You’re not funny.

Maybe I’m just more sensitive. Maybe it’s the election. Maybe it’s a lot of people feeling insecure and having to put someone else down. I don’t know why this kind of joke is suddenly a lot more common.

I don’t care why it’s more common. Just stop.

Don’t tell me you’re just kidding, or that it’s just a “good-natured” joke. Don’t use a ton of inverted commas to try to distance yourself from the ugly racist and discriminatory joke that was just told.

Sure, you’re entitled to have an opinion. You can tell me to “lighten up” all you want. I still laugh at America’s Funniest Home Videos – mostly. I laugh at Terry Pratchett’s books, at authors talking about were-jaguars and how they got agents. I laugh when my son calls quiches “egg pies”. I laugh at the stupid things my hair does in the morning, or the antics of our cats and dogs.

Those things are funny. But not these jokes I keep hearing again and again.

But these aren’t just rude or dirty jokes I’m talking about. These are demeaning, mean jokes.

Somehow, you making a wetback joke, you making a nigger joke, you making a joke demeaning women or gays or Catholics or Jews or Muslims… somehow those just aren’t funny.

Sure, you have a right to say the jokes. Absolutely. I have just as much a right to let you know that your “good-natured” jokes aren’t funny.

And, because I’m white, and because I’m male, and because I’ve had opportunities all my life because of the way I look and the way I talk and the assumptions people make about me, I have one hell of an obligation to let you know you’re being a discriminatory ass.