Comedian James Acaster is one of the guests on this week's Sunday Brunch, hosted by Tim Lovejoy.

It's been a high profile week for Acaster, but not for the reasons expected. He should have been promoting his new Dave comedy Hypothetical, which he co-hosts with Josh Widdicombe and his return to live comedy with a new show about hecklers and heckling and his upcoming new book about giving up social media, but instead has been drawn into the debate over the new Ricky Gervais netflix special, Supernature.

An old clip of Acaster criticisng 'edgy comedians' for punching down went viral again. He does not name Gervais in the clip but may viewers have thought that's who he is referring too.

In the clip, from Acaster’s 2019 acclaimed special Cold Lasagne Hate Myself 1999 Acaster says: “They say whatever they like, edgy comedians. No one tells them what they can and can’t say. They walk straight onstage, top of their specials sometimes, and do 10 solid minutes just slagging off transgender people.” 

“People on the internet get upset about it … the comedian’s always like, ‘Bad luck, that’s my job, I’m a stand-up comedian, I’m there to challenge people. If you don’t like being challenged, don’t watch my show. What’s the matter guys, too challenging for you?’”

“Yeah, cause you know who’s been long overdue a challenge? The trans community. They’ve had their guard down for too long, if you ask me. They’ll all be checking their privilege on the way home, thanks to you, you brave little cis boy.”

In an interview in the Metro, Acaster said: “It was important to me to do it because — first of all, it started, like a lot of comedy routines do, if you see something that’s ridiculous or silly, then you want to make a joke about it and I think the attitude of comedians saying that they’re challenging people with their comedy and then punching down is just completely nonsensical because that’s not how challenging people works.” 

Watch the clip here.

Sunday Brunch, 9.30am, Sunday, May 29, C4.