Well I know this list consists of high caliber, articulate, well traveled
professionals, but I feel this very polite, open-minded, forgiving reaction
to a joke about one-legged blacks is as disturbing as the original joke....
It was and remains a racist joke about handicapped people and should be
realized and treated as one.

The majority of those responding are in effect saying "oh it's OK, the
author is from a different country and jokes about crippled blacks are
quite acceptable over there", and if that's true then what we're saying is
"oh it's OK, jokes about crippled blacks are quite acceptable in Hungary".
I don't buy that. The author (or an entire nation for that matter) may of
course choose what is considered funny or which riddles are intellectually
stimulating, but those thoughts should be shared only with people who are
known to be similarly minded.

As suggested by another post, the "it's not funny but it doesn't offend me"
attitude can easily be reversed with appropriate substitutions. For
example, have you heard the joke about the one-legged Jew ? or the one
about the bald Christian ? or how about the joke with the stuttering
American ? not to mention the one about the Hungarian doctor.

I could rattle on here for quite some time, but enough already. The bottom
line is we have to be careful and polite about what we say, how we say it,
when we say it and to whom we say it. A lack of these considerations is, to
say the least, a lack of manners.

From time to time we may inadvertently offend someone. It's inevitable as
we don't all share the same moral or social background. We are not all
alike, yet when we do offend, we usually follow-up with a swift and sincere
apology. That, in my book,  is considered good manners.


Costas Anastassiades,
Athens - Greece