The Daily Princetonian has a story about the controversy sparked by its own "Lian Ji" joke column the other day: Joke op-ed sparks ire, controversy. Here's their official response to emailers, with the usual "we did not intend to offend" excuse:

Thank you for taking the time to write to us.

Since publishing Wednesday's joke issue, we have learned that some of our
readers were offended by a column satirizing Asian stereotypes. This
response surprised us: We did not seek to offend, and we sincerely regret
having upset some of our readers.

Many criticisms of the column, however, do not recognize its purpose. Using
hyperbole and an unbelievable string of stereotypes, we hoped to lampoon
racism by showing it at its most outrageous. We embraced racist language in
order to strangle it. At its worst, the column was a bad joke; at its best,
it provoked serious thought about issues of race, fairness and diversity.

The column in question was penned by a diverse group of students - including
several Asians on our senior editorial staff - who had no malicious intent.
Given our purpose, we are deeply troubled by and reject the allegation of
racism.

We welcome debate about our column, especially in the pages of this
newspaper. We hope our readers will see the column for what it is and that
the opportunity for constructive discussion about race and race-related
issues will not be lost.

Sincerely,

Chanakya Sethi, Editor-in-chief

Christian Burset, Neir Eshel, Anna Huang, Nancy Khov, Alex Maugeri, Tom Senn
and Ellen Young

Editors, 130th Managing Board, The Daily Princetonian

Meanwhile, an online petition has started regarding to Princeton's admissions policies: End Discrimination in Admissions Policies