How to shoot down someone else's sexism/racism/etc. without looking like an asshole?

[CynicalIdealist]

Topic.

Racist/sexist jokes in particular. It seems especially hard to defend blondes during a blonde joke, and blonde jokes are basically proxies for sexist jokes so...

[Broletariat]

"Fuck you"

[CynicalIdealist]

I like your answer and I'm sure I'll use it sometimes, but that wasn't really what I was looking for. >_>

[Broletariat]

I like your answer and I'm sure I'll use it sometimes, but that wasn't really what I was looking for. >_>

Tolerating intolerance is intolerable, I really don't care if I look like an asshole while deriding bigots, that's almost sort of the point.

[wunderbar]

Tell them why it's sexist/racist/whateverist and how it's wrong. I know it seems obvious and that people should know better, but the truth is many don't for one reason or another. I don't think "fuck you" is the best response because it just gives them an opportunity to act like they're the victim and that people are trying to silence them, which is bullshit of course.

This is assuming you or someone else hasn't talked to them about this before. If they just keep going at it, "fuck you" or some other insult is probably all you can do.