All Talk 55 - 2009 Predictions - Death By Practical Joke Part of The Law Commission Review

HUTCHBACK

Maybe there isn’t that much of a distance between a really bad practical joke and murder. There isn’t you know, a really bad practical joke often could end in death. So, at what point do you stop being a practical joker and become a murderer?

DR. NOSTRUM

What, like the second world war?

HUTCHBACK

No, but, you know, like accidentally pushing someone off the edge of a cliff, sort of thing, as a practical joke. I mean, that’s an extreme version of pushing someone off something.

DR. NOSTRUM

So is it called a practical joke because you’ve done something?

HUTCHBACK

Yes.

DR. NOSTRUM

You’ve actually practically done something?

HUTCHBACK

No, no, no, no, no.

DR. NOSTRUM

You’ve pushed someone over.

HUTCHBACK

Yeah. It’s physical humour.

DR. NOSTRUM

Physical humour, so as opposed to a, um...

HUTCHBACK

As opposed to a verbal joke, that’s why it’s called a practical joke.

DR. NOSTRUM

No, no, I wasn’t thinking verbal joke, no, cos then the difference would be a physical joke and a verbal joke. No, I was thinking, as opposed to a, um, metaphorical joke.

HUTCHBACK

(more mocking) A metaphorical physical joke, where you do an action that is a metaphor for something funny. No, I don’t think so.

DR. NOSTRUM

I don’t think there is a metaphorical joke is there? Oh, no! A literal joke, that’s what I meant, the difference between literal and metaphorical as opposed to between practical.. so there’s a practical..

HUTCHBACK

There’s a practical and an impractical joke.

DR. NOSTRUM

Impractical joke, that’s it.

HUTCHBACK

Yeah, an impractical joke, one that’s just slightly too burdensome to undertake.

DR. NOSTRUM

Hmm. Why are they called practical jokes?

HUTCHBACK

Cause they’re physical!

DR. NOSTRUM

So why aren’t they called physical jokes?

HUTCHBACK

I don’t know! I’m not a linguist.

DR. NOSTRUM

Practical Jokes. They always seemed a bit of a leap. I never, I mean, as far as I know, I never played one.

HUTCHBACK

You’ve never played a practical joke?

DR. NOSTRUM

No, I don’t think so.

HUTCHBACK

You’ve never put a bucket of water.. a bucket full of nails...

DR. NOSTRUM

...over...

HUTCHBACK

See, that’s it: bucket full of water; practical joke, bucket full of razor blades; murder.

DR. NOSTRUM

Hmm.

HUTCHBACK

So, it would be quite good to find out at what point it becomes murder, in the eyes of the law. See.

DR. NOSTRUM

Ah, as opposed to manslaughter?

HUTCHBACK

Yes.

DR. NOSTRUM

No, but they’re doing that now, they’re putting a category between murder and manslaughter – practical...

HUTCHBACK

Practical joke. Practical Joke Murder.

DR. NOSTRUM

...because murder was too far away from manslaughter.

HUTCHBACK

Right. But that’s not bad, working out the exact point at which a practical joke..

DR. NOSTRUM

No, but they’re doing that, they’re doing that.

HUTCHBACK

What do you mean they’re doing that?!

DR. NOSTRUM

It’s part of the Law Commission Review at the moment..

HUTCHBACK

For Practical Jokes?

DR. NOSTRUM

No! Not practical jokes, but the idea that there’s a big gap between murder and manslaughter.

HUTCHBACK

Oh, yeah, that, but it’s nothing to do with practical jokes.

DR. NOSTRUM

But that must come into it.

HUTCHBACK

That probably does come into it.

DR. NOSTRUM

If your defense is that it was a practical joke that went wrong..

HUTCHBACK

No, no, no, cause manslaughter, you can be done for manslaughter for stabbing someone, that’s clearly not a joke.

DR. NOSTRUM

Well, but you didn’t mean to kill them. Manslaughter is anything where you didn’t mean to kill them, right?

HUTCHBACK

Yes...

DR. NOSTRUM

I don’t know, we need our advisor.

HUTCHBACK

...but what I’m saying is that if you can be done for manslaughter for
stabbing someone there is no practical joke you can ever think of that would end up with a murder conviction because the intention of stabbing someone is much greater than the intention of leaving a sword poking up out of a staircase...

DR. NOSTRUM

I don’t think...

HUTCHBACK

There’s no way anybody would get done for murder for that.

DR. NOSTRUM

...not that our legal advisor...

HUTCHBACK

They wouldn’t get done for anything.

DR. NOSTRUM

...not that our legal advisor is here, but I have a feeling that stabbing someone and not meaning to kill them isn’t manslaughter..

HUTCHBACK

It is manslaughter.

DR. NOSTRUM

No, no, it’s attempted murder.

HUTCHBACK

No, it’s manslaughter. Because if they die, the often get done for manslaughter.

DR. NOSTRUM

Really?

HUTCHBACK

Yeah.

DR. NOSTRUM

Oh.

HUTCHBACK
Like that guy..

DR. NOSTRUM

So there’s no point in trying to figure out where practical jokes become murder cause they never will.

HUTCHBACK

That’s true. (thinks) No, no, pushing someone off a cliff is murder.

DR. NOSTRUM

But what’s the difference between that and stabbing them?

HUTCHBACK

No, because...

DR. NOSTRUM

(gets it) Oh! Because you know it’s going to kill them

HUTCHBACK

...because you know that if you push someone off a cliff it’ll kill
them.

DR. NOSTRUM

But only at some deep level, so, maybe there is a point, there is somewhere between the cliff and the bucket of nails?

HUTCHBACK

It’s how high.

DR. NOSTRUM

How high the cliff is.

HUTCHBACK

You can actually measure it on how high the cliff is; at what point you know the drop will be enough to probably kill them. See, that’s it. That’s exactly how you work out the difference between a practical joke and..

DR. NOSTRUM

That would be some court case.

HUTCHBACK

It’s the height of a cliff.

DR. NOSTRUM

Ok.

HUTCHBACK

It’ll be the height of the cliff. I’m pleased with that.

DR. NOSTRUM

That’s one. What else is there?

HUTCHBACK

One what?

DR. NOSTRUM

That’s one..

HUTCHBACK

..Prediction for 2009!

DR. NOSTRUM

Practical Jokes will appear as a new category of Homicide under the Law commission review.

HUTCHBACK

Yeah

DR. NOSTRUM

There you go.

HUTCHBACK

And murders will be rated in cliff height.

DR. NOSTRUM

No, no, it’s not that. It’s the height of the cliff defense.

HUTCHBACK

Ok, so also, the other one will be the, er, the weight of the big black weight thing that you balance on the door. Up to 5 kilos and over 5 kilos it’s murder.

DR. NOSTRUM

So then it becomes ‘The Practical Joke Defense’?

HUTCHBACK

Yeah.

DR. NOSTRUM

“My client didn’t know...

HUTCHBACK

...that the weight would kill him.” Yeah. It was just done as a joke...

DR. NOSTRUM

“...he’d seen on television a one ton weight falling..

HUTCHBACK

That’s it, “He’d been watching a Tom and Jerry cartoon earlier in the week...”

DR. NOSTRUM

Yeah, “...where Tom survived several..

HUTCHBACK

“...and seen Tom survived several one ton weights being dropped on him.”

DR. NOSTRUM

“And didn’t realise the one ton weight was hollow.”

HUTCHBACK

Huh?

DR. NOSTRUM

Didn’t realise the one ton weight was hollow.

HUTCHBACK

Yeah, “didn’t realise it was a drawing.”

DR. NOSTRUM

Well, yeah, but even the real life ones.

HUTCHBACK

They did a real life Tom and Jerry?

DR. NOSTRUM

No! You know those sketch shows where they drop a huge one ton.. you know, the old Monty Python’s.

HUTCHBACK

Oh, Yeah. “He was watching Monty Python and didn’t realise the giant foot...

DR. NOSTRUM

No, not the cartoon, the real one!

HUTCHBACK

Yeah alright. No, they must’ve had one where they had a real giant foot falling on them, didn’t they?

DR. NOSTRUM

No, I don’t think so, feet were too difficult.

HUTCHBACK

The feet were too difficult back then, back in those days.

DR. NOSTRUM

Yeah. Well, there’s one prediction.

HUTCHBACK

One prediction for 2009.