I apologise to all the members of Poetry Circle, especially Tom, for implying that American baseball players are homosexuals and that the game is akin to women's rounders and not a sport for real men like cricket is.

Thank you Tom for picking up on my insensitivity and deleting the offending word

Peter, what offends me is your idea of sexuality, or gender itself, as insult. Please cut it out. Tom

 Although I was only kidding - playing on the macho image of some 'male' sports and competiveness of nations: like the stereotypical tally ho British rugger player to the frontier hardness of some US males as opposed to the old caricature of the limp-wristed gay man (which can be the opposite now as apparently many body-build etc and can be more macho than Robert Mitchum) - I can see how it is nontheless offensive.

and it's got me thinking why in this age of openness when we can joke about necrophiliacs, masturbators, peeping toms, transvestites, phone-sex, inflatable Paul Simons and flagellation, we can't comfortably joke about homosexuality

Peter, using "homosexual" as shorthand for "inferior/unmanly" in a joke about the comparative manliness of two sports is not a joke about homosexuality; it is using "homosexual" as shorthand for "inferior/unmanly". Exploiting that destructive stereotype in the service of humor does not make you a bigot but in my judgment it is offensive and violates the PC's code of civility. - Tom

Tom, exactly!  Just like many sexual jokes magnify the size of a man's penis, or fishing gags embroider the incompetence of the angler, or toilet jokes exaggerate the looseness of the bowels so this joke distorted in its view of all gay men as effeminate (hence not candidates for robust sport)

I must stress I have some gay pals, have nothing whatsoever against gay men (as long as they keep their distance in the urinal).

I fully respect your views though that gay jokes are inappropriate for PC.

Not exactly relevant but:
“It is the test of a good religion whether you can joke about it.” - G.K.Chesterton

and:
“When humor is meant to be taken seriously, it's no joke” - Lionel Strachey
and my joke could have been.  So I'm in agreement with you, Tom

Inflatable Paul Simons?!