I’m not sure which depresses me most about the Popemail ‘scandal’: that executives in the FCO have time to muck around making gags while Britain’s exports continue to fall – or that nobody else seems to be able to take a joke. Once again, however, we’ve seen profound apologies and ritual humiliation of those who dared to have a sense of humour about something to do with religion. The increasing number of topics now off-limits for humour ought to be enough to tell anyone with a functioning brain that our culture will lose its liberties even more quickly if it loses its sense of humour. Gays, accents, extreme beliefs, gender and a host of other things must now be serious.

Certainly, the Papal visit suggestions made me laugh – Benedict condoms especially. But there’s no difference between this, it seems to me, and Paul Whitehouse doing a spoof commercial for Nelson Mandela’s Fighting Lager. There’s also a case for saying this is good satire: after all, persisting in the support of zero birth control in the 21st century (when there’s too much AIDS and not enough water) is so crazy, I think it’s a shame that the paedophile scandal is distracting attention from what is a far bigger problem – far too many of us.

Human beings will argue forever about what is and isn’t funny. My definition remains simple: if people of good heart laugh at something, it’s probably harmless….and it might even do some good. In fact one way and another, it’s been a week to ponder about such things.

“Scotland needs a champion” began Scot Andrew Marr this morning, before interviewing Scot Alex Salmond and after opining at some length about Scottish Prime Minister Gordon Brown. I laughed out loud at this, which gave my wife a start. She didn’t think it was funny, because first she’s Welsh, and second she doesn’t give a monkey’s about nationality or politics. Horses, dogs and Welsh rugger is as far as she leans in the direction of species favouritism.

A cracker of a literal on the BBCNews site last Wednesday (‘Parties seek lift from TV cash’) was hastily taken down in favour of ‘clash’, but after the FCO revelations I’m beginning to wonder if maybe there’s a few cases of tickle-cell disease in the BBC too. Is it altogether nice to make a pun about sickle-cell disease? I’d say yes – certainly no worse than referring to Loyd Grossman as suffering from irritable vowel syndrome.

Those are just two wildly differing examples. Only the madness of pc-fixated Big State Harmanism could imagine one could ever stop human beings laughing at peculiarity and difference: once more until it hurts, we are pack animals wired to question the right of unusual pack members to be in that pack.

Are Popes, Muslims, gays and women funny? Sometimes, of course they are. The Papal visit gags are a non-story – made newsworthy by the hypersensitivity of a society in emotional meltdown.