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Original poster

Saw a birthday card about gingers

51 replies

madhairgirl · 21/09/2011 17:15

Was in a gallery type shop in the Lakes today, and I was looking at the birthday cards they had. One by a well known card company person said on the front "Dear JK Rowling, I find your Harry Potter books very unrealistic. Whoever heard of a Ginger having 2 friends". I found it really unfunny, my DH thought it was good! Why are redheads fair game. If that had been about the colour of someones skin, they wouldn't get away with it, so why is it ok when it is someone's hair?

OP posts:
worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:20

Haha love it! Grin

Fortunately there are still some people who have a little chuckle at something that's obviously meant as a joke, and then they just move on.

northernmonkey · 21/09/2011 17:24

I am ginger and so is my brother, we find jokes like these hilarious in fact I go out of my way to find cards like that Grin
Maybe that's just my weird sense of humour

Whatmeworry · 21/09/2011 17:25

Hnads OP a League Of The Professionally Offended badge, with Bells on.

carabos · 21/09/2011 17:25

In this house it would be "Whoever heard of a ginger with ONLY 2 friends..." Grin. DS2 is ginger and top of the pops with his mates.

picnicbasketcase · 21/09/2011 17:25

Are you supposed to call redheads 'gingers', come to that?

Sirzy · 21/09/2011 17:26

There have been blonde jokes for years so this is no different/worse

I don't like a lot of the "jokey" cards so don't buy them!

worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:28

I imagine when our grand children are growing up, we'll be taking them to museums with 'humour' and 'comedy' in little display cabinets...and telling them it's a thing of the past Hmm

Original poster
madhairgirl · 21/09/2011 17:30

Ok need a sense if humour, just don't want my DC to grow up thinking there is something wrong with the colour of their hair. Have already had complete strangers making horrible comments about it once when they were in the library and I just felt that this makes that sort if thing acceptable.

OP posts:
BupcakesandCunting · 21/09/2011 17:36

Hmmm. I'm torn.

My best friend is a beautiful red head and she takes the gingerist jokes very well. She even shakes her fist at them and calls them gingerists, which i find hysterical.

I wouldn't like it if it were my child but then I think that kids need to learn to be thicker skinned because if it's not one thing, it's another. It's a fact of life that idiots people will always find something to rib. You just need to reinfornce confidence in your kids that they and their hair is beautiful.

Sometimes you just have to stop being offended at shit like this because you can find offence in most things if you look hard enough. It's best for your sanity. :)

stretch · 21/09/2011 17:37

I think it's horrible, I have a sense of humour thanks as well.
I wonder how many would be so blase about 'funny ginger people' if from the day you were 10 you were asked (by kids and adults) what colour your pubes were. (Still happens now) Imagine going through puberty (hard enough) like that.

And no, blonde jokes aren't the same, blondes are revered; gingers are ridiculed.

worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:38

But they also need to grow up not thinking that the world is against them and anything remotely amusing is a personal attack on them.

Well balanced children will eventually learn that different people find different things funny and that being able to laugh at ourselves and others, is different to being nasty.

Deflatedballoonbelly · 21/09/2011 17:39

Oh yes! No humour left on this planet, grumble grumble.

When its you who was tormented at school, all through your teens and when teens now still deem it OK to come up to your face and be bloody rude about your hair colour, its not so funny. Nor is it funny when your offspring have RED hair and people find it funny to tell jokes in front of them too, when they are tiny its also not funny. Hmm

unpa1dcar3r · 21/09/2011 17:39

Hey I'm from Essex...ok who's got some good Essex Girl Jokes for me?

i love red hair on people but still found that joke funny when I first heard it about 5 yrs ago. It's rather old...oh dear am i being ageist now?
My SIL is Irish, we save all the paddy jokes for him and he loves em.

All jokes are permissible as long as the recipient of the joke can defend themselves. If they are made at the expense of anyone who cannot defend themselves then that is reprehensible. Just my opinion.

Tortington · 21/09/2011 17:41

my dh refers to himself jokingly as titian.

i call him a red headed bastard - he calls me a midget.

not sure this is helping your cause op

Tortington · 21/09/2011 17:41

blonde jokes are better

love a good blonde joke

Deflatedballoonbelly · 21/09/2011 17:42

Funny thing is, I can take a well meant actually funny joke about red hair. But the way some people refer to ginger people as 'them' etc... as if we are a race, and then claim its not in any way prejudice when they shout 'oi ginge, hows your minge' across the street.

How would your 13 yo DD feel about that?

worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:43

I'm short

From Essex

Irish heritage

Probably every comedian's dream Grin

Deflatedballoonbelly · 21/09/2011 17:45

I appear to have a complex! Grin

Im very sensitive towards my kids tbh.Kids can be cruel and I know if it wasnt one thing it would another but... it can very spiteful. I had a mini argument with a mother in the playground the other week who was adamant that if she wanted to refer to my child as ginger, she bloody well would Shock

ShowOfHands · 21/09/2011 17:46
Tortington · 21/09/2011 17:48

only a ninja...

love tim

worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:48

Lol ShowOfHands did you see the first comment on that link!

"There are redheaded girls and there are ginger girls, trust me I'm irish. yes redheaded girls are hot. Ginger girls are like irish albinos."

The mind boggles Shock

wonkylegs · 21/09/2011 17:48

'blondes are revered; redheads are ridiculed' hahahaha
I've spent a large chunk of my life being immediately judged as ditzy or dumb or out to steal other women's husbands or that it can't be real because nobody your age is really blonde Hmm
It's a joke, laugh if you find it funny, don't if you don't, then move on like the rest of us .... It makes life so much easier

lifechanger · 21/09/2011 17:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

stretch · 21/09/2011 17:49

Erm worral, I think you'll find that someone shouting across the street, "oi Ginger Minge" in front of your children is a personal attack. Then to have that abuse condoned on TV with the likes of Graham Norton (remember the show he had and the episode about what colour pubes do gingers have?)
Yeah, not personal at all.

worraliberty · 21/09/2011 17:49

I don't know where the numbers came from? Confused

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