Schticks and stones...

I was watching a movie the other day...from the eighties...comedy...I probably knew more than half the dialogue...certainly all the punch lines...and as I watched I realized...quite sadly...that the same movie could never get past go these days...it would never be financed...never open in movies theaters nationwide...ah, political correctness...which when it crept into the corners of our society years ago was actually quite necessary...but now it has rendered us mute and frozen...we stop writing, afraid to offend...we become shrill...defensive...and humorless...were we always so insensitive...did our laughs come at the expense of others...uh, yes...if you did laugh did that make you a bigot...you probably would say of course not...but isn't everybody...even just a bit...laughing when we shouldn't because of unease of what we don't know or understand...can you laugh at yourself...at "your own people" as easily...I remember the old line that sometimes it is best if the joke you tell is only about yourself, or "your own people"...but are we only safe if we stay in our own lanes...where does that leave us in this rich melting pot that is our country...there is a scene in Spike Lee's insightful and incendiary "Do The Right Thing" where the characters...each a different racial or ethnic group...face the camera and hurl every slur they can at each other...kind of harsh and cathartic in bizarre fashion...I wonder sometimes...next time there is a national debate...let them all yell at each other...all that bile and distaste...get it out...pause...laugh at the absurdity...shake hands with meaning...and get the hell on with it...just thinking...