Bad Jokes & Ebonics

[Joe Varo]

On Tue, 18 Feb 1997 Kyburz at asu.edu wrote in response to an "ebonicized"
version of The Lord's Prayer:

> Is there any need to spread this crap any further.  Doesn't anyone 
> understand that ebonices "jokes" are hate speech?  I mean, yeah, if you 
> feel a great unbridled net-mediated freedom to be a public racist, then 
> that's one thing.  But I think that some folks just don't know that this 
> kind of stuff offends--really.

You know, I really didn't see this as an instance of racism. I didn't find
it especially witty, either, but then the subject does include the phrase
"bad joke".

It seems to me that just about *all* humor pokes fun at someone or some
group, whether it be ethnic, cultural, career (e.g. attorney jokes) or
whatever.

Hell, some of Richard Pryor's funniest stuff is when he pokes fun at WASP
speech patterns.  What about "The Simpsons"?  Should that show be branded
as racist because of the character Apu, the hindu Qwik-e-mart manager, or
Flanders, the simpleminded christian?

To claim racism in this way strikes me as at least a bit "knee-jerk-y" and
may have the unfortunate effect of diluting the problem of racism in
general.

But then, perhaps I'm in need of sensitivity training.

Joe