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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dannager" data-source="post: 6186628" data-attributes="member: 73683">Oh god.There weren't any "rape jokes". There was a joke that referenced rape, but the topic of the strip was not rape, and neither rape nor the rape victim was the punchline.No. Full stop.We're saying rape jokes (which this wasn't) - and jokes in general - are okay because they're jokes. Humor is one of the ways we, as human beings, deal with difficult situations. Rape is not off-limits for comedy, just as murder, dismemberment, tragedy, war, or any number of potentially uncomfortable topics are not off-limits. Because if we made a habit of self-censoring our comedy every time someone decided to be offended by it and (rather than simply removing themselves from exposure to that bit of comedy) complain loudly on the internet, we'd rapidly have very, very little humor left.(I mean, come on, have you ever seen a comedy roast? The stuff that gets said on there would be incredibly offensive were it not for the context of comedy surrounding it. It's many times worse than anything PA has ever done, and it's funny as hell and shouldn't have to take crap from people who think the ability to laugh at knock-knock jokes constitutes a well-developed sense of humor.)This is not something that is optional for you to understand. You need to wrap your head around this, before you discuss this any further.People threatened harm to his family.People who think that making a joke that references rape in their comedy webcomic strip constitutes "behaving badly" do need to stop being so sensitive.What the hell do "PA fanbois" (I really cannot believe you are stooping to that kind of terminology) have to do with this? Mike lashed out because people threatened his family. The best you can come up with is that people lashed out at Mike because "PA fanbois" threatened them? That makes sense to you?Yeah, it is, because he shouldn't feel the need to keep quiet about his own work.He brought it up because he was asked a question and he felt it was the correct response. The people who refuse to drop it refuse to drop it because they are engaged in a concerted, drawn-out effort to tear Penny Arcade down for its perceived insensitivity. I wish I were joking, but that is their explicit goal.Are you really going to be one of those people who sees a kid getting bullied finally lash out at the people harassing him, and then go and blame the kid?No, because that isn't something worth defending.Because that's not a point worth defending, either (though some of the bloggers in question definitely want to make PAX out to look like a haven for pro-rape knuckledraggers because that suits their agenda).</blockquote>

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