An Irish Muslim leader who Tommy Tiernan once asked about "blowing up" while on his chat show has defended the comedian following controversy over a joke he made.
Shaykh Dr Umar Al-Qadri, a prayer leader, Islamic scholar and sheikh based in Ireland, appeared as a guest on Tommy's chat show on season two, in January 2018.
Dr Al-Qadri has now come to the defence of the Navan comedian, who is embroiled in a controversy over a joke he made about taxi drivers at one of his comedy gigs in Vicar Street.
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Cabbie app Free Now has since pulled sponsorship of his show, despite the 53-year-old issuing an apology to RTÉ star Emer O' Neill, who first brought the issue to light after walking out of his Dublin performance.
Tommy made a joke about the African section of the zoo being full of taxi drivers and was brought to task over it by O'Neill. He later phoned her and publicly apologised. He also removed the joke from his set.
"I find it very unfair to #tommytiernan how he is being “cancelled”," Dr Al-Qadri said on Twitter.
He added: "He is an amazing human being and one with a pure soul which is reflected by his apology. He is a stand up comedian and artist."
Dr Al-Qadri said that as he is a comedian, he will "obviously" crack jokes. He highlighted that he personally expected this when he was interviewed by Tommy on his show five years ago.
"Tommy joked if I would blow up after reciting from the Quran. I laughed at it because I was at the #TommyTiernanShow and expected it.
"It's strange that some find it funny when a comedian jokes about other groups (nuns, priests) but do not find it funny when he jokes about them," Dr Al-Qadri stated online.
He stressed that the fact that Tommy Tiernan has apologised is testimony that he has "learnt from this experience."
"Everybody takes jokes differently due to their living experience.
"And those who wouldn’t tolerate jokes about their group should also not tolerate jokes about other groups," the Irish Muslim leader added.
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