On causing offence

From: Laurence Shandy
To: Peterborough City Council - Peterborough, England
Re: Offensive slogans

Dear Peterborough City Council,

International literary celebrity Laurence Shandy here. I recently read about your town's harassment of American expatriate David Pratt over his novelty t-shirt. Being a cultural relativist, I will not criticize your hamlet's rules of law. In America, as you may be aware, citizens such as myself (i.e. rich and white) enjoy the freedom of constitutionally protected speech. For example, I could stop a wandering English tourist on the sidewalk in front of my opulent apartment building and, with no fear of legal recourse, proceed to berate him for his home country's bestial predilection for boiled meats and neglected dental hygiene. In your community, this kind of behavior would saddle me with an eighty-pound fine, but here, it's simply called patriotism.

I understand why you would ban David Pratt from wearing his shirt. Its slogan, "Don't piss me off; I'm running out of places to hide the bodies", is clearly harmful to the disposition of the average Englishman. Only a citizenry bereft of ironic understanding could possibly tolerate a taxpayer-funded royal family, so it's no wonder that a passerby who might glance at Pratt's shirt would become frightened for his life. Humor is a subtle and slippery animal. For all a commoner knows, Pratt may be eying his next victim -- ready to snap at any moment. Sure, he offers a public warning of his murderous ways printed across his chest, but such brazen insanity may just be another symptom of his sociopathic psychosis.

Those who would walk about on the public sidewalks of Peterborough have a responsibility not to offend the half-wits and water-brained who hold no grasp on sarcasm or any other form of comedy. The sheepish, neurotic police force, likewise, have a responsibility to warn and, if need be, fine any public offenders. And you, the complacent, subservient, passive-aggressively fascistic Peterborough City Council, have jobs to justify.

Best wishes,
Laurence Shandy, gentleman