I'd heckle him because it's a **** joke. Using bad taste for cheap laughs without working it into a funny joke is a pretty low form of comedy.
The problem with those subjects and making jokes about them, is that generally, you will be labelled derogatory, racist or whatever if you make a joke on those topics. Personally I think that is wrong. I am no racist, but I think that certain people need to realise that when they hear a JOKE they should understand that a joke is light hearted and trying to be funny, not a serious opinion. For example, French, German, American etc jokes are very common and can be very funny too. However, when you change that to say Indian or other Asian countries, it becomes a tricky topic. Why? I would like to add though, that comedians or comediennes who base their act on their race really don't work. Shappi Khorsandi is an Iranian example who always plays on the fact she is Iranian, not sure why and more importantly it's not funny.
I'm a vegetarian and would never find a butcher's shop joke funny. But ****, murder and 9-11 jokes are my favourites!
Sometimes there is a serious opinion behind a joke. I don't find race jokes funny, but they're all acceptable as long as they are clearly just jokes. They're not acceptable when they come from the mouth of someone who actually is racist, like Jim Davidson.
So you can tell a racist joke as long as you're not racist? So is Ron 'Chubby' Brown in the clear or not?
Well as long as it's clear that it's actually a joke. If you're not racist, then you're not going to say something racist are you?
I'm pretty confident John Terry isn't a racist, but he may very well be found guilty this afternoon...
I'm not really following this case, but isn't it accepted by both parties that he said something that could be construed as being racist, but debated as to the context in which he said it. As an ex-student of law, I would say that you need both the act and the intent to be present. Terry will only be found guilty if it is shown that he intended to racially abuse Ferdinand. If someone intentionally, racially abuses someone, I think you can safely assume they're a racist.
I would say that for the racial bit of this the actus reus alone is enough (i.e. At the time of committing the offence, or immediately before or after doing so, the offender demonstrates hostility towards the victim based on the victim's membership (or presumed membership) of a racial group). Intention would come into it at the stage of deciding whether there was Harrasment or not. The prosecution have also conceded that Terry is not a racist as well. I think the way this part of the law works, you can quite easily be convicted without being racist, as long as your definition of a racist isn't a tautology. Then again, John Terry is from Barking, so nothing would surprise me.
