ...

YouTube video removals

Condell's video ''Welcome to Saudi Britain'' was removed by YouTube early in October 2008, but reinstated shortly after. In it Condell criticises Britain's sanctioning of a Sharia court, and refers to the entire country of

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries by area, fifth-largest country in Asia ...

as "mentally ill" for its abuse of women. A YouTube spokesman said "YouTube has clear policies that prohibit inappropriate content on the site, such as pornography, gratuitous violence or hate speech.... If users repeatedly break these rules we disable their accounts." The

was among the complainants to YouTube, saying "as usual, he (Condell) does not mince his words, but he is not saying anything that is untrue. His main thrust is one of outrage on behalf of those Muslim women who will suffer because they are forced to have their marital problems solved in a male-dominated Sharia court." Shortly after, YouTube reversed its earlier decision, saying, "Upon further review of the context of Pat Condell's comments, we've reinstated it."

Richard Dawkins Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An at ...

applauded the reversal, saying "I congratulate YouTube on an excellent decision. Pat Condell is hard-hitting, but always quietly reasonable in tone." Condell believed that it was removed due to a flagging campaign by Islamic activists. YouTube also briefly removed Condell's video ''Godless and Free'' but then restored it, emailing Condell and explaining that it had been removed erroneously.

Works

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Condell, Pat 1949 births 20th-century atheists 21st-century atheists Irish male comedians British atheism activists Free speech activists British Internet celebrities British podcasters English stand-up comedians English male comedians English political commentators English bloggers English expatriates in Canada English humanists English satirists English sceptics Former Roman Catholics Irish emigrants to the United Kingdom British social commentators Secular humanists Living people Anti-Islam sentiment in the United Kingdom English video bloggers British religious sceptics British YouTubers Articles containing video clips English male dramatists and playwrights British critics of Islam Counter-jihad activists Critics of multiculturalism Male critics of feminism Critics of creationism British male bloggers Commentary YouTubers 20th-century Irish comedians 21st-century Irish comedians