Are You Offended By This?

[Lee]

Waheguru ji ka Khalsa!
Waheguru ji ki fateh!

What do you get when you cross a sheep with a kangaroo?

Everybody from the eldest uncle down to the yountgest sister knows this one, the answer of course is a whooly jumper.

It is a joke, not a very good one(in my opinion) but very very funny to my young children. Jokes like art and beauty are subjective things.

Take the above joke for example, is it in bad taste, would it offend sheep and kangaroo's both? Does it offend you?

The answer is probably no, well I hope it is no, there are no sheep reading this I take it? What though if it was an English, Irish, Scotsman joke? Or did you hear about the Paki joke, or some sort of Sardar joke?

There is a very good chance that some people get offended by these sorts of joke. In fact there is a bit of a debate going on elsewhere on other Sikh websityes, and other Sikh forums where a suppriseingly(to me) large number of Sikhs seem to have suddenly encountred a sense of humour failiure with people making sardar jokes.

Perhaps, it is Punjabi Sikhs, or Sikhs from families with Punjabi origin that are just fed up with years of these jokes, and if that is the case then I begin to understand.

However I'm getting off track, the point of this post is to talk about what offends us(humanity in all of it's guises) and why?

Okay first off applogies to any that this may offend, but here goes;

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif][SIZE=-1]'Santa Singh was in the hospital, near death, so the family sent for his friend Banta. As Banta singh stood beside the bed, santa Singh's frail condition grew worse, and he motioned frantically for something to write on. Banta singh lovingly handed him a pen and piece of paper, and Santa used his last ounce of strength to scribble a note. Then he died. Banta singh thought it best not to look at the note just then, so he slipped it into his jacket pocket. Several days later, at the funeral, Banta singh was visting Santa's family. He realized that he was wearing the same jacket that he'd worn the day Santa died. "You know," he said, "Santa handed me a note just before he died. I haven't read it, but knowing Santa, I'm sure there's a word of inspiration there for us all." He unfolded the note and read aloud, "You're standing on my oxygen tube!"'[/SIZE][/FONT]

Was that offensive, did it offend anybody?

If you answer yes, why?

One reason I can think of, it makes us look like idiots, it infers that sikhs are not clever

Are we idiots, are we not clever? No so this joke is lying.

Are we offended by lies?

How about becuase others hearing it may think that we are idiots?

Do we care what others think of us? Isn't careing about how others view us egotistical? So are we offended because we are deeply immursed in ego?

I don't understand. There is a saying we have in England, and I'm sure you have something similar whereever you are it goes:

'Sticks and stones may brake my bones, but names can never hurt me'

We teach this to our children, when they come home crying that some bully has called them a name. It teaches them that someone can call you an idiot, don't let it upset you, is it true? No? So what harm can it do you, it's only words, words not sticks.

Brothers and Sisters, what is more harmfull to Sikhi, that people make jokes of us, or that Sikhs practice improper Sikhi? What is it better to do, get angree at words meant to ridicule us, or worship an idol?

Thoughts anybody?

 

[vijaydeep Singh]

Gurfateh
Das read that as per old book Suraj Granth non belivers Muslims and Hindus started to make fun of Sikhs since the time of Tenth Guru.

Guru made Sikhs so much powerfull later that not one was allowed to make joke on them.Anyway we have seen that as er old saying of Guru that stone worshiper has mind like stone so often stone worshiper be it Hindu or Muslim do make fun of us.

But thier making fun on us in our made makes them feel iditoicaly unreasonable as we are not like that yey they say that we are like that so here they are wrong.

But in India majority of porfessional people who are well educated at present avoid making any joke of comment which may hurt the religeos sentiment of Sikhs or nay others.

Other people over here who are made fun off are Pandits and practising Muslims but time is changing.Das wantas to know that do Irish people are still made fun of in UK?Das did himslef did not find any English person dooing such things for Irsihmen but ironically found some Punjabi(Could be an ex Sikh) doing so.This is hypocratic.

anyway in India Tamils,Biharis,Haryanisvis aomg others are often made fun of.

In all the cases they are often above average in some field.Just to show them thier proper place intentionally some of thier profession rivals may start such joking.

In India joking other faiths started more by protestants while evanglism and Arya Samajis and Tablighis copied them and some bigot Sikhs also took inspiration.

 

[Arvind]

Dear Lee,

Very good post it is.

'A' (Sardar) and 'B' (Other Person) are sitting together. 'B' cracks a joke on 'A' making 'A' appear idiot. 'A' took that in total sense of humor. Now when 'A' tries to joke on 'B' in extended sense of humor, 'B' does not accept it at all!!! This dual behaviour starts causing problems.

In a two sided conversation, when both sides are willing to take jokes on each other... it is all fun

just 2 cents

Regards, Arvind.