From Spot the Dog:

Another thought occured to me...do lawyers feel offended at jokes about them?...like the one who fell into a logoon full of sharks and swam out unscathed...when asked how he managed this feat he just said..professional courtesy.... Is this offensive to their profession?

Well, having been one for 30+ years, I would say, there are a good number of lawyers who fit the sterotype. But if you tell jokes that depict all lawyers as heartless, greedy, win-at-all-costs, take-your-last-penny-for-fees types, it's as offensive to those who don't - and if I do, and am not richer than I am, that means I'm dreadfully incompetent - as any other joke based on a negative stereotype of a group.

If I looked hard, I could certainly find some lazy, stupid, criminal blacks; some drunken, wife-beating Irishmen; miserly, conniving Jews; or some Australians who were "violently alcoholic roughnecks whose idea of a good time is throwing up on your car" (National Lampoon, mid-1970s). If the fact that some of all of the above exist doesn't justify digs that assume all of the group fits the stereotype, why should it with lawyers?

Or is it the idea that "they have no feelings anyway?" That's been applied to others in the past. Maybe it's just our turn.

Peter.