Xref: utzoo news.misc:2048 soc.culture.jewish:8300
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!peregrine!elroy!ames!haven!ncifcrf!shore
From: shore@ncifcrf.gov (Melinda Shore)
Newsgroups: news.misc,soc.culture.jewish
Subject: Re: Racist jokes
Message-ID: <672@fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov>
Date: 23 Nov 88 20:58:51 GMT
References: <8030@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU> <1058@osupyr.mast.ohio-state.edu> <1223@fig.bbn.com> <179@loci.UUCP> <2361@looking.UUCP> <251@blake.acs.washington.edu> <423@mccc.UUCP> <17379@agate.BERKELEY.EDU> <670@fcs280s.ncifcrf.gov> <260@blake.acs.washington.edu>
Reply-To: shore@ncifcrf.gov (Melinda Shore)
Organization: NCI Supercomputer Center, Frederick, MD
Lines: 31

In article <260@blake.acs.washington.edu> mcglk@blake.acs.washington.edu (Ken McGlothlen) writes:
>*Bzzzt*.  Sorry, that answer is *wrong*.  You *don't* get the dishwasher,
>you *don't* get the car, and you *don't* get the $50000!  But feel free
>to take this handy-dandy "u" key as a consolation prize.

Damn these Sun keyboards.  You've got to blow a question just to get
the vowels.  Okay, but I still need an 'a', an 'e', an 'i', and an 'o'.

I'm not suggesting that anybody is suggesting that racism is funny
(although I know people who think it is).  I'm asking if anyone thinks
that racism is okay when couched in humorous terms.

When I was growing up in Virginia in the '60's and '70's, it was not
at all uncommon to hear kike and nigger jokes.  It is pretty clear that
the fact that these jokes were told so openly and frequently helped
create an environment in which people did not feel uncomfortable being
openly racist.

At the same time, both of my parents came from Orthodox Jewish
backgrounds.  When we went to visit the family, everybody would sit
around the table after meals swapping jokes, many of them about Jews
and Jewishness.  There was a considerable difference in tone and
content between these jokes and the jokes I heard back home.  Yes,
ethnic humor can be funny, but that does not mean that it isn't used as
a weapon as well.  Some of what I've seen in rec.humor.funny has been
extremely vicious, and I don't think it's appropriate for Brad to put
his stamp of approval on it and post it to the net.  Du bis nit a
mensch, Brad.  Do the right thing.  Racism is not acceptable, period.
-- 
Melinda Shore                                    shore@ncifcrf.gov
NCI Supercomputer Facility              ..!uunet!ncifcrf.gov!shore