I can always tell when I'm talking to someone with a strong filter and it always makes me feel uncomfortable. They don't seem genuine, they don't seem honest, they don't seem real. I wonder how they are really like when relaxed with their filters down. What if they really are a douchebag? I've met plenty of people who filter heavily but are still basically sociopaths.

I've heard there is now corporate training on how to have a strong filter without letting other people know that you have one, by intentionally and strategically letting out noticeable but forgivable gaffes at certain points to make it appear as if you are genuine.

"Common sense" isn't as "common as we like to think, is it? "Public" is a state of mind.

Adria was overhearing a conversation not meant for her ears. It was her error.

You can never make a joke that isn't offensive to at least one person somewhere one way or another, unless you give up joking altogether. You said it yourself "every single person has something that they are sensitive about". It could be as legitimately rightful as sexist jokes.. or as unrightful as joking about anything else entirely, maybe my mother was run over by a bus driver.. does that mean that you cannot joke about bus drivers next to me?.. Well actually yes, but only "if" you knew of my particular situation and in this case he did not.

The general rules of decency dictate that you steer away from the generally offensive jokes in your respective crowd and the joke he made was not such, it was if anything something that fits that crowd perfectly. I for one had no idea what it was supposed to mean outside the tech lingo but unlike her I was not in a PyCon conference.