Lawyer joke
Lawyer jokes are a species of professional humor and reflect the exasperation of the general public with the cost, uncertainty and delay of the legal system, at least in the U.S., where there are estimated to be about 2 million law school graduates (not all of whom are practicing lawyers). There is a common perception that lawyers, like many other professionals, arrange the system more for their own benefit than for the common good which they supposedly serve.
Lawyer jokes also provide what some describe as a relatively non-controversial outlet for humor about unpopular groups, in an age in which humor based on race, creed, color, sexual orientation, physical or mental disabilities, or national origin is taboo. Unlike the preceding groups, lawyers are not commonly perceived as targets of discrimination or violence, and are apparently fair game for humor that might be considered harsh if applied to some other group.
Four examples of Lawyer jokes follow:
- Why didn't Cupid fill the lawyer's heart with love by shooting an arrow at it?
- Are you kidding? Even Cupid can't hit a target that small.
- What's Black and Brown, and looks good on a lawyer?
- Either a Doberman Pinscher, or a Pit Bull.
- What do you call 200 lawyers, with a chain around their necks, attached to a 10 ton weight at the bottom of the sea?
- A good start.
(This joke was popularised in the movie Philadelphia.)
- What's the difference between a dead lawyer on the road, and a dead skunk on the road?
- Only the dead skunk has skid marks in front of it.
A somewhat kinder view of lawyers is embodied in the following story:
- A priest, a lawyer and a rabbi are marooned on a desert island surrounded by man-eating sharks. After a while their food and water run out and they are in danger of death. Just then an otherwise empty rowboat containing a large barrel of water comes floating by. The three castaways are in agony - they must have the water, but to swim through the hungry sharks is certain death. The lawyer says he will try it - the others beg him not to, saying "It's hopeless".
- The lawyer swims out to the boat, grasps the painter rope in his teeth and tows it back to shore. The sharks completely ignore him. When he gets back to shore they all begin talking at once:
- PRIEST: It's a miracle! It's a miracle!.
- LAWYER: That was no miracle.
- RABBI: Well, what DO you call it?.
- LAWYER: Where I come from, we call that "professional courtesy".
Anecdotal history
Dislike for the legal profession includes many historical anecdotes frequently misunderstood:
- Shakespeare, with the depiction of Cade's rebellion in Henry VI, Part 2, gives the well-known line, "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." Although this is usually interpreted to be antagonistic to lawyers, precisely the opposite meaning is intended. Cade seeks to cement his revolution by destroying the justice system.
On the other hand, there are Hamlet remarks about lawyers in the Graveyard scene.
- Jesus Christ, in the New Testament, has an antagonistic relationship with the lawyers of his day, and condemns them on a number of occasions, including Luke 11:45-52, and Luke 14:1-6. Much of this criticism relates to the enforcement of the strict religious government of his time.
There are a number of colloquial synonyms for lawyers, e.g. ambulance chaser, based on to the conceit that some of them will jump at any chance to offer their services to accident casualties.
Lawyers themselves frequently write humorously about their profession. A list of such articles is here: [1]. Supernatural Law is a humorous comic concerning "Wolff and Byrd, Counselors of the Macabre".