It's said often that we should have a sense of humour,
able to see the funny side of things less favourable than we wish,
able to laugh at oneself instead of self pity or indulging in soul
destroying stress. Some are blessed with sense of humour, others have to
cultivate it; some come up with funny and encouraging comments
lightening the serious of a bad situation, others simply make fun at
others' expense. Unfortunately there are too many of the latter.
When
humour mocks or ridicules other people's physical defects, disability,
or their abject situation or circumstance, it becomes a jeer, a
mockery, a downright contempt and an insult, on top of display one's own
lack of compassion and basic human decency.
I greatly enjoy humour, the kind that's intelligent, a mixture of irony, satire, optimistic and positive criticism, small doses of resignation and generous tolerance.
This
little outburst of mine here had been boiling in my heart since this
early morning, when I saw a group of teenagers, without any
provocation, were laughing at one very unhappy girl, about the same age,
plain, with a cracked lip and an obvious limp. I am not going to put
down here what they said to that poor creature suffering such injustice
of nature, life or destiny. I am not able to repeat the insults
because it shames and pains me there are such people amongst us; and
the parents who obviously had not done their duty of educating their
youngsters the basic courtesy and decency, qualities not found in
school text books.
If
they can't show the less fortunate compassion or help, they should at
least refrain themselves from throwing at her sick humour that merely
magnifies their own deficiency as human beings.
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