> So perhaps if anybody has a “right” to make jokes in poor taste about the “Demon Core”… it might be the Japanese?

> I’m not here to be the humor police, or to say things should be “off limits” for comedy, or that it’s “too soon,” or make any other scolding noises. Dark humor, in its own strange and inverted way, is arguably a sort of coping mechanism — a defense against the darkness, a way to tame and de-fang the horrors of the world.

I am always of the opinion that as long as the joke lands with the audience or does what the teller intended, it's a good joke. Comedy is about a give and take between the comedian/artist/whatever and their audience.

The problem arises when people think they are an intended audience when they are not (the pope going to a Bill Hicks show), or when a comedian thinks that they're in front of their intended audience when they are not (a conservative comic at the Appolo). A lot of people need to learn this on both sides, and more importantly need to stop complaining when they come to this realization.