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| Belief and Spirituality General thinking beyond the boundaries of religion and organised belief |
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01-07-2006, 06:44 PM
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#1 (permalink) |
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Peace, Love and Unity
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Scotland
Posts: 5,877
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Religion and humour
When is humour relating to religion plain funny, vs plain blasphemous?
Obivously, it's going to be an individual call to some degree - but I'm curious as to whether there are obvious boundaries? For example, there's the great historical uproar over Monty Python's "Life of Brian", which IMO is one of the most hilarious comedies ever made... Then there are blunt instruments such as "Father Ted", a somewhat brilliant series that dealt with an extremely caricatured Catholic Church (I'd love to get feedback on that from Catholics - is it so far into the ridiculous that it's not seen as offensive?). Since 9/11, there's also been some targeting of figures such as Osama Bin Laden, the Taleban, and of course, Saddam Hussein. While not directly commenting on Islam, it seems hard not to see this as an issue that Muslims won't be acute to. Anyway...humour and religion... |
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01-07-2006, 09:27 PM
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#2 (permalink) |
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UNeyeR1
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Maryland
Posts: 9,554
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Re: Religion and humour
totally subjective....
to those who stand on weak ground or take everything personally, darn is a curse word, as is gee whiz. to others who aren't religious, nothing is not fair game. You should have seen the anti semetic skit perpetrated on me as MC of an event while in an orthodox retreat center....it contained antisemetic epithats, cursing, racists slurs and staged violence...however the Rabbi was aware of what was going to happen and some of the staff were involved, however I and the majority of the crowd were caught completely unaware... In the middle of it, before we knew it was humor...it was blasphemy and then when the cat was out of the bag as it were...it changed completely. The next night of revelry started with me saying that after last nights episode, I'll expect everything to be a skit so someone else will have to call 911 if someone is slain.... It humor or blasphemy will always depend not on the person telling, but the persons listening.... |
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01-09-2006, 06:19 AM
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#3 (permalink) |
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Interfaith Forums
Join Date: Jan 2005
Posts: 3,173
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Re: Religion and humour
one person could do humor & it would be funny. if someone else did the same exact thing it may not be funny, which does not make sense but it is true.
cartoons & entertainers doing characters VS. making a deliberate & direct mockery of someones beliefs is two different things to me. entertainers tend to get away with it because it is expected. sarcasm all the time gets old. i always liked the church lady & "is it satan?". there is an old comedy called the flying nun, that i used to watch. the farting preacher & there are several others. |
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01-09-2006, 04:43 PM
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#5 (permalink) |
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Moderator
Join Date: Jul 2003
Location: Germantown, MD
Posts: 436
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Re: Religion and humour
Blasphemy is in the mind of the listener, I think. To some folks, mentioning the word "God" is blasphemous. To others, anything goes. To yet others, a joke told by one of their group is fine, while an 'outsider' telling the same joke would be abhorrent.
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01-09-2006, 07:16 PM
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#6 (permalink) |
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at peace
Join Date: Apr 2005
Location: Texas
Posts: 3,267
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Re: Religion and humour
Hi--Peace
 I am constantly amazed at the frenzy sparked by certain new T.V. programs, etc. There is one in particular right now--"The Book of Daniel"--a program whose adversaries have started a vigorous "just-say-no" type email campaign. (Of course this only serves to guarantee that I will check it out ).I did so, and I was so incensed that I (yawn) fell asleep  .What? God doesn't have a sense of humor? Of course, "He" does. I have secretly wondered from time to time if there weren't a few good jokes left out of the canon?  Okay--I am being silly. But when the subject of humor and religion comes up, I always think of the Scripture passage where Jesus was asked about whether taxes should be paid to Caesar. I always picture him with a great big twinkle in His eye when he asks them to show him whose picture is on the coin. I know there is Scripture that states "Jesus wept." Sometimes I wish there was one that said, "Jesus laughed", because I just know He did. If we can't laugh at ourselves, then we only wind up crying. I do not like mean-spirited humor toward any religion, but I suppose "mean-spirited" is a call left up to the listener (like Bruce pointed out.) But I think religious humor is some of the funniest around. InPeace, InLove |
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01-10-2006, 02:10 PM
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#8 (permalink) | |||
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UNeyeR1
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Maryland
Posts: 9,554
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Re: Religion and humour
Quote:
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01-12-2006, 05:19 PM
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#14 (permalink) | |
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Episcopalian
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Wild, Wild West
Posts: 3,913
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Re: Religion and humour
Quote:
I never actually go out of my way to watch it, and I'm cringing most of the time when it is on...but you just can't deny that it is funny. cheers, lunamoth |
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