Rock around the clock

In Skypeland, not all characters are equally outrageous. Many are calm and reasonable. However, there are a wide range of views about who is reasonable, and who is not, which behaviors are normal and which are not, and which opinions are rational, and which are not.

One participant in Skypeland that evokes widely differing assements is D, a secular American Jew who is living in Greece. D participated as a guard at the Japanese War Crimes Trials at the conclusion of World War II. D is a staunch defender of Israel and Jews, although he is not religious himself. Some other Jews have wondered if D can really claim to be a Jew, but D clearly knows a lot about Judaism and history.

D has a tendency to lecture passionately on subjects he is interested in, or knows a lot about. One of his favorite topics to discuss is Babi Yar, a ditch in the Ukraine that was a dumping ground for tens of thousands of corpses, starting with the slaughter of a large number of Jews by Nazi troops in World War II.

D's defense of Israel and attack of Israel's opponents can sometimes verge on the strident, and there are a large number in Skypeland that either condemn D, or support him. Some of D's opponents are fueled by D's tendency to be very quick to categorize others as enemies. If D judges that someone does not support Israel or Jews aggressively enough, then D will quickly turn on them.

One of D's most striking characteristics is his incredible repertoire of jokes. D finds his favorite joke so humorous that he can only rarely tell it without bursting into laughter. Here is D's favorite joke:

Two Eskimos were fishing through a hole in the ice. One Eskimo asked the other, "say do you have any bait?". The other Eskimo replied, "What do I look like? A clock?"

There is not much more that can be said after that punchline, is there?