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For example, when discussing red-black trees in lecture, is it appropriate to use the phrase "Black Nodes Matter?"
The proof that red-black trees are balanced relies heavily on the property that each downward path originating from a node contains the same number of black nodes. Given this, I am wondering if it is appropriate to say #BlackNodesMatter.
This would be very unfortunate. People across the political spectrum have strong feelings about the words Black Lives Matter. Indeed, the subject matter of the movement is literally life and death. It's not something that should be made light of in mixed company, let alone in a classroom.
The joke is in poor taste and inappropriate to a professional environment.
As pointed out by others, this might either be taken as moderate to serious offence in some places and just misunderstood in others, hence it is unlikely to achieve any of the intended effects. Places where most people would laugh wholeheartedly at the joke are probably places where I would not feel too comfortable staying.
While I agree that anything can theoretically be made light, this strongly depend on context and company.
As a general rule, if you feel like it is a good idea to check the appropriateness of a joke with somebody, then the joke is not appropriate.
Besides for potentially offending your audience, a joke like the one you suggest can also detract from the goal of your presentation, which is presumably to inform or educate your audience.
For example, a couple of years ago I got this email, addressed to all of the authors on a paper I co-authored:
I wanted to write to say that I’m a big fan of your [REDACTED] work—it is a really cool idea that addresses a real problem, and it was great to see the work in this year’s [NAME OF CONFERENCE]. However, the actual talk as presented really bothered me, and I felt that it was important to write to you. Based on conversations during the breaks and at the end of the day, I know that I’m not the only person who feels this way.
The email went on to say that this person, and apparently others at the conference, thought a joke that was part of the talk (which was delivered by my co-author, and which I hadn't seen before) was sexist. Personally I thought the joke was more stupid than offensive, but I was unhappy with my co-author for using it - because when people talk about my paper during the breaks at a conference, I want them to be talking about the content of the work, not a joke that the presenter made. The joke was a distraction from the real goal of the talk.
Jokes are good when they support your goal of educating the audience, but not when they distract from that goal. (And definitely not when they're offensive.)
Do not do this. Simply pointing out how nodes are identified as black, and relating it to Black Lives Matters, isn't a joke, it's a basic observation/wordplay. Race and color do not make good wordplay.
Are you African American? If not, don't relate the color of the nodes to someone else's race. In comedy this would be called punching down (a joke at the expense of groups with less power).
-Performing comedian for 6 years.
I agree with many of the previous answers, and the major issue is that it can be offensive and distracting to poke fun at a sensitive and important topic. However, there are several other factors to keep in mind:
Whatever you say may be overanalyzed. For example, in your red-black tree example, black nodes particularly matter since they play a special role in the proof. By contrast, "Black Lives Matter" means they matter as much as other lives (despite not being treated as being equally important), not that they matter more than others, so the analogy isn't very compelling. An uncharitable interpretation of your joke is that it's poking fun at or undermining BLM by comparing it to the assertion that black lives are unusually important relative to other lives. If that were the intent, it would make the joke (even) more offensive. Of course the purpose was presumably just to create a striking mnemonic, not to make a political statement, but when you joke about sensitive subjects you should expect to have far more read into your joke than you had intended.
It's easy for the class to spin out of control. For example, a student may respond with "Don't red nodes matter too? I think the only fair statement is that all nodes matter." All that point, you really have no good response. It's not wise to go off topic into an actual political discussion, but you're in a messy situation since that response has emphasized your joke and made it even touchier politically (ending the discussion with "all nodes matter" would not be a good idea). If you get a follow up of this sort, I'd recommend apologizing for raising a sensitive issue and explaining that additional jokes and discussion are off topic. In any case, the point is that class members may take the joke further than you did and in a more explicitly political direction, and you shouldn't set up such a situation unless you are prepared to deal with it.
The best you're going to get out of a classroom joke like this is a light chuckle.
The worst is that you've badly offended a student.
The risk:reward ratio is pretty heavily biased toward "Just don't."
First I would like to mention that this specific joke would be very offensive to some people in the US and I think it is a very bad idea to use it.
However, to answer the question more generally, I think the appropriateness of joking about a charged subject in a lecture is very culture-dependent. In some countries, the worst-case scenario is that such a joke would be dismissed by some students as bad taste without any serious repercussions. However, in the US, I would personally either be extremely careful what I joke about or refrain from joking altogether, since there is a low threshold for what is considered offensive and repercussions can be very serious (just to be clear - I am not passing judgement on this). This is especially true if you are a non-native in the US, as you may not even be aware of what is considered offensive (I have seen this happen several times).
Is the intention to provide an extra knowledge connection that would help students remember the material better? It seems like it could be helpful in that regard; that'd be a primary benefit ('pro').
Pros should be weighed against cons and the net compared to alternatives.
Are you demeaning the lives of people who are killed by police brutality, or the work of those advocating on their behalf, by calling attention to that movement in this setting? Based on the fact that you asked this question at all, it doesn't sound like you are intending to demean anyone, but whether or not people interpret it that way depends not only on intention but also on audience and context (e.g. classroom mood, what style students have come to expect from you), etc. If your audience receives a demeaning message from that line, that'd be a primary 'con.'
If you are supporting the work of those advocates by calling attention to their cause, as they seek, then your reference would be helping the #BlackLivesMatter movement (and whether this is a pro or con probably depends on how you feel about that movement).
Well, your question almost answers itself:
Is it appropriate to make a pun that references a highly charged topic in current events, in a lecture on an unrelated subject?
"Highly charged topic" perfectly matches racial slurs and sexist jokes. In particular "highly charged" implies several quite opposed sides with vested interest and emotions.
Which means that some people will likely get similarly offended like some would be with racials slurs or sexist jokes, and their offense is taken for the amusement values of others.
Is it appropriate? I think that answers itself. You probably wanted to rather ask whether it nets you sympathies. Maybe it will. But I'd recommend using more appropriate ways to do that.
It's very likely that if you make such a pun you make it a lot harder for the audience to reason rationally about the subject that you are talking about.
Half of your audience might spent 5 minutes thinking about the political implications of your statement instead of the math you are talking about.
