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Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxn!ihnp4!qantel!hplabs!nsc!pyramid!decwrl!Glacier!Navajo!fournier
From: fournier@Navajo.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.jokes
Subject: Rock Hudson Jokes
Message-ID: <195@Navajo.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 4-Oct-85 21:55:45 EDT
Article-I.D.: Navajo.195
Posted: Fri Oct  4 21:55:45 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 7-Oct-85 04:45:57 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: Stanford University
Lines: 37

Pardon the title, and pardon the posting in net.jokes.
There will not be any joke.
Why should I do that, when (I hope) thousands of people on the net share
my feelings, I do not know. I was waiting and expecting somebody to say it.
For months now we have been subjected to "Rock Hudson Jokes", and "AIDS Jokes".
None of them had any redeeming value, even assuming that they could have had.
They mostly were the kind of statement an unthinking 10 year old would write
on a bathroom wall (but even them usually do not pick the name of a dying
person to make them look "current"), or feeble puns on various names associated
with Rock Hudson. Regardless of the circumstances, they were not funny by any 
definition of the word.
It would be easy to believe that these "jokes" and their posting were
prompted by hatred, stupidity, ignorance and fear (surely humor was not a
factor). I will try to assume otherwise. I will try to assume that the people
who posted them are not hateful, stupid, ignorant or afraid. I will assume that
they were maybe a little too quick on the old keyboard, maybe tired at the end
of a long day, maybe too influenced by the flotsam that usually encumbers
our consciousness. I will also assume that they are reading this.
Next time you post a joke, or read one, please ask yourself (you are easy to
identify, you are the person whose dim reflection you can see in the screen
in front of you): why do I post this joke, why do I laugh, do I laugh? 
And more important, what does it say about me. Do I want my name to be 
permanently associated with that material and this message.
If the person closest and dearest to you (including you, if you are this
person) were dying a certain death under your very eyes, no matter of what 
disease or how contracted, would you reach for the terminal to share a laugh
about it with the rest of us.
I hope not, and I hope than when you die, the rest of us, providing they
notice, will not feel like sharing a laugh about it.
Two more remarks before I stop. The death of Rock Hudson per se does not make
matters worse. I do not think we should respect death, I think we should use
all the respect, concern and care we can muster for the living. And last I
will not reply on the net to comments about this, except through mail. My goal
is not to start a debate. I just want to be able to say that when ugly things
were said on the net, I as a user disagreed publicly. I wish we all have the
wisdom to do that more often.
Thank you for reading this.