SOURCE: Weinsheimer, Joel. “Shaftesbury in Our Time: The Politics of Wit and Humor.” Eighteenth Century 36, no. 2 (summer 1995): 178-88.

In the essay below, Weinsheimer compares the criticism of Shaftesbury's satire with prohibitions against certain forms of “offensive” humor in contemporary American culture.

“The main problem is we live in a world with no sense of humor or irony.” Such was Art Spiegelman's response to the outrage ignited by his New Yorker cover depicting a Hasidic Jew kissing an African-American woman. “We are stunned that you approved the use of a painting that is obviously insensitive,” wrote the director of the Anti-Defamation League. Likewise Rev. Herbert Daughtry, a black activist, called the artwork “crude and offensive” to both blacks and Jews, saying it “trivializes the problems” between the two communities. “A tasteless publicity stunt,” asserted Rabbi Abraham Flint, and so on.¹

Instances of the humorlessness Spiegelman complains of are not...