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The Finger Awards 2021

We thought 2020 was challenging, but then 2021 was like – hold my beer. For quite a few people on the planet, comedy is not just a form of entertainment but a tool that helped us through the day, helped put stuff in perspective, help unite people, communities, and even nations. As the nominees for The Finger Awards showed, comedy can really make a difference.

The Winners:

The Most Effective Award went to global creative agency Analog Folk and its campaign Intensivão da PPK, the first pilot of its kind in Brazil. This ‘digital school of vaginal health’ offered a five-week programme to teach young people everything they need to know about vaginas in a fun and forthright way. Better education eradicates shame so the campaign sought to arm young people with all the knowledge they need to understand how their vaginas work, have honest conversations about their bodies and allowed much better access to treatment. With 28 interactive lessons on Tik Tok delivered by experts and influencers, specialist knowledge on vaginas, psychology and body positivity, the campaign has garnered 44 million views and achieved the de-censorship of the word ‘vagina’ on Tik Tok.

The Most Creative Award went to Istanbul based Titrifikir for its work Big Change with Fox News in Turkey. Big Change was designed to raise awareness of deaf issues in Turkey where there are 3 million deaf people. When sign language translators are used on screen they are usually placed in a small box in a corner. To raise awareness on this issue they made a ‘small’ change in Turkey’s most-watched morning news show during the International Week of the Deaf. The news anchor and the sign language translator positions on screen were swapped to show the disparity between deaf people’s provision and the hearing.

Honorary mentions were awarded to climate related projects due to the focus of the COP26 summit held in November 2021

Climate Night in the USA, a unique project created by award winning exec producer Steve Bodow. On September the 22nd seven network and cable late-night shows took part in Climate Night – a first-of-its-kind collaboration where each programme focussed its themes and content on climate change. Participating shows were The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Late Night With Seth Meyers on NBC, The Late Show With Stephen Colbert and The Late Late Show With James Corden on CBS, Full Frontal With Samantha Bee on TBS, Jimmy Kimmel Live on ABC and The Daily Show With Trevor Noah on Comedy Central.

And Cuddle a Koala in Australia saw Dan Ilic, an Australian presenter, comedian, and filmmaker initially crowdfunded money for a campaign to buy billboard space in Glasgow to coincide with the Summit. After massively exceeding his target, he then bought 10 minutes of time on the billboard known as Godzilla in Times Square in New York to ‘publicly shame’ the Australian government’s response to climate change creating worldwide headlines.

The Finger Awards 2020

There is no way to survive 2020 without some humor. It can help explain complicated issues, encourage safe behavior, and ease the tough days. Comedy has never been more critical than in 2020. It’s a creative tool to push institutions, politicians, and nations to re-think topics and make urgently needed changes.

The Finger Awards honor those who have mastered that craft and share their achievements — no matter where on the globe they are. From race, gender, environmental issues, and more, if they use comedy to make it better, we want to finger them. Over 100 nominees from more than 30 countries were considered for the Award. The finalists and winners were picked by over 50 comedy professionals worldwide, members of the Comedy for Change community.

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The Winners:

The Finger Award for Most Creative Comedy went to the Dick Pics Museum in Germany, where award-winning German TV show Joko & Klaas Gegen Prosieben ran a campaign against sexual harassment. In a museum space, the creators opened an exhibition of ‘Dick Pics’ that a famous actress had received. The exhibition featured in a 15-minute special segment about gender relations that also included female celebrities sharing sexist comments made after they appeared on social media.

The Finger Award for Most Effective Comedy was won by Star Trek actor and social media sensation George Takei for reclaiming the term ‘Proud Boys’ from the far-right, neo-fascist and male-only political organization of that name that promotes and engages in political violence. Takei encouraged Twitter users to flood the platform with images of LGBTQi pride using the #proudboys hashtag.

2020’s Special COVID-19 category went to The Corona Song from Vietnam. The Vietnam Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health set the #GhenCoVyChallenge, which turned into a mass dance craze that encouraged people to wash their hands properly and stay healthy during the coronavirus pandemic. Thousands of funny variations for it were created on TikTok.

Lastly, a Special Contribution to Comedy was awarded to British comic Ricky Gervais recognition of his “brave use of comedy to promote representation of disability and discourse about depression and mourning” in Netflix series After Life.

The Finger Awards 2019

For the first time ever, The Comedy for Change international community has awarded The Finger Awards, a prize created to honor outstanding comedic projects with social impact anywhere around the world.

The Finger Award for most creative comedy was given to Taboo a 9x 60 Belgian TV show which first aired on broadcaster VRT in 2018 with a 54% share and has been given a greenlight for another series in 2021. In Taboo, comedian Philippe Geubels invites four guests with a range of disabilities or illnesses for a week’s holiday in a lovely country house. After spending time getting to know his guests, he does an entire comedy-set on every topic with his new made friends on the front seats of a venue packed with people who are confronted with the same issue.

The Finger Award for most effective comedy was given to The Tampon Book created by Germany based The Female Company. They created a campaign against unfair taxation of female sanitary products. The Female Company “tricked” the system by selling tampons hidden in a book thus avoiding the controversial “luxury items” tax on female hygiene products.

An honorary mention was awarded to German comic Jan Böhmermann for his project Do They Know It’s Europe where 20 political satirists from 16 European countries, united to create a new European anthem for the 2019 European Parliament election.

Take a look at our other finalists in this clip

The first-ever Finger Awards ceremony was hosted by Cally Beaton, a former senior TV executive, turned comedian, writer, and broadcaster at a special event held at C21 Content London.

The Finger Award was created to provide a platform for comedy professionals who have gone out of their way to try to make the world a better place using their craft. It represents an industry recognition of these efforts by an international panel of over 50 A-list judges, all members of the Comedy for Change community. Among them are writers from The Simpsons, Family Guy, HIGNFY and more.

Nominations for the first Finger Awards included 80 candidates from over 30 countries and encompassed standup routines, trolling acts, TV shows, ad campaigns, podcasts and more.

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Our 3 main goals:

Awareness

Promoting and honoring excellence comedy work that generated a social change.

Education

For the general audience to spread the word of the power of comedy as a tool for generating a change. Among comedy professionals to share techniques and test-cases using comedy as an effective tool.

Community

Maintaining a big international community of A-list comedy professionals that are obliged for using their abilities to promote social change.

About Comedy For Change

Established in 2014, Comedy for Change is a vibrant international community of comedy writers, performers and executives who are interested in using their skills and platforms to effect social change. The network has over 100 senior representatives from 20 countries. The goal of the network is to share, teach, learn, and collaborate in creating effective comic content. Special focus is given to fighting racism and discrimination.

Now accepting nominations for next year!

Did your comedy change the world this year? Know anyone we just have to see? Send it our way using the email down below.

info@thefingerawards.org

In collaboration with

Executive Director: Omri Marcus // Head of Production: Noa Margalit

TV Research: Keri Lewis Brown // Digital Research: Sandra Lehner //Media Strategy: Cheryl Clarke // Advisory Board: Yael Rosen