Finnegan's Wake began as an English musical hall song that ridiculed the Irish. But it is such a damn good song, with such a wonderful metaphor of resurrection, that the Irish soon adopted it as their own. Likewise, The Auld Orange Flute started as a song that ridiculed the Roman Catholic Church, but it is such a wonderful song that today it is more often sung by Irish Catholics in self-mocking humor than it is sung by Protestants. By the same token, did the songs of the late Alan Sherman perpetuate stereotypes of the Jews? Or were they intended to lampoon one's own group, and thereby confront prejudice with humor? I believe we all know the answer.

I do not know where, when, or under what circumstances Ralph the Magic Drag Queen originated. It has certainly been around for a long time. A friend tells me that he heard Al Cooper (later from Blood, Sweat, and Tears) sing a version of it in the mid 1960s. I do know that it has been taken up my gay men, and that if you go to Provincetown in the summer or Key West in the winter there is a chance you will sung in chorus around a piano. Pat the Irish Faggot is a piece of more recent political satire that came out of the struggle by the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization of New York to march in that city's official Saint Patrick's Day parade.