A recent survey on bad language at work makes interesting reading. What is interesting is the idea of a politically correct joke.  A joke is often making fun about stereotypes...

So the findings of the survey are:
 
A seismic shift in the acceptability of jokes and slang within the UK workplace has taken place over the last decade, according to a survey of more than 270 company directors by the spoken communications consultancy, The Aziz Corporation.
 
•    Company directors are ten times more likely to find politically correct jokes acceptable in the office than they did ten years ago,  when nearly 40% believed jokes were unacceptable at all times.
 
•    In 1999 only 1% of respondents found politically correct jokes acceptable in internal office meetings, today the figure has increased to nearly 70%.
 
Another shift has taken place in the differentiation between offensive and inoffensive jokes.   In the earlier survey 64% of directors thought politically incorrect jokes were acceptable in informal conversations with colleagues, if funny. Today the proportion has dropped to 47%.
 
•    Mild swear words in internal meetings were deemed unacceptable by all respondents ten years ago. Today 50% have no problem with this with nearly 20% even accepting strong swearing in the office.
 
•    Increasingly slang has become accepted with 64% of directors finding this appropriate even in internal meetings.
 
Khalid Aziz, Chairman of The Aziz Corporation commented:  “British business has been stereotyped for its formality but this survey demonstrates a dramatic change. “
 
“I suspect this process has accelerated during the recession when people are desperate for anything that will raise their spirits.  Britain has a long standing tradition of gallows humour and that may also be a factor; what's the difference between a banker and pigeon?  A pigeon can still make a deposit on a Porsche!"