David Harsanyi Is Offended by Your Offense
If both sides are going to prosecute entertainers for thought crimes and failed jokes, our culture is going to become even more tedious.
Lena Dunham received plenty of criticism for her insufferable New Yorker piece titled "Dog or Jewish Boyfriend? A Quiz." In it, the creator of Girls weighs the pros and cons of getting a pet or keeping her Jewish boyfriend: "He doesn't tip," and "he never brings his wallet anywhere," and so on. The jokes may tell us something about her comedic abilities, writes David Harsanyi, but despite much hand-wringing, it tells us nothing about anti-Semitism.
Making fun of your nebbish boyfriend is lame, but it's tough to believe that Dunham was flirting with anything resembling bigotry, Harsanyi argues. Not every ethnic, religious, regional, and racial idiosyncrasy has to be off-limits. If both sides are going to prosecute entertainers for thought crimes and failed jokes, our culture is going to become even more tedious.
