Yesterday, I was talking to a co-worker of mine, whom I came to know about 7 years ago when used to go to the graduate school. John, my friend, has a side job as a stand up comedian. He is funny with a little bit of satire spice added to him:). John is a very intellectual young man, who also has a degree in philosophy and world religion. OK, enough of introduction! While we were sitting out and enjoying the afternoon breeze, I asked him about his up-coming competition with other stand-up comedian. His face turned bitter and he told me that most of th epeople come to his show, prefer him to use dirty jokes. There was a disappointment in his look when he talked about an old lady of 78 who might win, because she used a very nasty and dirty sexual content in her semi-final, which blew away every audience’s mind and the place was crazy with their applauding for such a degrading joke. Apparently, she had mimicked a viberator’s sound, and pretended enjoying it. Alright! I was kind of amused thinking about a 78-year-old lady explaining stuff behind her private doors; however, was it really funny? To john it was not. Why? Because to him it was a little bit overwhelming to hear an “old lady” winning over him for disclosing the stuff that was too much for someone her age. And getting the audience attention? That was too much on his part. I asked him which was the worst for him, her part or that she might win. He explained to me “an old lady” using the language that is not appropriate for her age, acting that is worse that the language, and winning the audience all bothered him. I told him if he was aware of steretyping, and he believed he was and sometimes being stereotypical is helpful. I believe he was valid to some degree. But looking back at our own culture, I can see we have so many jokes about different people of our country: Yek Torke, Yek Rashtiyeh, Esfehaniyeh, Ghazviniyeh, and Abadaani (by the way, I have not heard anything about people of Tehran) I do have a Tabrizi friend who tells jokes about her own people! Where do we draw the line? Or should we?
Why can’t an old lady do that? Who are we to judge what she should do or is appropriate for her to do? What is having boundary and the relation between that and comedy? How helpful is stereotyping?
