How many Jews ...

[Nic Name]

It seems that, like your father, I raised children in the same generation as you and Paul, so I am very close to people your age. You're not a good example of your generation.

I do sense that Paul was raised properly but is under a bad influence by you. It would be great if you could be a positive role model.

Paul will recall, and you may too, that his intuitive response to my criticism above was to post, "I apologize. really" That was based on his values that he got from his parents.

I think that you encouraged him to retract that apology and attempt to justify his remarks, since his replacement post spoke directly to you.

Paul then indicated that he didn't think that anyone here would be offended by his remarks above and offered up a link to your Tasteless Jokes thread as some example of what's acceptable around here. I can see where he might get the impression that he had support for his offensive post from listening to you and reading those racist jokes.

Dave, you aspire to be a leader but you don't have the qualities of a leader. You're young and, quite frankly, very immature for your age. Surely, you'll grow up. It remains to be seen what you'll grow up to be. What are your values and do you live by them?

Your Tastless Jokes thread sends a message to many people that the Cellar is not a worthwhile place for them: that it will be uncomfortable for them. I think it should be uncomfortable for racists and bigots and other bullies and I won't "shut the fuck up" while you and a few others attempt to make racists feel at home here.

In the Tasteless Joke thread, I tried to clue you in that your reputation is at stake. You just don't get it. Actually, I think Paul does get it, but he was clueless that his personal reputation is also at stake. He is lead astray by people like you who make him think your behavior is normal. Well, guys, it's not. That is exactly how people who aren't really racist get caught up in hate crimes, as the statistics show. Better Paul learn that here and now than learn the hard way on the streets on in the courts.

Your Tasteless Jokes thread created an environment in the Cellar that made it seem OK to Paul to make hurtful remarks wherever, even changing his profile to take an anti-Semitic view.

As others have said in your Idiots thread, maybe this gives us something to think about. We're all ready to say what the Israelis, or Iraqis or Palestinians should do. Maybe it's fair to talk about how we should behave.

This thread was created to send a message to Jews and other groups denigrated by you and your buddies, to whom "How many Jews..." is a joke about ashtrays. This thread was created to confirm that people in the Cellar are decent folks. People that have been raised with values and respect for others.

Paul's comments attempted to support your view that this thread should go away. His posts before and after my criticism are designed to make this thread as offensive to Jews as the Tasteless Jokes thread. He knows better, I'm sure. He might even regret it. He did apologize ... for a moment, anyway.

Maybe we have all learned something valuable in this discussion. Perhaps there is no longer a need for this thread or the Tasteless Jokes thread in the Cellar. I wonder what Paul thinks ... if he does think without asking you what to think.

Here's the problem with you, Nic. You are <b>so sure</b> that you are 100% right. And you're not, as I'm about to clearly demonstrate.

Paul will recall, and you may too, that his intuitive response to my criticism above was to post, "I apologize. really" That was based on his values that he got from his parents.

Without speaking for him, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you <b>again</b> missed the sarcasm.

I think that you encouraged him to retract that apology and attempt to justify his remarks, since his replacement post spoke directly to you.

And again, you are wrong. I didn't see his "apology", and I haven't spoken with him since Monday. I didn't encourage him to retract it because until you just posted it, I didn't know he'd written it. That having been said, I'm willing to bet that I picked up the meaning whereas you did not - mainly because I, unlike you, am not totally ignorant of what Paul means when he says something.

Paul then indicated that he didn't think that anyone here would be offended by his remarks above and offered up a link to your Tasteless Jokes thread as some example of what's acceptable around here. I can see where he might get the impression that he had support for his offensive post from listening to you and reading those racist jokes.

I can see how he'd get that idea; most people around here are not you. Most people find some tasteless jokes funny because most people have an appreciation for dark humor. They do not celebrate the travesties of the past; they simply realize that life isn't worth living if you're not having a good time.

He does have support for his post - because it's <b>funny</b>. There's nothing wrong with poking fun at one's history.

Dave, you aspire to be a leader but you don't have the qualities of a leader.

No. I don't aspire to be anything. I look to enjoy life and that's about it. I don't know where that will take me, but I'm comfortable knowing that I'll be smiling when I get there.

Your Tastless Jokes thread sends a message to many people that the Cellar is not a worthwhile place for them: that it will be uncomfortable for them. I think it should be uncomfortable for racists and bigots and other bullies and I won't "shut the fuck up" while you and a few others attempt to make racists feel at home here.

People choose to see that message. The message I'm sending is "it's okay to laugh; laughter helps ease the pain." Whether or not you choose to see that is your decision.

Regardless, I'm not at all attempting to make racists feel at home here. I despise racists more than you can imagine. I don't like people that hate. I have a half-Chinese friend, three black friends, a lesbian friend, a Jewish friend... and a few others. One of my African American friends, Mike, is coming over to my house this weekend to LAN - "If your woman doesn't mind having a negro in the house " (his words). Yes, I suppose he is also racist, by demonstrating that it is okay to refer to an African American as "negro"; to instill in my impressionable mind the idea that separation of races is normal and okay.

Now, I'm not telling you about Avi saying he hates Jews and Mike refering to himself as a "negro" and implying segregation because I want to justify my actions on the basis that I have minority friends and therefore it's okay. I'm telling you because it shows that even those who have the most justification for being insulted by such words <b>are not</b>. I don't know a young black man that hasn't joked about being a young black man.

In the Tasteless Joke thread, I tried to clue you in that your reputation is at stake. You just don't get it.

I get it - I simply don't care. I have no interest in knowing someone who can't laugh at the hard things. I don't like people who are <b>that</b> serious. I don't need to know people that have that much guilt. I didn't kill the Jews. I didn't round up the Japanese. I've never owned any slaves. I think all of those things are despicable (as I've stated here before), but <b>I am not guilty of them</b>, and I refuse to let you make me feel as if I am.

He is lead astray by people like you who make him think your behavior is normal. Well, guys, it's not. That is exactly how people who aren't really racist get caught up in hate crimes, as the statistics show.

No. Racists and haters get caught up in hate crimes. Those that truly don't hate <b>don't</b> get caught up in them. It's pretty simple, and I'm not sure how you figure that a few tasteless jokes make me a cross-burning KKK member. Hey Rho, better look out! Nic says sycamore is a racist.

Better Paul learn that here and now than learn the hard way on the streets on in the courts.

What you are teaching Paul is that older people are not worth listening to. People like warch and Tony and Griff post thoughtful messages that actually try to help. You come off as arrogant. You tell people how they are when they know differently. Paul isn't going to learn that joking about how Germans hate Jews is wrong from you, nor is he going to learn it from the courts and on the streets. It's not a problem for Paul. There's nothing wrong with joking around, and since he doesn't actually feel as though Germans should be "blaming the Jews", he's not going to learn that's wrong either. He already knows it's wrong. He jokes about it and that's it.

Your Tasteless Jokes thread created an environment in the Cellar that made it seem OK to Paul to make hurtful remarks wherever, even changing his profile to take an anti-Semitic view.

No it did not. My Tasteless Jokes thread created an area of the Cellar where people could enjoy dark humor. If someone isn't racist, a tasteless joke isn't going to make them so. I'm not changing any minds and I'm not espousing hatred. I'm laughing at the hard things.

If you had been paying attention, you'd know that Paul's profile had the "anti-Semitic" view ever since he signed up. He didn't change it because of my thread. It's a way of making fun of the Germans, not the Jews. It's not his fault that you don't get it.

This thread was created to confirm that people in the Cellar are decent folks. People that have been raised with values and respect for others.

This is perhaps the only part of your argument that I will mostly agree with, though I'd submit that you created it more as a potshot at those making the jokes.

People here at the Cellar <b>are</b> decent folks. Some of them just aren't as tight-assed as others.

Paul's comments attempted to support your view that this thread should go away.

No, I think Paul attempted to get a few people to chuckle.

I think that the original image in this thread is a waste, simply because everyone has seen it before. It's nothing special. The second one you posted was something special, and I recommended that another thread be started with it. You read too much into what I'm saying. I was simply doing what you've done many times before - suggest that a rather dull and tired image be deleted as "not worthy" of the title "Quality Images".

Maybe we have all learned something valuable in this discussion.

By "we all", I'm assuming you mean "everyone else". I've seen no indication whatsoever that you're actually willing to learn. You seem quite content to pretend you're omniscient. Well, you're not. There are things you don't know and things that you don't understand. So maybe, instead of dismissing my notions outright, you should sit back and consider them. Perhaps you should consider that I know David Ham and Paul Lastname better than you do.

[Tobiasly]

Nic, you Just Don't Get It. And if you think raising kids means you know how they think and why they act the way they do, you are sorely misguided.

My parents couldn't begin to understand the issues that face our generation. And I think that's probably been true for much of human history.

I love my parents dearly, but I simply accept that their worldview is very different from my own. And so I act differently around them than I do around others, and I'm sure your kids do as well.

Don't try to pretend like you know what it's like to be a young person today. Dave is a rather good example of how most of the people I know in our generation think and act, at least when they're around their peers. And I'm sure I know a lot more of them than you do. Whether you agree with that behavior is another issue.

To us, making jokes about race, religion, sexual preference, or other formerly-taboo subjects is a way of saying "I recognize that these differences exist. I'm not going to pretend that all people are the same, because they're not." It's a way for us to cherish the diversity of the human race.

I'm sure that concept is about as foreign to you as just about anything you could think of. But that's the way our generation thinks, and you're not gonna change it by posting pictures of piles of dead, emaciated Jews.

[Undertoad]

That's it, that's exactly it. It's generational.

When Nic was born, he was born into an era that had just figured out that they had been massively wrong about race relations and racial/cultural differences, and it was critically important to society that they change attitudes in the space of a generation. (The generations previous to them had been busy saving the society in different directions.)

When Warch and I were born, we were on the cusp; they were still trying to figure out what went wrong with the first attempts to get everyone to change, and why it had led to race riots, suburban white flight, etc. We were schooled in thinking the right direction, but the people teaching us were still scarred by the recent past history. They were anxious, jumpy, uncertain.

People now in their 20s were born into a world where many of the really terrible problems hadn't existed for several decades, and even the upset of changing the culture was pretty much over. What was left, though, was the weird taboos and some of the weird anxiety.

Nic's anxiety literally is, if we keep this kind of thing up it will make us culturally liable to repeat the mistakes of the past. This thinking is bred into him as he is a product of the society he was raised in. If we don't solve our differences it may eventually cause our breakup as a culture.

Warch's anxiety is a result of being raised after Nic's generation: we are all one multi-culture and so the big mistake that we make is offending people in that culture. It isn't that we irreparably damage our culture; it's that we may damage people within that culture, which is insensitive, uncaring, and damages us in different ways.

The next generation sees the anxiety without the cause and wonders, what the hell! The racism that continues is not built into the culture any longer; all the racism they have seen has been rare, usually found after a long search and carefully rooted out. It's more likely to be individual cases of extended idiocy.

I think the real change has happened in the last 7-8 years. Consider the use and meaning of the word "nigger". In the 50s, it was a casual racial epithet. By the 70s it had become the "big" epithet, the single word that indicated bad intent. Through the 80s it became an incredible taboo, which increased its negative meaning. But by the early 90s it began to see regular use in hip-hop culture and actually achieved a positive meaning: it was more often used to indicate brotherhood and common experience than to put anyone down.

Making it a huge taboo was a mistake in the first place. It gave more power to the word than was ever intended. I think that, the younger you are, the more likely the silliness of the taboo is clear to you.

So I think that when younger folk make jokes today they are indicating a togetherness that comes from disrespecting the taboo, acknowledging both the silliness of it and, in a way, noticing that the taboo is no longer so important because many of the root causes are solved.

But I could be wrong.

[tokenidiot]

i deleted the original reply because i thought that it might be somewhat ambiguous, and might lead you to think that i was actually apologizing.
while i'll apologize for not realizing your fragility when it comes to a topic, i won't apologize for the post. was it funny? not really. was it well thought out? not really. does it make me "mentally defective" and "morally corrupt"? no. if anyone here is defective, i dare say it's you.

[Griff]

UT nailed it. Are you folks are trying very hard not to understand each other? Lets not let this board disolve into an empty flamewar.

[wolf]

back in the olden days of the dial-up BBS incarnation of the Cellar, Toad set up an Anonymous board. We used to post stuff on there that makes the stuff on the tasteless jokes thread that started this whole thing look tame and silly ... I don't think this interface allows for that option ... ah well.

I don't want to see the Cellar lose members over the kind of nonsense represented in this thread ... However, I also don't want a "let's just all get along" mentality to take hold ... because it IS our differences that make the cellar worth participating in.

I could be spending time on a number of similar boards, with much more homogenous audiences. But that ain't nowhere near as much fun.

'Nuff Said

[elSicomoro]

This is cute...

Of course I'm a racist Dave! God, you're such a nigger! I keep Rho in the slave quarters out back, and also have a noose hanging over the entrance to our kitchen...it keeps her in her place.

(She nearly fell out laughing at this. For those not in the know, Rho--my fiance--is African-American.)

The shift against taboos seems to have started with the later end of my generation (mid to late 70s). The later generation (which would include Dave, jag, and my brother...1981 forward is what I've seen on the breakdown) has torn the wall down even more. From my own personal experience, when my friends and I would bullshit around as we did, some of our peers "got it," but many were mortified. Nowadays, it seems like many in that later generation "get it," while fewer are mortified.

UT, that was some sharp ass insight. I might have to give you a more expanded role in the Blastenbrei administration at City Hall.

Nic, I think I understand the point you are trying to make, but IMO, I think you are overreacting. It could very well be the generational gap, the difference between Canadian and American societies, I dunno...

I wouldn't say that Dave is immature for his age...he can be rough around the edges, but nothing that won't pass with time, IMO. In fact, he reminds me a lot of how I was at 21...the main difference is that my political thinking was more left--I was between what jag is now and what I am now. All in all though, I'd say he has his shit together pretty well.

One of the biggest problems with the Cellar is that you have a lot of smart people that gather here. And nobody likes to be wrong. Add those two together, throw in pinches of emotion and mean-spiritedness, finish off with dashes of generational and cultural differences, and it can get ugly.

I believe that we all can and should be able to get along, in spite of any differences we might have. It certainly can't be all roses and puppy kisses, but the general civility that exists here is what makes it stand out from the crowd. In the end, all we can do is continue to work towards better understanding each other.

[Tobiasly]

Originally posted by sycamore
I keep Rho in the slave quarters out back, and also have a noose hanging over the entrance to our kitchen...it keeps her in her place.

Hahaha... if she ever mouths off or tries to get outta cleaning up the kitchen one night, you can just give it a lil' tap and say "sounds like <I>someone</I> wants to go for a swing!"

[elSicomoro]

I just take it off the wall, hold it up in its hanging style, and chase her around the apartment, saying, "Don't you sass me nigger!"

This usually makes her cower in fear and say, "Oh no massa! I be a good nigga! Please don' be hangin' me wit dat rope!"

One year, I had an idea for Halloween. Rho would dress up in an Aunt Jemima-looking outfit, and I in a klan robe. I would have a noose around my neck, and Rho would be holding the rope. I don't think a lot of folks would appreciate the humor in that, though.

[Skunks]

Originally posted by Undertoad

So I think that when younger folk make jokes today they are indicating a togetherness that comes from disrespecting the taboo, acknowledging both the silliness of it and, in a way, noticing that the taboo is no longer so important because many of the root causes are solved.

Kinda. I think so. I hope so.

I don't really get out much, but within the limited group of people that I know, that's the modus operandi of most of our humor; we rely on our established cluon-level to indicate to the people around us that our imitation of stupid things really is only for the sake of mockery.

I'm not so sure that this is really the case for all of 'my generation', though. Homophobia seems remarkably alive and well, considering how many people use 'gay', 'homo', and 'fag[got]' as synonyms for 'bad', 'moron', 'general_negativity', etc.

--Sk

[That Guy]

Originally posted by Undertoad
That's it, that's exactly it. It's generational. ...

Goddamn, you're an insightful mofo!

[Tobiasly]

Originally posted by sycamore
I don't think a lot of folks would appreciate the humor in that, though.

I'd give ya some candy!

You better put some blackface on her though, just to be sure the image is complete..

[quzah]

My whole problem with many issues is that people don't leave well enough alone. Yes, horrible tradigies occured in multiple wars. Yes, it would have been nice for them to never happen. No, I don't need to be reminded of them. But since it's been brought up...

When is a number big enough to care?
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, an estimated 103,000. Go America! We stopped a war. At what cost? 103K is peanuts right? I mean, it hardly approaches 550K...

East Timor, an estimated 200,000. Go America! All in the name of oil! So what, it's only 200K. It's not like it's 550K...

Does anyone badmouth America for either one? Does anyone brand the USA for their horrible acts? And if you think there "we" haven't committed any you're kidding yourself.

If that hasn't offended you, try this on for size: My other huge gripe is with racism because "we were slaves", or "you white folk drove us from our land". Yeah, and I should hate Romans because I'm a blue eyed boy and once upon a time Rome conquerored the entire known world and enslaved the populus... So my ancestors were enslaved! I should hate those damn Romans!

The fact is, people always conquer eachother. They kill eachother, sometimes in huge numbers. It sucks, but that's how people are. People enslave others. It still happens. It will happen for all of time.

But that's ok, because it's not 550K. Right? I mean, who cares if on the way home someone shoots through your window and kills your passenger. That's just one person. It's not like it's 550K, so who gives a fuck?

[edit]
Fixed links, because I was stupid and forgot to paste the URL in. D'oh!

To reply to below, and not take up another post, the point is, no one says anything when America does anything horrific, but we're constantly reminded about the "evils of others".

It's just hypocritical and assinine.
[/edit]

Quzah.

[slang]

Originally posted by quzah

But that's ok, because it's not 550K. Right? I mean, who cares if on the way home someone shoots through your window and kills your passenger. That's just one person. It's not like it's 550K, so who gives a fuck?

I couldn't get your links to work. Is the point of this post that you don't like America? I'm not real clear on the references you used, and you seem a bit angry.

I will say that in my world it is the job of the front seat passenger to keep me from getting shot and that is communicated before the car moves.

Slang: ok, I need you to fasten your seat belt and lay this across your lap (hands over Remington marine magnum), if you see anyone so much as point a finger at this car, blast em.

Passenger: Roger that.

So, if my passenger gets shot it's because he wasn't paying attention, but I do give a fuck.