For the most part, I have a good understanding of what is funny.

I have funny friends. I watch funny shows. Sometimes I’m even told I am funny.

Everyone has his or her own sense of humor — mine is erring on the side of nerdy — but some people have an especially warped idea of funny.

Usually those people have the ability to shock, and experts say that shock is one of the main components of making someone laugh.

But some jokes are a little too shocking. What really determines if the shocking joke is so tongue-in-cheek it’s hilarious or if it falls flat is the person it’s coming from.

Take, for instance, the Tucson pair — one of whom is a former UA student — who decided to dress up as an airplane and one of the twin towers for a Halloween party.

Now, people have made jokes about Sept. 11 in the past, but for the most part they have been jokes about people who mention Sept. 11 — Rudy Giuliani, anyone? But rarely have the jokes been so graphic as to depict burning action figures and people jumping out of a building.

I don’t know Nicole Cassese or Yael Nadel-Cadaxa, the two people who took this joke too far, but I do know they have a warped sense of humor, and not in the good way.

Conservative news outlets have gotten a hold of this story and have had a field day with it. Assuming that these two students are left-wing, freedom of speech-loving God forbid. Liberals who are completely misguided, they have torn the couple a (cough) new one.

I’m not here to do that. By now I’m sure they know what they did was wrong. I figure the costumes were part of an inside joke said in privacy that was taken to public with reckless disregard for other’s opinions. It was tacky, tasteless and rude.

But with a not-so-ordinary name like Yael Nadel-Cadaxa, you’d figure they’d try a little harder to be discreet. No judgments with the name ; I just care about their safety.

Posting on Craigslist’s “Rants & Raves” section have suggested that “these two should be shot to death” and that “their idiot liberal parents, who probably thought it was artistic, should be put in jail for just being flat out too moronic to exist in society.”

Anger is understood. I can’t help but empathize with the students, though. Not because I think what they did was funny or right in any way — I don’t — but because they will be forever known as the students who made this horrible mistake.

One Google search of their names brings up news results for their costume. Cassese is a journalism major, and not one of her stories comes up when you enter her name.

I can’t help but think that their “joke” is part of a larger social phenomenon of shock humor. We’ve become desensitized, partially, I’d say, due to popular media.

When I was growing up in conservative Gilbert, many of my fellow students were unable to discuss the previous night’s “Simpsons” episode because their parents simply did not let them watch it. It was too gritty.

In comparison to today’s “Family Guy,” or really anything else shown on Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim, “The Simpsons” seem extremely mild. They’ve even had to make their humor a bit more edgy to draw more viewers.

If I had kids, I’m not entirely sure that I’d allow them to watch any of these programs. This is coming from a liberal, left-wing, freedom of speech lover.

It’s a strange dilemma for me, filled with pros and cons. Freedom of speech is probably stronger than it ever has been before in the past, but at what cost? Is it really doing society a favor?

I’ll leave that up to you to decide.

Try your jokes out on me at christina.caldwell@asu.edu.