Years ago, a friend, a black man, told me a great joe about racist jokes. "You know how I can tell y'all are telling a N****r joke?" He quickly looked over one shoulder and then the other. A great joke about who people tell jokes to/in front of..
Marines are notoriously fond of dark humor. Even though we had lost friends we would tell the singing telegram joke around each other, but not to a gold star family. Even the most crass of us would read the room out of empathy, rather than fear of getting punched in the face.
There is a difference in a joke that is in poor taste and the crap that comes from some writers on tedium who insult from the safety of their keyboards.
I was at a conference taking place at a local elementary school. The school administrator told us, that the school regularly received bomb threats. There was a hushed silence as she described the need to evacuate each time that happened, and the emotional tension that caused. She said "and if we don't answer the phone, they leave the threat on the message machine". I said "if you want to leave a bomb threat, press one." The room exploded in the laughter that lasted about 15 minutes. The joke was arguably in bad taste, but it was also what everyone needed to hear right then, as it dissolved the tension. It was both the right time and the wrong time to tell it it. No one who was there criticized me for telling it, but I can imagine somebody criticizing me after they hear this story.
“I’m 100% sure that a talented comedian could tell a joke about a terror attack that would give the people who had just survived it a (probably desperately needed) laugh.”
I’m reminded of the time a friend of my brother’s had their house catch fire and burn to the ground. Another friend, who performed professionally as Joel the Jester, showed up to the fire with a package of marshmallows for toasting. *That’s* how you give people a desperately needed laugh.
Years ago, a friend, a black man, told me a great joe about racist jokes. "You know how I can tell y'all are telling a N****r joke?" He quickly looked over one shoulder and then the other. A great joke about who people tell jokes to/in front of..
Marines are notoriously fond of dark humor. Even though we had lost friends we would tell the singing telegram joke around each other, but not to a gold star family. Even the most crass of us would read the room out of empathy, rather than fear of getting punched in the face.
There is a difference in a joke that is in poor taste and the crap that comes from some writers on tedium who insult from the safety of their keyboards.
I was at a conference taking place at a local elementary school. The school administrator told us, that the school regularly received bomb threats. There was a hushed silence as she described the need to evacuate each time that happened, and the emotional tension that caused. She said "and if we don't answer the phone, they leave the threat on the message machine". I said "if you want to leave a bomb threat, press one." The room exploded in the laughter that lasted about 15 minutes. The joke was arguably in bad taste, but it was also what everyone needed to hear right then, as it dissolved the tension. It was both the right time and the wrong time to tell it it. No one who was there criticized me for telling it, but I can imagine somebody criticizing me after they hear this story.
"Some people have stopped trying to find the balance."
So true. Sometimes it feels like there is widespread resentment that the balance even exists.
I am dying laughing!
“I’m 100% sure that a talented comedian could tell a joke about a terror attack that would give the people who had just survived it a (probably desperately needed) laugh.”
I’m reminded of the time a friend of my brother’s had their house catch fire and burn to the ground. Another friend, who performed professionally as Joel the Jester, showed up to the fire with a package of marshmallows for toasting. *That’s* how you give people a desperately needed laugh.