Well, This Should Get Some Panties in a Bunch

[Spock]

I debated about posting this but then I decided "Screw the Pearl Clutchers" plus it was funny as hell.

Littlest Spock (a senior) had his post-prom event Saturday night and one portion included a hypnotist.

He was one of the 10 or so kids hypnotized and, boy did he put on a show. He says he remembers everything that happened but he did not have control over it.

A friend sent us the video and Mrs S and I haven't laughed that hard for years.

Somewhat surprisingly, given the tenor of the times, the show included the kids "Getting" their dream sports car and driving really fast and getting chased by the police. There was a case of mistaken identity and the police "thought" the kid was a kidnapper and opened fire on them.

1)There is a lesson there I think for the pearl clutchers that people still live their lives and still find things that are supposed to be off limits funny.

However-Mrs S and I just about died laughing at Littlest Spock's reaction to the police incident.

The other kids were all stopping and putting their hands up in the air and diving for cover when the police opened fire.

Not mine though-as the other kids stopped and raised their hands-He continued to try and drive away And when the police opened fire-Most surprisingly, he mimed shooting back (that was the point, Mrs S and I just about died laughing) first with a pistol and then with a pump shotgun.

My Gawd, everybody else was diving for cover and mine was using their bodies for cover to shoot back. Probably not a reaction that the hypnotist sees very often.

[silverscreenselect]

Somewhat surprisingly, given the tenor of the times, the show included the kids "Getting" their dream sports car and driving really fast and getting chased by the police. There was a case of mistaken identity and the police "thought" the kid was a kidnapper and opened fire on them.

1)There is a lesson there I think for the pearl clutchers that people still live their lives and still find things that are supposed to be off limits funny.

I'm going to go out on a limb and make an assumption here that the audience was pretty much all white. I doubt a group of black students would have found this very amusing.

[tlynn78]

Somewhat surprisingly, given the tenor of the times, the show included the kids "Getting" their dream sports car and driving really fast and getting chased by the police. There was a case of mistaken identity and the police "thought" the kid was a kidnapper and opened fire on them.

1)There is a lesson there I think for the pearl clutchers that people still live their lives and still find things that are supposed to be off limits funny.

I'm going to go out on a limb and make an assumption here that the audience was pretty much all white. I doubt a group of black students would have found this very amusing.

Good thing they have you to decide for them what amuses them!

The hypnotist at my oldest son's graduation is the only show like that I've ever seen, but it was pretty awesome, and the kids LOVED it.

[silverscreenselect]

Somewhat surprisingly, given the tenor of the times, the show included the kids "Getting" their dream sports car and driving really fast and getting chased by the police. There was a case of mistaken identity and the police "thought" the kid was a kidnapper and opened fire on them.

1)There is a lesson there I think for the pearl clutchers that people still live their lives and still find things that are supposed to be off limits funny.

I'm going to go out on a limb and make an assumption here that the audience was pretty much all white. I doubt a group of black students would have found this very amusing.

Good thing they have you to decide for them what amuses them!

The hypnotist at my oldest son's graduation is the only show like that I've ever seen, but it was pretty awesome, and the kids LOVED it.

I don't have a problem with hypnotist shows in general. I remember one from high school.

But I'll repeat that I don't think a group of black students would think a show in which their fellow classmates think they are being chased by police firing at them particularly entertaining.

[BackInTex]

I'm going to go out on a limb and make an assumption here that the audience was pretty much all white. I doubt a group of black students would have found this very amusing.

Good thing they have you to decide for them what amuses them!

The hypnotist at my oldest son's graduation is the only show like that I've ever seen, but it was pretty awesome, and the kids LOVED it.

I don't have a problem with hypnotist shows in general. I remember one from high school.

But I'll repeat that I don't think a group of black students would think a show in which their fellow classmates think they are being chased by police firing at them particularly entertaining.

I don't know. They would think a show with fellow classmates calling each other the 'N' word entertaining (as long as those fellow classmates where also black. I don't find a homely pudgy woman spreading her legs singing about her WAP entertaining, but apparently a lot of people do. I don't thing you nor I can accurately predict what parts of our society that we are not part of will find entertaining.

[silverscreenselect]

[I don't thing you nor I can accurately predict what parts of our society that we are not part of will find entertaining.

You don't have to watch a hypnotist's show to see black people acting like they are scared of being shot by the police. You can just watch the nightly news to see the real thing.

[BackInTex]

[I don't thing you nor I can accurately predict what parts of our society that we are not part of will find entertaining.

You don't have to watch a hypnotist's show to see black people acting like they are scared of being shot by the police. You can just watch the nightly news to see the real thing.

What one is scared of and what one finds entertaining in a fictionalized portrayal is often the same thing. Again, I don't think a white suburban attorney can speak for what urban blacks will or won't find entertaining. You keep trying to speak on their behalf, and they aren't asking you to.

[silverscreenselect]

What one is scared of and what one finds entertaining in a fictionalized portrayal is often the same thing. Again, I don't think a white suburban attorney can speak for what urban blacks will or won't find entertaining. You keep trying to speak on their behalf, and they aren't asking you to.

I'm not speaking on anyone's behalf. I am making an observation that Spock's comments about humor and how people react to it was limited to the crowd in attendance at the hypnotist's show and those watching videos of it like Spock.

If someone made a comment about watching a blackface minstrel show with watermelon-eating jokes and finding that hilarious, I'd make a similar comment.

[Bob Juch]

[I don't thing you nor I can accurately predict what parts of our society that we are not part of will find entertaining.

You don't have to watch a hypnotist's show to see black people acting like they are scared of being shot by the police. You can just watch the nightly news to see the real thing.

What one is scared of and what one finds entertaining in a fictionalized portrayal is often the same thing. Again, I don't think a white suburban attorney can speak for what urban blacks will or won't find entertaining. You keep trying to speak on their behalf, and they aren't asking you to.

I'm a white suburban computer geek, and I can speak for myself. It wasn't funny.

[BackInTex]

What one is scared of and what one finds entertaining in a fictionalized portrayal is often the same thing. Again, I don't think a white suburban attorney can speak for what urban blacks will or won't find entertaining. You keep trying to speak on their behalf, and they aren't asking you to.

I'm not speaking on anyone's behalf. I am making an observation that Spock's comments about humor and how people react to it was limited to the crowd in attendance at the hypnotist's show and those watching videos of it like Spock.

If someone made a comment about watching a blackface minstrel show with watermelon-eating jokes and finding that hilarious, I'd make a similar comment.

Oh, I see. You're making something non-racial to be racial. You're projecting a person being pulled over by the police, then shooting back as "could only be a black person". I think many white people behave badly, too. It's telling that you automatically see that with mocking racial undertones.

[silverscreenselect]

Oh, I see. You're making something non-racial to be racial. You're projecting a person being pulled over by the police, then shooting back as "could only be a black person". I think many white people behave badly, too. It's telling that you automatically see that with mocking racial undertones.

Spock started this thread with mocking undertones. He didn't just relate an anecdote about his son; he framed the entire issue.

There is a lesson there I think for the pearl clutchers that people still live their lives and still find things that are supposed to be off limits funny.

The clear implication is that anyone who doesn't find this hilarious is overly sensitive.

Now I can accept that a group of high school students might not have realized that this entire routine was in extremely poor taste in the current climate, but Spock and BiT should know better. I'm not projecting that the only person who might shoot back at the police would be black. I am saying that the issue of police chasing and shooting at people is very sensitive for many black people right now and playing it for laughs is not in good taste. And if this hypnotist routine took place in Minnesota, it would be in extremely poor taste right now.