Sex Pistols' Johnny Rotten was public enemy No 1, now it's Ricky Gervais, but cancel culture's hate figures tend to mellow with age – Aidan Smith

Best headline of last week if not 2022 thus far? I know a lot of you will have loved the Partygate one, “Vomit, fighting, karaoke… ” which I’ve already quoted but have no problem doing so again. You see, it could easily apply to the subjects of my own particular favourite: “I’m tired of the Sex Pistols. I’d rather listen to Steely Dan.”

This is Steve Jones, the Pistols’ guitarist, whose version of events from when punk rock caused such an almighty stooshie has been turned into a TV show by Danny Boyle and airs on Disney from today.

It’s a great quote if you’re a Steely Dan fan like me because the Dan were the antithesis of the Pistols. They were serious musicians. Goatee-stroking musos whose records were finessed to the level of high art. Jones’s words could be interpreted as an admission that punk failed. So permit me to be fourth-form for a moment: ya boo sucks, my band won.

But really I’m much more interested in what John Lydon has to say. Even if you didn’t like punk he’s never dull. For the best part of half a century, he’s been a provocateur. How tiring must that have been? Right now, Ricky Gervais may also have an answer.

John Lydon, former nihilist, says now: 'I can find the good in everything'

There are obvious parallels between Lydon when he was Johnny Rotten and Gervais, the star of the SuperNature stand-up show, who’s going about comedy in a very punk manner.

Gervais is currently the most outrageous comedian in the world, just as back in 1977 Rotten was the most outrageous rock star.

On TV, Rotten and the rest of the Pistols were goaded by host Bill Grundy to be more and more foul-mouthed and to top their previous expletives. By himself, Gervais builds his act the same way. Did he just say that? ’Fraid he did. But surely he’s not going to… oh yes he is.

Similar to punk’s slap-dash, two-and-a-half-chord thrash, Gervais is a slovenly performer who laughs at his own jokes, some of which have not had the midnight oil burned on them, and at one point he admits: “This is so childish and misinformed…”

Both like to remind us of their pre-eminence and notoriety, with Gervais slagging off other comedians, and Lydon, who’s been in costly dispute with his ex-bandmates, trying and failing to stop their songs being used in the Boyle series, called Pistol, and asserting the other day: “The group did nothing before I joined and have done even less since I left.”

Gervais’ critics accuse him of being outrageous for outrageous’ sake, of blurting shocking things purely for effect. That’s what they used to say about the Pistols who in the Silver Jubilee year of ’77 chose the most provocative location imaginable for the signing of a record deal – Buckingham Palace.

That contract was ripped up after just one week with the label waving a white flag in the face of the Pistols’ staged and occasionally violent mayhem. The comedian would seem to have the same self-destructive tendencies when the question is being asked: does Gervais actually want to be cancelled?

“God save the Queen, a facist regime,” was viewed as Rotten at his rottenest, prompting angry lorry drivers to put a boot through the television set. The Pistols were never going to be allowed to top the Hit Parade with that, and it’s long been suspected the charts were rigged to enable Rod Stewart to claim number one.

Gervais, with his version of the Pistols’ most extreme lyric, is being accused of ridiculing trans people: “Use your best pronouns, be the gender you believe you are, but meet me halfway, ladies – lose the c***”. He could end up properly gagged as now there are reports that a new UK Government “hate crimes strategy” will enable the public to register official complaints about the likes of comedy material deemed offensive.

His joke has got a bit lost. Gervais is sending up the extreme activism and dogma which doesn’t do the cause of gender self-identification much good. Like all comedians, though, he’s much funnier when having to work within the confines of, say, the BBC. He can get away with more – and possibly, he feels, articulate his middle-age, middle-rage-ness better – on Netflix, the producers of SuperNature and also After Life, but neither of these is comedy gold like The Office.

Rotten never produced the equivalent of The Office. Punk was always going to spontaneously combust. Just the wrong age for it, I had nevertheless entered the world of work, requiring me to wear a suit, so enjoyed its rebellious spirit, at least for a while. The music may not have aged well but at least Lydon has.

On Mark Ellen and David Hepworth’s A Word in Your Ear podcast recently, the former nihilist announced “I can find the good in everything”, before reminiscing sweetly about his childhood and the loyalty and sense of community that existed in his corner of North London, even when having to share an outside loo with a rowdy pub.

Most movingly, he spoke of his wife, Nora Forster, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2018, requiring Lydon to completely re-jig his life around the care she needs. “You can’t daydream,” he said. “Because of the unpredictability, the tension, you need to be concentrating. But I don’t really need four hours’ sleep at night now and when I’m sleeping it’s with one eye open, just in case.

“It’s very hard but when you truly love someone you find a way. And you don’t question anything. You just say: ‘These are the gifts God has given us, let’s play the hand.’”

Another thing: Lydon today has total respect for the Queen. Just watch Gervais mellow. No one can stay public enemy No 1 for ever.