Hypocrisy & Psychopaths & Martyrs & Madmen

[mleaman@sccoast.net (Mark Leaman)]

>I don't think that it matters where your ancestors are from or what your own
>curriculum vitae looks like:  When you are posting a joke (or an anecdote, a
>remark, or whatsoever) concerning a certain social group, then you are
>responsible for its content.  There are two reasonable negative reactions you
>might have to expect:

Bernd:

I take complete and ultimate responsibility for each and every joke I post.
And none of them are meant to offend. And I'm sure some do. but you can't
bake the grits (as they say in this area) without boiling some water. 
Yeah, I know...how can you bake with water. Hey, *I* didn't make it up!


>   (1)  Someone not belonging to that group says:  `I think your joke violates
>   good taste.'
>
>   (2)  A member of the group shouts:  `Ouch!  Your joke really hurts me.'

Oh, I definitely violate good taste! But back to the grits...most of the
humor deals with making fun of SOMEBODY.
But I don't mean to hurt anyone. I am not easily offended, and I suppose I
don't expect anyone else to be either. I mean, what good does it serve to
get angry over such things? I don't want to spend my life upset and angry. I
just laugh things off and consider the source. I invite anyone offended by
my posts to do the same.
Of course, I AM in an incredibly good mood now that I'm no longer chained to
that crappy job. Even my friends are telling me that I'm too damned happy
these days.

>However, if
>
>   (3)  someone not belonging to the group shouts:  `Ouch!  Your joke really
>   hurts me'
>
>then this is a) ridiculous and, most likely, b) hypocrisy.  We saw this in our
>recent analysis of Fang's scalper joke.  But by the same time, we also saw some
>listers reasonably react like (1) - do you really think that they were also
>hypocrites?

I think that if they are offended by jokes or digs on one certain group and
not another, the answer is: Yes.
IMHO.



                   Cheers                   ML

"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity."  L. Long