Legal Quandary

Lawyers Taking Themselves Too Seriously? Never!

I went to a staff meeting today where my boss expressed his intense dislike for lawyer jokes. I've heard this view before, most recently at graduation, when our entire graduating class was yelled at for the shame we would bring to the profession at some future date.

On the flip side, one of the Staff Judge Advocates* I knew long ago, would either lead or close with a lawyer joke when it was his turn to talk at Wing Staff Meeting.

To be fair to my boss, he was addressing a recent and very serious ethics issue. One which has the potential to make us the target of lots of jokes of the "lawyers are all liars and cheats" variety.

But I'm curious what other attorneys, law students, and non-lawyers think about the subject. Personally, I think tasteful humor is a good way to humanize lawyers a bit - to show we can laugh at ourselves. Especially in a military environment where the only thing people seem to associate with lawyers is prosecution. Your thoughts?

*The SJA is the senior attorney in the organization. The other military lawyers in the office are Assistant Staff Judge Advocates. I think it's analogous to many Prosecutor's offices.

posted by Legal Quandary at 21:28