Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!iuvax!bsu-cs!dhesi
From: dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi)
Newsgroups: news.misc
Subject: Re: REMOVAL OF RACIST JOKES
Message-ID: <4818@bsu-cs.UUCP>
Date: 18 Nov 88 15:04:22 GMT
References: <8011@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> <17117@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <8016@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> <1211@fig.bbn.com> <8028@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU>
Reply-To: dhesi@bsu-cs.UUCP (Rahul Dhesi)
Organization: CS Dept, Ball St U, Muncie, Indiana
Lines: 26

In article <8028@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> richmond@athena.mit.edu (Jonathan E. D.
Richmond) writes:
>My ultimate goal -- to reply to question 4 --
>is the elimination of racist jokes from rec.humor.funny.

I'm afraid you are proceeding from a false premise.  Being Jewish is
not a matter concerning race.  Being Jewish, like being Hindu, is a
religious and cultural distinction.

But there's a more serious problem here than just your incorrect use of
a word.  While I sympathize with your desire not to have your cultural
heritage be made fun of, what you wish to achieve cannot in general be
achieved without eliminating humor altogether.  Things that are funny
are funny because something or somebody -- some culture, or some
profession, or some individual -- is made to look silly.

I think a better strategy would be for you to obtain "equal time" by
sending Brad jokes about other cultures and religions.  That way we
will all get to laugh at each other, and in doing so, perhaps we can
also laugh with each other at the human experience in general.  Being
sullen and rebellious won't achieve that, however.

(If you can't find anything funny to say about other cultures, then I
think we have diagnosed the problem :-)
-- 
Rahul Dhesi         UUCP:  <backbones>!{iuvax,pur-ee}!bsu-cs!dhesi