One of the great things about working on your jokes with other comedians is that it’s a very safe environment to say almost anything you want. White people can try out racial jokes, men can try out jokes about women, people can use any kind of language they want, whatever. Also, you can poke fun at each other all you want, and no one takes offense, because in that room, everyone works under the same moral code:

If it’s funny, it’s good.

It’s pretty liberating, actually.  In day-to-day life, we all measure our words, we try to avoid saying things that are offensive, and rightly so.  But it’s a great feeling to sit in a room full of other people who will judge what you say ONLY on whether it’s funny or not, rather than on whose feelings you might hurt by saying it.  A week after the Virginia Tech shootings, I had a Virginia Tech joke (I didn’t set out to write it! I swear! It wrote itself in my brain!).  It was great to be able to go into my comedy class that week, tell it, and have everyone laugh at it before someone said, “I think it might be a little too soon for that one.”