Thank you, David, for sharing this insightful and heartfelt plea.

My favorite example of a skillful subversion of stereotypic humor is the scene in The Merchant of Venice (a play, as you know, that is full of anti-Semitic stereotypes) where Shylock is complaining to his buddy Tubal (who plays the "straight man" in this scene) about the betrayal of his daughter Jessica and her theft of his ducats (i.e. his savings). Up to a critical moment, the scene is pure stereotypic parody, as he rants about his daughter and his ducats as if they were of equal value. But then comes the following exchange:

TUBAL: One of them showed me a ring that he had of your daughter for a monkey.

SHYLOCK: Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal. It was my turquoise, I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor. I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys . (Act III, scene i)

OUCH! The stereotypical Jewish miser has just morphed into a suffering human being, who has known love, with whom we can all empathize...