> I have no idea what any of that post means. Sorry.
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> Anyway, I have organized some thoughts in my head that I think will help clarify what I'm thinking.
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> The point I'm trying to make are that there is an area between "humor involving sin" and "humor that is corrupt" (which, engaging in, I suppose, is a sin itself). The gray area between encompasses a range of humor of varying degrees of advisability, and the sinfulness of its use may depend on circumstance.
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> Before I substantiate the second part of that, let me substantiate the first by refuting that all humor involving sin IS sin. I don't see how it can be. As you all know by now, movies are my most comfortable area of media, so let's go by them. Every dark comedy ever made goes out the door. Charlie Chaplin's "Monsieur Verdoux," a dark comedy about a man who tries to off his various wives, goes out the door. "The Great Muppet Caper," involving a jewel heist, goes out the door. "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World," a sordid tale of greed and double crosses, goes out the door. Any incidence of humor which involves a lie goes out the door.
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> RinkWorks is downright depraved. Yank out half the Filmmaker's Exam, because there are questions about aberrant or exhibitionist sexual content in movies. Chock out a handful of Computer Stupidities, because some of the anecdotes have humor that derives from the angry profanity of disgruntled consumers. I Think #115 is out. The vast majority of the IABBBBM reviews are out, especially the one for Slumber Party Massacre, which elaborates on the insidiously transparent and ineffective measures the filmmakers take to pretend it isn't just a blood-and-skin flick. How To Be Romantic jokes about men who which to appease their wives and invest as little time as possible into the effort. Book-A-Minute Bedtime, in the introduction to that page, jokingly *advocates* the shirking of parental responsibility.
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> We joke about sin with every other chuckle and half the time we never think twice about it. Is this all sin? Doubtful. So why is it ok to joke about some sins and not others? Gluttony, shirked responsibility, false witness -- these are all common fair game. Murder can be funny without a second thought if it's done well enough, as Chaplin did. The opening sequence of "The Wrong Box" is another example. Drunkness is ok, too. It's impossible to COUNT all the movies made in which a drunken bum extra sees something crazy going on, mistakes it for a hallucination, looks shakily at his bottle of liquor, chucks it away, and swears off the stuff for good.
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> Is this all sin? If you're nodding your head solemnly, we have nothing more to say on the matter. But assuming you're still with me, I have just established that "humor involving sin" does not imply "humor that is sin." That conclusion makes it necessary to consider the logical question, "Where, then, is the line drawn?"
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> For starters, let me explain what I'm NOT going to explain. I'm NOT going to touch on issues you brought up in your post about laughing at something in private vs. laughing at something in front of someone who will be hurt by it. All that stuff concerns other issues; by laughing at someone who will be hurt by it, the sin is in the lack of consideration for others, or possibly actual malicious intent, or whatever. Whether the humor itself is also sinful or not is an issue polluted by the other circumstances.
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> Actually the other thing I should say before I continue is that if you're still with me, I've established all I feel it necessary to establish. If you don't agree with what follows, that's fine; I don't find it worth fighting about. But here it is, to trigger more thought on the matter.
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> But if we're talking purely whether the humor itself is INHERENTLY sinful or not, what I believe about this is that it depends on a number of things, not just about the humor itself but about who is relating the humor. How can this be? How can the same action possibly be ok for one individual and inadvisable for another?
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> I'll make an analogy to another area in which I believe this to be true. Consider a pornographic photograph of a nude woman, and an artistic photograph of a modestly dressed woman. By Christian beliefs, lust is a sin. I think it would not be controversial to say that the act of *creating* the pornographic image is a sin, and that the act of *creating* the artistic photo is not. But what about looking at them? You can lust after a modestly dressed woman. You can look at a pornographic image (why? I don't know -- you could be the model's father and want to know what's going on, or a judge in a court case over it, or a psychologist making a study of human sexuality, or just a guy that happens to be looking at it for no particular reason) and NOT lust after it. So let's take something in the middle. An artistic, non-pornographic nude photograph. Is it sinful to create, view, or distribute such a photograph? Different people will have different perceptions of where the gray area is between "clothed image" and "porn image" so if "art nude" doesn't hit close to where you draw the line, pick an example that does. Is creating, viewing, or distributing images like these sinful?
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> I believe it depends on the person involved. We're all different. We all have different emotional strengths and weaknesses. If you can handle artistic nudes without falling into lust, without "stumbling in your walk with Christ," so to speak, I don't believe it's a sin. If you have a weakness in this area, then exposing yourself to that kind of material is, I believe, a sin. It's a gray area. The sinfulness of these things, or lack thereof, is often not inherent in the image itself but in the individual and his knowledge of his own weaknesses.
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> Having established that, I submit that there's a LOT of gray area in the realm of humor that conforms to similar rules.

I know this is not my post, and I may be out of line interjecting here, but I think what Grishny is saying can be supported in the bible. Eating of the meat offered to idols. A rightous man knows that there is nothing wrong with the meat. It is simply meat that has been cooked. Never mind that it was offered to a non-existant diety. Since the diety does not exist, the meat is nothing more than cooked meat and the rightous man man does not sin simply by eating it. But if an unsaved person sees him eat it, he may feel that the rightous man is a hypocrit since he says one thing (his witness for God) and outwardly shows something else (eating meat sacrificed to an idol.) This makes the rightous man sin since his witness has been scarred by his otherwise non-sinful actions. The same can be said for many other things. For instance, I don't believe that alcohol in and of itself is evil. I have been known to partake, although never to excess (I have *never* been drunk.) But I do not visit bars for any reason because if I witness for Jesus, and then allow myself to be seen in a bar with a cool one on the table in front of me, I run a high probability of letting someone who needs to have the right influence, get the wrong idea instead. I think this is what Grishny is saying. Sam, I don't think he is attacking your actions, or even saying that you have commited a vile sin, but that when you play that close to the gray area you have mentioned, you run the distinct chance of giving the wrong impression to people, and that *can* be just as bad as outright sinning.

Drac "I was not there either, so I really can't make an opinion about what happened" imaS