Didn't get the unfunny joke..
I didn't hear the joke clearly, what did Ashton say? What can't a black man get? And then what......please help
shareA black eye, a fat lip and a job.
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MovieChat Forums > Guess Who (2005) Discussion > Didn't get the unfunny joke..
What I didn't get was why they were so offended by that joke. I simply don't find it funny, but they really overreacted.
My karma ran over your dogma.
It isn't enormously offensive to say that a black man can't get a job?
Try telling a black man that he can't hold a job. See how he takes it.
He'd take a brick to your head- that's how he'd take it.
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That wouldn't make that reaction reasonable or warranted.
My karma ran over your dogma.
Let me try again.
Blacks have often been stereotyped as lazy and unemployed, in America and elsewhere. It's a common myth that they don't work and suck up welfare.
Saying that a black man can't or won't get a job draws on these stereotypes.
So it really offensive.
I never said the joke is completely benign. I just think that on a scale of, say, 1 to 10, its offensiveness is about a 0.5, and the family's reaction was completely over-the-top for what it was. Especially considering that he only told it in the first place because they kept insisting on it!
But honestly, I am quite sensitive to hateful remarks regardless of what race or ethnicity they pertain to, and if I heard a "joke" like that in real life, I would have made certain conclusions about that person's supposed sense of humor, NOT about their character on the whole.
Overall I felt sorry for the guy - he was reduced to walking on eggshells and constantly having to prove himself only because he happened to be white. It was a totally racist attitude on the part of the family.
Anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.
hahahaha, they don't get offended when a black woman is referred to as being a ho, but when he makes a remark about a black guy getting a job...hes KKK status. I thought it was stupid, too. If I was bernie mac, I would have called him a cracker and flung a carrot at him. The end.
shareUmmm, did you not watch that scene? Theresa's sister was pissed when the ho joke happened! Personally, I was not offended about the "unfunny" joke, but I can understand why other black people would be. They kind of set up that scene at the beginning of the movie when Percy said something about him having a job AND when Theresa said the first thing her dad asks about her boyfriends is, "does he have a job?".
share"Theresa's sister was pissed when the ho joke happened! Personally, I was not offended about the "unfunny" joke.."
The director of this movie (who is black) and screenwriter(s?) seemed to pick out individual family members around the dinner table to be "offended" by one or more of Ashton's jokes (but NOT offended by all of the jokes). Grandfather got in a rage over some jokes, but not by others (at which he really laughed!)
That showing of an individual joke causing "selective offense" among different people (different sexes, ages, and previous life experiences) within a family is what really happens in family life. The director of this movie did a great job at bringing that situation to the screen!
Consider a similar scene where a black man is urged to tell "Italian jokes" to a family of Italians seated around a dinner table!
I think the black eye and fat lip part were more offensive then the job part
shareI get that the joke was offensive but the problem I have is that it was no more offensive than the other jokes. Why did they react to that one and not the other jokes? Certainly the sister as ho joke was far worse. I thought that whole scene was strange.
shareI get that the joke was offensive but the problem I have is that it was no more offensive than the other jokes.That's exactly my take on it. Even if it was a stereotype it was still one of a whole string of racist jokes they were compelling him to tell. It's clear he didn't tell it out of malice. If I were Simon except for jokes mentioning or dealing with the N word I wouldn't have figured out which ones were acceptable or not.
Yours sincerely, General Joseph Liebgott share
Yeah, I'm guessing they had a more offensive joke in there, but the studio or censors didn't let them keep it, so they had to settle for this one.
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