Do you find this Sikh joke funny?

BhagatSingh · #1 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 03:31 AM

Sardarji: The Most Popular Man in the World
Bill and Sardarji walk into a fast food joint one afternoon to get lunch. Bill orders and the cashier gives him his meal. Sardarji goes up to order and the cashier greets him with "Hello Sardarji! How are you? Hey everybody! Sardarji's here!"
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/opinion-polls/30071-do-you-find-sikh-joke-funny.html
Everybody in the restaurant comes up and says hello to Sardarji. After everyone has greeted him, Bill and Sardarji sit down and begin to eat. "Sardarji, you're pretty popular!" says Bill.
"I'm the most popular man in the world," says Sardarji.
"Now Sardarji," says Bill, your pretty popular but you're not the most popular man in the world."
"Oh yeah," Sardarji replies "I'll bet you a thousand dollars that I'm friends with anybody you can name!"
"That so?" answers Bill, "How about the President of the United States?" "Let's go!" says Sardarji.
The two fly to Washington and knock on the front door of the White House. The president answers, "Sardarji! How are you doing? I haven't seen you in ages!" The three go play a round of golf and then leave. "That was luck!" says Bill, "Two thousand says your not friends with the Queen of England!"
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071
"Let's go!" says Sardarji.
The two fly to Buckingham Palace and, sure enough, are greeted by the Queen. ''Hello Sardarji my boy! What have you been up to these days?" They enter the palace and have some tea and leave.
Frustrated, Bill says, "Double or nothing, you don't know the Pope!" "Billy!" says Sardarji, "Let's go!"
When they get to the Vatican, Sardarji instructs Bill to wait outside and Sardarji will come out on the balcony with his arm around the Pope. After a while, a crowd gathers to hear the Pope speak. And as told by Sardarji, when the Pope came out, Sardarji's arm was wrapped around him. Sardarji looks down from the balcony and see's Bill passed out on the ground. He rushes down and wakes him up.
"Bill! Bill! Wake up!" Bill opens his eyes and says,"Sardarji. You're the most popular man in the world."
"I told you that, Bill," says Sardarji, "but you didn't faint when I knew the President! You didn't faint when I knew the Queen!"
"Well I was shocked that you knew the Pope," says Bill. "But I just couldn't take it when the guy next to me tapped me on the shoulder and said "Who's that up there with Sardarji?"

Vote "other" only if it doens't relate to "funny": e.g. it makes you feel good or it made you cry or you think this is true and it shocks you because that guy didn't recognize the POPE! etc.
You may still comment if you select "Yes" or "No".

Narayanjot Kaur · #2 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 03:36 AM

Frankly I don't think it is funny! It would not be funny even if Sardarji were changed to something else. But then I never thought any ethnic jokes were funny. They just don't connect for me.

jdnaz · #3 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 06:52 AM

No, i don't think it's funny at all, i believe it's unacceptable to belittle any becon of faith no matter how qutely it may be discised.
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071
Jdnaz

Gyani Jarnail Singh · #4 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 09:37 AM

Looks like someone trying to massage the ego...only the "sardarjis" whose EGO needs massaging will find this "funny"...not me (although i do have an ego too ) These are stereotype ethnic jokes better dead than alive.

Aman Singh · #5 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 10:00 AM

*** No offense intended ***

Frankly, i may not be well known for my sense of humor and have indeed a big EGO too but, personally, i found this joke quite funny :veryhappymunda1: without going into the technicalities.

Did you guys checked-out this interesting campaign going on at facebook where world renowned S. Baldeep Singh Ji has started a campaign: Please Do Not Stop Sikh Jokes...! opposing already going on campaign Stop Sikh Jokes launched by youngsikhleaders.com...

Baldeep Singh Ji goes on to say...

Quote:

Well, as I wrote on my FB page, people with a decent sense of humour, humility and intelligence are not humiliated - such is my conviction. I do not see the difficulty in sifting good from the bad ones. Moreover, I think I can withstand even the bad ones - they do test me but I am able to handle them quite well actually.

What will we start instead - making jokes on other people? Would that be fair?
And if on mere impulse one rebuts that we should just not make or have jokes at all - well, I will not be a party to either of such worlds.

If any other community is not able to withstand jokes about themselves - I do not see this as their strength - but their pitiable weakness. Be it any community.

This so called damage to the Youth's mind is not because of the jokes - you have to be joking for inferring so! It is lack of values and education. Reacting to jokes is just not getting a joke right - it is lack of intelligence. The remedy in my view in not banning jokes - I am sorry that you find me differing with

And i echo his views 100%.

Gurfateh

Sinister · #6 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 10:30 AM

hey... common .... it was funny.

mind you...my favourite type of jokes are blonde jokes ... it just tickles my funny bone all the time

So, this blonde girl goes into walmart and sees the stockboy stocking shelves. She asks him what he is stocking and he replies; "it's a thermos". She asks "what does it do?" he replies "it keeps hot things hot and cold things cold". So she takes the thermos to work the next day, and her boss is impressed that she has a new shiny thermos, so he asks "what do you have in it?" the blonde replies; "a cup of coffee and two popsicles"
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071

BhagatSingh · #7 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 10:37 AM

I don't get it...

Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071

BhagatSingh · #8 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 10:51 AM

It seems like 3 people said No, they don't find it funny. Yet they didn't vote??
The "other" option were supposed to be things other than funny e.g. it makes you feel good or it made you cry or you think this is true and it shocks you because that guy didn't recognize the POPE! etc.

Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071

I thought it was funny but then immediately recognized the background to it. Sikh jokes are really famous and that's why Sardarji is more famous than the pope... one could interpret that in a good way or bad way.
The fact that a Sikh man, Sardarji, is easily recognized amongst a crowd, he's gotta be more popular than any other man.

I used to find Sikh jokes funny. Not because they were targetted towards Sikhs or anything but because they carried some wit. Once I read some articles/threads written by some people explaining how Sikh jokes came to be. I felt ashamed and terrible everytime I saw one. Now I don't mind them because overtime things lose their meaning. Even if the history around the jokes isn't so pleasant, its sort of lost its meaning. Like how piercings were once worn by slaves for identification, etc. Now everyone wears them and no one really cares about where they came from.
Reference:: Sikh Philosophy Network http://www.sikhphilosophy.net/showthread.php?t=30071

I agree with Baldeep Singh ji, jokes targeted at any ethnicity should be encouraged if they are positive.

Mai Harinder Kaur · #9 (**permalink**) 20-Apr-2010, 12:51 PM

The first time I heard this joke, as I recall was in the 1960s, only Bill was a hard-hat, patriotic, pro-War (Vietnan) arch-conservative and Sardarji was an unkempt, dirty, pot-smoking hippie. As I recall, it was funny then, but that was a long time ago, and I've heard this in so many different forms that the only thing of interest is which groups are going to be chosen as the subjects. May I vote other?

This is a post I published in one of my blogs, sometimes - 2, on 23 March 2007:

Quote:

IT'S NOT FUNNY, JI

I have so much to write about; everything from the fourth anniversary of the[expletive], [expletive], [expletive] war in Iraq to an update on Mary (she's staying with Maman now) to my inability to plant my garden because of the crazy weather to the further deterioration of my health. Lots of things.

But I really feel like chatting, and none of my chatty cyberfriends are on line. So I have decided to take up the cause of ethnic humour.

This Santa/Banta jokebook seems to be causing quite a stir in the Sikh community. I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. On one hand, my view of freedom of speech and the press is more radically American than it is Canadian. Let people say what they what, short of shouting 'A turban! Must be a Taliban terrorist!' on an airplane in flight. On the other hand, it is quite easy to attack and even kill people you already treat with derision and disrespect.

It is no secret that my command of Punjabi, especially since the stroke, is most rudimentary, at best. But I remember a website that had a bunch of Santa/Banta jokes posted. I read a few of them, wondering exactly what they were. I found out all right. They are simply recycled Polish jokes that I had heard in the sixties, the 1960s. They weren't funny then and they aren't funny now. Which is one thing I definitely have against them: they aren't funny. Jokes need to be funny, not merely mean.

I kept reading and figuring out the Punjabi words until I got to one that was entirely in Punjabi. I wrote the webmaster about that one, telling him/her that I don't have to understand the language to know that Santa and Banta and Waheguru don't belong in the same sentence. (I have no idea what the 'joke' was about.) I got no reply, but when I rechecked, that 'joke' was no longer there. So politely speaking up seems to have accomplished something in that particular case.

What is the point of this post? I'm not really sure. I personally have found very few, if any, racial/ethnic/religious jokes making anyone look stupid at all humourous. ('Syntax,Mai, syntax,' I hear a high school English teacher whispering in my ear.) Humour must be humourous to be humour.

But should these jokes be outlawed? Can they be outlawed in any meaningful sense? Kids and bigots will continue to tell them. I asked one acquaintance of mine, 'What is the appeal of these slanders? Does anyone really believe we're a bunch of idiots?'

He kind of looked at me sideways.'You Sardars are so touchy. It's fun to **** you off. And those swordfights last winter really did made you guys look like idiots.'

[Aside. Yes, like everybody else, I saw those tapes on youtube. And they are disgraceful! No excuses!]

Does that mean that we should react to them the way I usually do when my husband says something annoying to me, that is, totally ignore them? The problem there is that you do teach people how to treat you. And if you don't stop this when it's small, it can and does escalate. Every bit of disrespect adds to every bit of disrespect and it piles up until these little bits of disrespect add up to a massive bonfire of disrespect. And that can be fatal.

Am I saying that Delhi'84, for example, was caused by these silly jokes? Of course not. But they do add fuel to the fire. And they're uncivilised, too. What is the point of upsetting your neighbour for 'fun'? Am I getting whiny? I suspect I am. I guess whatever point I'm trying to make has been made.

Advice: Don't listen to or laugh at insulting jokes about anyone. If people don't laugh, the joke-tellers won't get their payoff and maybe they'll just shut up.

It's very important to respect yourself and others. It's also important to be able to laugh at yourself. Each individual needs to decide where to draw the line.

I think a few excepts from the Times of India editorial might help.

After being the national butt of jokes for years, a section of the Sikh
community has struck back with the demand that the Mumbai police should block
websites dedicated to Sardar humour. The protest, fresh on the heels of the
arrest of the publisher of the popular Santa and Banta Joke Book, is a clear
sign that Sikhs are seriously riled at the merciless stereotyping of themselves
as intellectually challenged...

A dunce cap sits ill on a turban...

Bans will not gag the jokesters. But a little more sensitivity towards the
agitated Sardars would go a long way in restoring their amour propre.
Not Funny, Ji - Edit Page - Opinion - Home - The Times of India

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