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Yeah. It was a funny joke up until about the 3rd or 4th post whining about it stereotyping Frenchmen and Americans.
--The whole concept of government granted and government regulated 'permits' and the accompanying government mandate for government approved firearms 'training' prior to being blessed by government with the privilege to carry arms in a government approved and regulated manner, flies directly in the face of the fundamental right to keep and bear arms.
“The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.”
The major parts of this joke is the vet and the airport staff. You would have to change around some of the wording to make the joke relevant though.
So if we make the customs officer an american airline worker we would have to change the punchline from "there weren't any french people around to check it" to "there weren't any (insert airport personel here) to check it. It has to be in France though, or else the vet seems like a looney.
An eighty three year old American man takes a trip to France. When he arrives, he is asked to produce his passport by an American airline employee. The old man has some trouble finding his passport. Annoyed, the other American asks "haven't you ever been to France before?" "Yes," the old man replies. "Then you know you should have your passport handy," the younger American chides. "The last time I was here, I didn't have to show it."
Told this way, the joke makes little sense and loses any chance of being funny. Humor is the result of cleverly resolving tension. The tension of an older American getting slightly hassled by a younger American has no connection to the setting of France. Because the setting is not the locus of the tension in this version the meaning of old man's ultimate response (the punchline) is easy to miss. If someone told you this version of the joke, you'd probably look at them blankly for a moment and then so "oh, because he fought in D-day." But you wouldn't laugh. Because it's just a story about an old person nagging young people about having done important things in the now-distant past. That's not funny.
EDIT: Your suggestion of the punchline change to "they were no airline employees around" is also not potentially funny. You're right to identify that the tension has shifted away from the notion of Americans "saving" France. But the joke relies on a comparison rather than a contrast. The old man is not saying "we didn't come over for a tour in those days, sonny!" he's saying "you shouldn't be rude to me because I saved you, sonny!" Now, he didn't save future American airline employees in anything but the most tenuous sense. But the main claim of the original joke is "France owes respect to the United States for fighting on France's side in WWII." There is no similar "American airline employees working in France owe respect to D-Day veterans" tension that works out to a laugh.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/02/12 07:35:21
Australia (Recently ravaged by the Hive Fleet Ginger Overlord)
Relapse wrote:Robert Whiting,
An elderly gentleman of 83, arrived in Paris by plane.
At the Customs, he took a few minutes to locate his passport
In his carry on.
"You
Have been to France before, mister?" the customs officer asked
Sarcastically.
Mr. Whiting
Admitted that he had been to France
Previously.
"Then
You should know enough to have your passport ready."
The American said,
"The last time I was here, I didn't have to show it."
"Impossible.
Americans always have to show their passports on arrival in France !"
The American senior
Gave the Customs Officer a long hard look. Then he
Quietly explained, ''Well, when I came ashore at Omaha Beach on D-Day in
1944 to help liberate this country, I couldn't find a single Customs Officer
To show a passport to."
Still funny I think.
Smacks wrote:
After the game, pack up all your miniatures, then slap the guy next to you on the ass and say.
Actually, I probably would laugh. Seeing as though the punchline "last time there was no one to check my passport" still rings true. You just don't have a sense of humor.
It would be comparable to the captain getting measured from one body part to another in order to determine pay and asking to be measured from the tip of his wang to his boys and later telling the measurer that his boys are in vietnam.
Corvus wrote:I see your point, but in that case you should just go after the people who are honestly dumb enough to take a freaking joke seriously rather than the one who made the joke.
Sure. When Homer Simpson says he's been seperated from Marge for three days and now he's dirty as a Frenchman, it's a funny joke that's just that, a joke. But not every joke works the same, the humour often comes from something different. When the kerfuffle between the US and France developed over Iraq you saw a lot of jokes come out where the humour was derived entirely from denigrating the French, particularly their military.
To me, and presumably a few other posters here, this joke feels a lot like one of those jokes. Sometimes the knowledge that some idiots out there would take the joke seriously makes it stop being funny. When I was a kid I thought a lot of racist and homophobic jokes were really funny because they were so absurd (who would really hate someone because of their skin colour or their love interest?) Then I met real some actual bigots and those jokes stopped being funny.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
LunaHound wrote:I see your point , i really do. I think the joke in first post is clever no doubt.
So , how much WTC 911 jokes do you think i can post before im banned? ( <-- that is just a question not that im going to do that , so mods , dont! )
It isn't necessarily the subject matter, but the joke itself. Myself and a lot of others defended that new British comedy about the London bombings because it looked like it was lampooning the terrorists and the incompetence of the police.
The problem here isn't that the joke mocks the French per se, its the nature of the joke itself.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Emperors Faithful wrote:Really? I gotta say sebster, I honestly did not know that. Funny piece of info there. And yeah, that's pretty messed up.
Yeah, it's messed up. Or you can look at it and be proud of how far we've come. Either way, it's important to know, and it's a shame that the greatest generation narrative has come to dominate WWII so much that any other information has been abandoned.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
helgrenze wrote:Some people just want to be offended.....
Did anyone say they were offended?
Imagine the OP as if it were done by the Monty Python Crew. Over acted and all that.
Would it be considered "funny" then? Or would the "easily offended" be up in arms about it?
It's nothing like a Monty Python sketch. Python was so good and so important to comedy because it was with absurd ideas, and the only time it addressed popularly held ideas was to lampoon them. For instance, the Fawlty Towers sketch where Basil is so worried about mentioning the war to the German fellow (who doesn't even consider the issue) that in the end he can't think of anything else.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2010/02/12 07:38:30
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
And I think you have your head up well past your sigmoidal colon.
Yay, continuation of verbal attacks.
Just think outside of the damn box manchu, not everything mentioned in the world today is meant to be taken seriously or negatively. In fact, this could probably just be a silly JOKE. There are just some things that have no hidden meaning, but people make one up anyways. I just happen to be a free thinker who sees this as joke about a vet who has not lost his wits over a course of 80 years of life going to france.
Actually IF you understand the hisotry of transoceanic flight its riotously funny......
being as there would have been few airline employees.... or even customs agents in existence at the time.
Of all the races of the universe the Squats have the longest memories and the shortest tempers. They are uncouth, unpredictably violent, and frequently drunk. Overall, I'm glad they're on our side!
Office of Naval Intelligence Research discovers 3 out of 4 sailors make up 75% of U.S. Navy.
"Madness is like gravity... All you need is a little push."
You must have missed my comments to both LunaHound and Relapse on the previous page (see, no verbal attack necessary). The as-is joke is lame in my opinion and funny in yours. Fine. I'm not telling you that you shouldn't find it funny. What I am saying is that the joke's potential humor, which you appreciate and I don't, hinges on the notion that the French owe some respect to Americans as a legacy of the Second World War. It's not about Americans mysteriously working as French Customs Officials. It's not about giraffes in airports. It's about an American getting the better of a Frenchman.
No kidding. It's funny become some young punk got his ass handed to him by an 80yo man in an airport.
Who the hell cares what nationality the tourist and the official were.
It could have been an American airlines official and the old man could have been French and he could have said "the last time I set foot on American soil was probably the same year your dad was jerking off to pictures of Bobby Jo Hayes in his HS yearbook."
See? A snarky comment from an old man putting a young punk in his place.
This is why this country is so fethed up. People take gak way to serious and let everything offend them.
--The whole concept of government granted and government regulated 'permits' and the accompanying government mandate for government approved firearms 'training' prior to being blessed by government with the privilege to carry arms in a government approved and regulated manner, flies directly in the face of the fundamental right to keep and bear arms.
“The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.”
halonachos wrote:Actually, I probably would laugh. Seeing as though the punchline "last time there was no one to check my passport" still rings true. You just don't have a sense of humor.
No, liking a joke doesn't mean you have a sense of humour and someone else doesn't.
It would be comparable to the captain getting measured from one body part to another in order to determine pay and asking to be measured from the tip of his wang to his boys and later telling the measurer that his boys are in vietnam.
Penis is big penis jokes? How are they comparable or funny?
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
Australia (Recently ravaged by the Hive Fleet Ginger Overlord)
sebster wrote:
halonachos wrote:Actually, I probably would laugh. Seeing as though the punchline "last time there was no one to check my passport" still rings true. You just don't have a sense of humor.
No, liking a joke doesn't mean you have a sense of humour and someone else doesn't.
And yet you continue to fail in demonstrating yours.
It would be comparable to the captain getting measured from one body part to another in order to determine pay and asking to be measured from the tip of his wang to his boys and later telling the measurer that his boys are in vietnam.
Penis is big penis jokes? How are they comparable or funny?
Do you seriously want to get into a discussion about this?
Smacks wrote:
After the game, pack up all your miniatures, then slap the guy next to you on the ass and say.
This country is "so fethed up," to the very marginal extent that it is, because many people are extremely overconfident about their communication/reading comprehension skills. As sebster pointed out and I myself JUST reiterated, the topic is not about the joke being offensive.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/02/12 07:57:06
Emperors Faithful wrote:@sebster: What exactly IS the nature of the joke then?
The French are rude despite us totally saving their asses in WW2.
(And yeah, I guess it is good that we CAN look back at that and see how bad that was)
Yeah, seeing so many people take French jokes seriously made them stop being funny.
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
It's nothing like a Monty Python sketch. Python was so good and so important to comedy because it was with absurd ideas, and the only time it addressed popularly held ideas was to lampoon them.
I see. So, seeing Terry Jones as the Customs Agent and Graham Chapman as the American, both overplaying their parts, involved in such an exchange would not be considered funny because its not "Absurd"......
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2010/02/12 08:03:31
Of all the races of the universe the Squats have the longest memories and the shortest tempers. They are uncouth, unpredictably violent, and frequently drunk. Overall, I'm glad they're on our side!
Office of Naval Intelligence Research discovers 3 out of 4 sailors make up 75% of U.S. Navy.
"Madness is like gravity... All you need is a little push."
Fateweaver wrote:No kidding. It's funny become some young punk got his ass handed to him by an 80yo man in an airport.
Who the hell cares what nationality the tourist and the official were.
It could have been an American airlines official and the old man could have been French and he could have said "the last time I set foot on American soil was probably the same year your dad was jerking off to pictures of Bobby Jo Hayes in his HS yearbook."
See? A snarky comment from an old man putting a young punk in his place.
This is why this country is so fethed up. People take gak way to serious and let everything offend them.
You've stopped making sense. Jokes are funny because they relate to things. An old man being snarky to airline guy isn't a joke outside of the crappiest of crap sitcoms.
And no, a country doesn't get ruined because people have a higher standard for their jokes.
“We may observe that the government in a civilized country is much more expensive than in a barbarous one; and when we say that one government is more expensive than another, it is the same as if we said that that one country is farther advanced in improvement than another. To say that the government is expensive and the people not oppressed is to say that the people are rich.”
Adam Smith, who must have been some kind of leftie or something.
By post 3 or 4 people were saying it could be construed as stereotyping because the old man is "typical" snobby American and it was an obvious stab at the French's military prowess during WW2.
Maybe nobody here was TRULY offended but to discuss that it's potentially offensive (and I do recall someone telling the OP he was being racist) just means that obviously there are people out there who don't have thick skins.
I'm 1/2 German and I've heard enough comments and jokes about Germans being Nazis and Jew killers to write a book on the subject. Jokes about Germans being baby killers and Nazi's don't offend me.
The fact that this is up to 4 pages pulling this joke apart because it "might offend" (and that IS why it's up to 4 pages) reinforces my idea that people need to get a thicker skin and stop being so goddamned sensitive about things.
--The whole concept of government granted and government regulated 'permits' and the accompanying government mandate for government approved firearms 'training' prior to being blessed by government with the privilege to carry arms in a government approved and regulated manner, flies directly in the face of the fundamental right to keep and bear arms.
“The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government.”
Much funnier than the OP is how offended you are at the thought of people being offended.
The four pages are depressing although not for the reason you suggest. No one is trying to show how the joke is possibly offensive at this point. The point is to show what the joke is actually and obviously about since someone has claimed its about something else entirely. The thread is now getting longer because I'm having to point out to you yet again that the discussion is not about the joke being offensive.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2010/02/12 08:09:33
halonachos wrote:Actually, I probably would laugh. Seeing as though the punchline "last time there was no one to check my passport" still rings true. You just don't have a sense of humor.
No, liking a joke doesn't mean you have a sense of humour and someone else doesn't.
It would be comparable to the captain getting measured from one body part to another in order to determine pay and asking to be measured from the tip of his wang to his boys and later telling the measurer that his boys are in vietnam.
Penis is big penis jokes? How are they comparable or funny?
The short version of the joke:
It was once a military practice to give bonuses depending on the length between any two parts of a person's body. The first man got measured from the top of his head to the bottom of his foot, the second man raised his hand into the air and got measured from the tip of his fingers to the bottom of his foot. The captain wanted to get measured from the tip of his penis to his balls. When he was being measured the measurer asked "where are your balls?" to which the captain replied "In vietnam."
Manchu wrote:Much funnier than the OP is how offended you are at the thought of people being offended.
The four pages are depressing although not for the reason you suggest. No one is trying to show how the joke is possibly offensive at this point. The point is to show what the joke is actually and obviously about since someone has claimed its about something else entirely. The thread is now getting longer because I'm having to point out to you yet again that the discussion is not about the joke being offensive.
