Graham Linehan should be reassured - here's the long list of comedy greats who have been cancelled, says Ben Monro-Davies

John Cleese ran into trouble post-Grail with Fawlty Towers. The Germans – where Basil insults some German guests about World War Two, has been questioned for going too far.

The use of racial slurs in the episode by the Major, a bigoted World War Two veteran who lives in the hotel, have been edited out in some transmissions.

Mel Brooks was perhaps even braver, or more insensitive, in milking World War Two for laughs. Twenty-three years after the end of the conflict he made “The Producers” – a film about the making of a Hitler musical on Broadway. The main song is Springtime for Hitler – and critics attacked it as tasteless and anti-semitic.

The film became a sleeper hit, and a stage version has sold out around the world.

Such controversies are far from confined to the twentieth century.

Little Britain with David Walliams and Matt Lucas was taken off some streaming services because the show featured “blackface”. The comedians have apologised and say they would not make the same show now.

In an echo of the Linehan row, Lucas also he would no longer make jokes about transvestites – although Linehan of course was cancelled for his personal views, not his routines, which do not mention the trans issue.

Another Walliams and Lucas vehicle Come Fly with Me ran into similar problems. This time it wasn’t just “blackface”, “brownface” and “yellowface” that saw the series pulled.

Ali G, played by Jewish actor Sacha Baron Cohen, has been accused of racism.

Comedian Richard Blackwood told The Guardian: “Too many people are left thinking that is how black people chat to one another, that they are ignorant and don't know about world issues." There are reports Baron Cohen is set to revive the character.

There is of course a difference between this long-standing offensive comedy tradition, and what has happened to Linehan.

He has been cancelled because of his beliefs, not his work.

Perhaps the closest historical parallel to this is the Hollywood Blacklist – where in the 1950s actors, writers and directors were denied work because of their alleged communist sympathies.

The episode is a regular subject of liberal outrage – many refused to applaud the director Elia Kazan’s honorary Oscar because he was accused of turning in some of his colleagues to politicians investigating Russian influence in Hollywood.

Linehan may allow himself a smile that his comedy Father Ted – which mercilessly mocked Catholicsm in Catholic Ireland – proved far less provocative than tweets on the issues of trans rights.