The Line Between Entertainment and Ignorance

By Penny Lai

  

    When watching a comedy shows, people laugh because they can relate to the jokes, and the jokes or the lines are cleverly designed or serve their purpose. To entertain people and make them laugh is not an easy task, so the comedians or the joke writers must possess a certain level of knowledge and intelligence of how to crack a laugh without offending people, especially when the material is controversial.

 For the past few months, there are several pieces of news about university students crossing the line in some school activities by pressuring the freshmen to act out some humiliating postures for the sake of “entertainment.” And in the barbecue event of English Department of SHU, the sophomores named the teams in puns based on off-color jokes, which caused quite a bit of a fuss on the DCard forum. There is nothing wrong with having fun by trying to be creative and make people laugh. However, when the jokes serve no purpose and make people uncomfortable or even offended, it should not be tolerated but should be swept under the rug and called a mindless joke.

  People would expect to see highly educated students have some sense of decency. However, in many cases, such an expectation is often failed. The jokes may seem innocuous, but they actually show that even highly-educated students do not have the sensibility for decent wording and to decide on what is funny and what is not. And the interesting thing is that the most “entertaining” things they can think of are all sex related. Perhaps society suppresses sex related issues too hard and, as a result, young adults are made so curious as to doff the suppression eagerly. Good jokes do not have to involve or suggest sex in order to make people laugh. Even if they do, the wording would be appropriately polished according to the taste of the audience. After all, a nerdy academic joke can rarely crack a smile on the face of a hearty builder and vice versa.

  

It is understandable that schools try their best not to interfere students’ activities and affairs.

However, universities should also set up some basic rules to prevent students from crossing the line. Being creative and humorous are good things, but no matter how creative a mind is, there are always public opinions and moral standards to consider. Most importantly, when holding events in the name of the school, students should stay aware that they are shouldering the reputation of their schools, what one says and acts can easily be placed under inspection by the public to scrutinize their school. Behaving and voicing oneself in a manner to match the identity of an educated intellect should be a good thing to keep in mind throughout one’s college days.