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I recently raised a small squall in a tiny teacup with my blog within Illustration Friday Night. It was fascinating to watch (and I admit, gently coax) the extremes of reaction, from those who 'got' the intended irony and satire in the piece and others who either chose to misinterpret them and then pound their fists in anger or even those who amazingly didn't get the fact that there was no offence intended at all. Of course a large part of the fault was mine in assuming that any subtlety in humour (and I have to say I thought there was bugger all subtlety!) would translate across the many different countries and cultures represented within IFN. For the record, and not in any way to mitigate the original post and comments but rather to expand on the points raised, I said that we should put older fatter women to work and replace them with younger women with large breasts. Not only am I not a misogynist, but I don't judge people by weight or shape. It. Was. A. Joke. By saying something completely outrageous and totally indefensible I thought to raise a slight smile on the face of anyone reading it. But then I am being called names, or having people waving admonishing fingers or others complaining that I am attention seeking. A lot of those comments were also said in the spirit of the original post and also meant to be dismissed as lightly but there is a fear that those who had the tone and nature of the humour pass them by with nothing but a slight whistling sound as it passed over their heads, were probably cheering on the detractors and thinking 'damn right' that sure showed him! Steve W. pointed to an interesting article in The Guardian by Tim Dowling picking up on the theme and the nature of posts on blogs. One of the points was to suggest we only say things in blogs that we would say in person. Well, personally I am a 6'3'' Glaswegian and will happily say the same things in person and deal with the consequences too. But in person I can adopt a sardonic air, raise an eyebrow or even crinkle the skin around my eyes in such a way as to make clear that it's fine, I'm only joking. However for the same reason as I would never literally stick my tongue in my cheek to signal a lack of sincerity I refuse to add LOL or a wee happy smiley face after a sarcastic sentence; if someone doesn't get that I am joking, tough.
So just to be clear: If I want to offend or insult someone I will not be subtle about it, I will happily call them a tosser to their face. If I make some outrageous statement apropos nothing whatever, I am joking. I mean no offence. Unless it's to dog owners. What a pathetic bunch of losers they are. LOL :)!!!