The moment the PC brigade win the argument to stop people being the butt of jokes, there will no longer be any humour possible. And at that point, I will be leaving the planet.
Bernard Manning might not have been to everybody's taste, but he simply did not feel constrained by any limits on what he was prepared to joke about. He was very funny and clever.
The best one I ever heard about Bernard Manning, was when he was doing a show at a very 'Northern Town', with the audience full of a lot of genuinely racist people, and he made a joke about the Falklands War at the expense of the Argentinians, which naturally went down well with many in the audience. Then he added 'But seriously, there are a couple of lads in the audience with us tonight who are genuine veterans of the Falklands War, so I'd like you to give them a big hand'. At which point many started enthusiastically applauding. Moments later Bernard added: 'Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Jose and Pedro.' Whereupon all the bigots in the audience realised that Manning was totally taking the p*ss out of their racist attitudes.
Bernard Manning was very clever like that, and pulling something like that off live requires an intimate knowledge of the audience and perfect comedy timing.
It's like that joke he made about his grandfather dying at Auschwitz, which he would occasionally stun audiences with, only to add that it was when he fell off a machine gun tower and broke his neck. Regardless of whether you think it was in poor taste, in terms of comic construction and timing, it was very clever.
His comedy style was not my cup of tea personally, but I can appreciate his wit and ability to come up with some great jokes.
Chock