"The sense of humour" is a very powerful weapon, in a positive, but also in a negative sense. It is quite a typical way for the conformists to disqualify any attempt at change as ridiculous. A detached, ironical observer's role is so comfortable and so conservative.
Therefore, I think the destruction of a person's image through making him seem ridiculous, rather than dangerous and BAD, is very efficient, nowadays. Many do not mind being feared, they are scared of being mocked (and I can think of some cases when I love and admire the mocking approach, especially when it means taking a risk, but not this BBC document, totally conformist with the prevailing neo-liberal, classist, anti-French nationalist trend).
There is a great film which unmasks this negative, socially-paralyzing role of humour and wit, and it's not a coincidence that it is French and takes plays a couple of years before the Revolution: the film's name is Ridicule.