The phrase “it’s just a joke” gets thrown around a little too much these days.
Now don’t get me wrong, I love a good joke. I love to watch Comedy shows like SNL, The Daily Show, or Last Week Tonight just as much as they next person. But the moment a joke trivializes a serious issue or perpetuates a stereotype, I start to question whether it’s really worth laughing at.
We like comedy because of the way we can relate to it. For instance, bathroom humor is funny because it’s a universal experience we all have and can relate to. We also find jokes funny because of the truth behind them. Most jokes about Donald Trump are like that. We laugh at a joke about Donald Trump being a pumpkin, because he truly does have an orange tinge.
A joke is a difficult think to maneuver. It is difficult to find the fine line between offensive and satirical. But I think the question to ask yourself before you make a joke is - would the laughs I get from this be worth trivializing the real suffering of a group of people? Would they be worth perpetuating an established stereotype?
What I’m trying to say is that we shouldn’t simply say whatever we want. We certainly can say whatever we want, write what we want, express what we want, however we want based, on our rights as citizens of the United States. Nobody should be denied freedom of speech and freedom of thought. They are rights, and must be respected as such.
However, that is exactly the point. They are rights that should be respected. The right to freedom of speech does not mean simply say what comes to your mind without considering how it may affect others.
I realize how dangerous of a ledge I am teetering on. I do not suggest that freedom of speech should be limited in any way, but rather that we must be intentional about how we speak and act. Something as harmless and light-hearted as a joke could be something completely different for somebody else than it is for you.
It is all in good fun to poke fun at each other, to laugh at ourselves and to make the burden of the world’s issues a little lighter through laughter. But relentless jokes about a particular group, particularly one that has or is enduring hardship, are not fun. Just as one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, one man’s joke is another man’s reality. It is important to consider every human being as something of value, and consequently to consider every human being’s adversity for what it is: suffering and hardship.
