emirates7 - With the power of his razor-sharp humor, pioneering political satirist Basem Youssef left audiences reeling with the effect of his impactful words during his solo stand-up session at BRIDGE Summit 2025, aptly titled ‘A Decade of Satire. Did It Work? '
“I have to be honest with you. When I got the invitation to speak at BRIDGE Summit 2025, I thought it was spam. Look at the programme of the Summit, I mean there are economists, policy makers, tech innovators, thought leaders, too many CEO’s and many of them are quite rich. I feel like I'm a fish out of water. All my life I was a fish out of order and let me tell you, I was a very confused fish.”
Youssef, referred to as “Jon Stewart of the Arab World’ began by wielding the one tool he knows to use best. “When the revolution in Egypt broke out, I did the one thing that made sense to me. I left medicine and I became a comedian. And because of that decision, many more patients are alive today. You can be a hero by just doing nothing.”
The former host of AlBernameg, Middle East’s first and most influential political satire programme became the region’s first digital-to-broadcast success story, reaching 30 million weekly viewers. Transforming how political commentary was delivered across the Arab world, the five-minute YouTube established Youssef as a bold, fearless commentator.
“I am in this very peculiar position where I'm a comedian, but my name is associated with wars, revolutions, and human tragedy. And I have to admit, it's a messed-up position for a comedian to be in,” Youssef admitted. “I went viral for my political views, not my jokes. For some reason, people take my jokes more seriously than they should.”
The acclaimed storyteller turned the question ‘Did Satire Work’ to how it has worked, referring to the use of irony as a shared language of resistance. “Here at BRIDGE Summit, I was asked to give a talk titled ‘A Decade of Satire. Did it work?’ And the short answer is of course not. But let me give you the longer answer.”
Playing on the word ‘power’ the rhetorician asked how one defines something that has ‘worked.’ “Did anything work? Governments, media, politicians, the military, industry, tech, everybody contributed for making this world a much more terrible place. And this is where people turn to comedians, not because we know better, but because comedians are the only ones doing their job, which is simply making fun of a broken world. And that led to people taking comedy more seriously while serious people became the joke. But does that mean satire worked? Satire didn't fix things because it wasn't funny enough, or because we didn't try hard enough, or because the jokes weren't sharp enough. Satire failed because we expected it to do something it was never designed to do. “
Calling satire “an exaggerated reflection of reality” the orator deep dived into an existential explanation of how the job of a satirist is to critique and entertain. “That's it. It’s critique wrapped in entertainment, which sounds sophisticated until you realize it's basically like trying to serve desserts while the kitchen's on fire. Many people hate satirists for the critique part. They get angry at the jokes, the irreverence, the audacity of making fun of serious things. They hate us for being disrespectful, inappropriate, or too political. But they forget we are entertainers first. That's the job. The critique is just what happens when you let the class clown read the news”.
Expounding further on this, the trained cardiothoracic surgeon added, “As long as we are laughing we are still fighting, not in the way soldiers fight, not in the way activists fight, but fighting to stay human to stay awake, to stay connected to each other. And in a world that is trying very hard to take that away from us that might be the most important fight there is. So ya, let’s keep laughing, joking, messing around. Not because it will change everything but because it will change us.”
“I have to be honest with you. When I got the invitation to speak at BRIDGE Summit 2025, I thought it was spam. Look at the programme of the Summit, I mean there are economists, policy makers, tech innovators, thought leaders, too many CEO’s and many of them are quite rich. I feel like I'm a fish out of water. All my life I was a fish out of order and let me tell you, I was a very confused fish.”
Youssef, referred to as “Jon Stewart of the Arab World’ began by wielding the one tool he knows to use best. “When the revolution in Egypt broke out, I did the one thing that made sense to me. I left medicine and I became a comedian. And because of that decision, many more patients are alive today. You can be a hero by just doing nothing.”
The former host of AlBernameg, Middle East’s first and most influential political satire programme became the region’s first digital-to-broadcast success story, reaching 30 million weekly viewers. Transforming how political commentary was delivered across the Arab world, the five-minute YouTube established Youssef as a bold, fearless commentator.
“I am in this very peculiar position where I'm a comedian, but my name is associated with wars, revolutions, and human tragedy. And I have to admit, it's a messed-up position for a comedian to be in,” Youssef admitted. “I went viral for my political views, not my jokes. For some reason, people take my jokes more seriously than they should.”
The acclaimed storyteller turned the question ‘Did Satire Work’ to how it has worked, referring to the use of irony as a shared language of resistance. “Here at BRIDGE Summit, I was asked to give a talk titled ‘A Decade of Satire. Did it work?’ And the short answer is of course not. But let me give you the longer answer.”
Playing on the word ‘power’ the rhetorician asked how one defines something that has ‘worked.’ “Did anything work? Governments, media, politicians, the military, industry, tech, everybody contributed for making this world a much more terrible place. And this is where people turn to comedians, not because we know better, but because comedians are the only ones doing their job, which is simply making fun of a broken world. And that led to people taking comedy more seriously while serious people became the joke. But does that mean satire worked? Satire didn't fix things because it wasn't funny enough, or because we didn't try hard enough, or because the jokes weren't sharp enough. Satire failed because we expected it to do something it was never designed to do. “
Calling satire “an exaggerated reflection of reality” the orator deep dived into an existential explanation of how the job of a satirist is to critique and entertain. “That's it. It’s critique wrapped in entertainment, which sounds sophisticated until you realize it's basically like trying to serve desserts while the kitchen's on fire. Many people hate satirists for the critique part. They get angry at the jokes, the irreverence, the audacity of making fun of serious things. They hate us for being disrespectful, inappropriate, or too political. But they forget we are entertainers first. That's the job. The critique is just what happens when you let the class clown read the news”.
Expounding further on this, the trained cardiothoracic surgeon added, “As long as we are laughing we are still fighting, not in the way soldiers fight, not in the way activists fight, but fighting to stay human to stay awake, to stay connected to each other. And in a world that is trying very hard to take that away from us that might be the most important fight there is. So ya, let’s keep laughing, joking, messing around. Not because it will change everything but because it will change us.”