Posted on 11/17/2018 11:11:52 AM PST by billorites
When former Dartmouth Professor of Government Ned LeBow cracked a joke on a San Francisco elevator, nobody could have foreseen the international firestorm it would spark. The resulting story of p.c. overreaction and academic idiocy left everyone except the 76-year-old professor looking ridiculous.
But not, apparently, quite ridiculous enough. The p.c. pinheads have censured the professor again.
The story began at an academic conference in San Francisco when Professor Lebow, currently of Kings College London found himself on the same elevator as Simona Sharoni, a professor of womens and gender studies at Merrimack College in Massachusetts. When Professor Sharoni courteously asked her fellow riders what floor they needed, Lebow joked Ladies lingerie, please.
And thats where the courtesy ended.
Sharoni claims she was offended by the joke, as well as the laughter of the white, middle-aged men on the elevator. In her formal complaint to the International Studies Association, the organization hosting the conference, Sharoni said: After they walked out, the woman standing next to me turned to me and said, I wonder if we should have told them that it is no longer acceptable to make these jokes!'
The ISA responded to Lebows lame joke, not with an eye roll, but with a rebuke. They ordered him to apologize for his offensive and inappropriate remark. When he refused, they formally censured him.
Now the story has taken another turn, as recounted by Professor Lebow in the Valley News:
I discovered that she [Professor Sharoni] had not grown up in either the U.S. or U.K. where saying ladies lingerie in an elevator is a well-known gag line so I explained in the same email the meaning of my remark and how it was in no way directed against women.
"I further suggested that I considered a complaint of the kind she made damaging to efforts of women to combat serious and unacceptable mistreatment.
"She complained to the ISA, this time about my having contacted her, and I was censured a second time."
Comedy is in the eye of the beholder and it may be that Professor Sharoni simply didnt like Lebows attempt at humor. But why complain over an attempt by the gentleman to explain the comment and clear up any confusion over its offensiveness? Complaining the first time was embarrassing enough. Why complain again?
Anda more significant questionwhy would an (allegedly) serious academic institution like the ISA pile on with a second censure? Professor Lebow has a theory:
What ISA officials want is not an apology but a capitulation .giving in to their demands would further chill free speech among younger colleagues and students who are far more vulnerable than I am to sanction by their professional organization.
Somebody in this story is getting bullied. How many people believe its the gender-studies professor from Massachusetts?
No one would know what you were talking about.
One of the big gifts that the Left grants to us is this tendency on their part to eat their own. One day you’re part of the PC mob, attacking others for this or that violation, and the next day, you’re the victim. There’s only one person on Earth who is immune, but nobody knows who it is. They would have to be on the “oppressed” side of every possible schism imaginable.
That isnt what you said. Lol @ defending an untruth with an untruth.
Happy Thanksgiving!
RUN!!!
and don't look back. (DANG!)
” My mother want trying to get into the panties of anyone riding the elevator, she was making a freaking joke.”
Um...say what? Maybe some typos in that sentence?
Writing comedy skits 101
Elevators
A stock phrase associated with department store elevators, which in Real Life often emit a prerecording that lists the “departments” of the current floor. (In the days of live elevator operators, it was typically the operator’s job to do this.)
Typically the formula is two normal items and a plot relevant item, though this can be mixed up by having another mundane item after the plot-relevant item. The plot-relevant item is often jarringly discordant with the other mundane items.
The Gender Studies takes less than a minute.
There are two things to understand - Innies and Outies.
When you've got that you've mastered the subject.
The Women's studies is different.
Understanding women is a whole different ball of wax!
No one has ever mastered that subject.
Simone Sharoni is an excellent example of why that is.
Taking everything as literal is a sign of mental illness.
Depends how you say it.
“Ladies Lawn Jerry.”
[There are two things to understand ...
When you’ve got that you’ve mastered the subject.]
O.K., you’ve already lost Barack and Moochelle and their followers.
These are very difficult concepts. For them, that is.
It Way predates that British show to the beginning of television; and Most people from then recognize it.
Good find! I forgot about that one.
Delightfully incorrect, politically speaking.
Being born in 1945 I can remember being in department stores that had elevator attendants who announce the items for sale on each as the elevator arrived at that floor. Invariably, it be something similar to: “Third floor, ladies’ lingerie, dresses, gowns, and beauty products” followed by “Fourth floor, mens’ haberdashery.”
When elevator attendants went away so did the announcements, they were replaced by a directory posted near the elevator.
Naturally, ‘50s comedians had many jokes with the, “Third floor, ladies lingerie.” as a punchline. The jokes were harmless and not in the least riske. I take that you might be rather young to never have heard the subject line spoken in jest.
Only a humourless, trouble-seeking, radical would take offense where none was intended.
Being born in 1945 I can remember being in department stores that had elevator attendants who announce the items for sale on each as the elevator arrived at that floor. Invariably, it be something similar to: “Third floor, ladies’ lingerie, dresses, gowns, and beauty products” followed by “Fourth floor, mens’ haberdashery.”
When elevator attendants went away so did the announcements, they were replaced by a directory posted near the elevator.
Naturally, ‘50s comedians had many jokes with the, “Third floor, ladies lingerie.” as a punchline. The jokes were harmless and not in the least riske. I take that you might be rather young to never have heard the subject line spoken in jest.
Only a humourless, trouble-seeking, radical would take offense where none was intended.
Being born in 1945 I can remember being in department stores that had elevator attendants who announce the items for sale on each as the elevator arrived at that floor. Invariably, it be something similar to: “Third floor, ladies’ lingerie, dresses, gowns, and beauty products” followed by “Fourth floor, mens’ haberdashery.”
When elevator attendants went away so did the announcements, they were replaced by a directory posted near the elevator.
Naturally, ‘50s comedians had many jokes with the, “Third floor, ladies lingerie.” as a punchline. The jokes were harmless and not in the least riske. I take that you might be rather young to never have heard the subject line spoken in jest.
Only a humourless, trouble-seeking, radical would take offense where none was intended.
Being born in 1945 I can remember being in department stores that had elevator attendants who announce the items for sale on each as the elevator arrived at that floor. Invariably, it be something similar to: “Third floor, ladies’ lingerie, dresses, gowns, and beauty products” followed by “Fourth floor, mens’ haberdashery.”
When elevator attendants went away so did the announcements, they were replaced by a directory posted near the elevator.
Naturally, ‘50s comedians had many jokes with the, “Third floor, ladies lingerie.” as a punchline. The jokes were harmless and not in the least riske. I take that you might be rather young to never have heard the subject line spoken in jest.
Only a humourless, trouble-seeking, radical would take offense where none was intended.
Many departments stores in the cities had elevators and one of the floors was womens' undergarments.
It was a running gag for years in elevators when the human operator would ask you, "What floor?" the laugh line was "Ladies lingerie, please".
It's an old joke and outdated for today's Marxist PC language and to those like yourself, who don't even know where the line came from.
The exact etiology I don't know but try watching a bunch of old B&W movies from the 30s and 40s and 50s and you'll eventually catch the line in a script.
Those old movies are what made the then-funny gag line popular.
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