“World Ends: Women and Minorities Hardest Hit” (NY Times headline joke)

A conservative joke shows how a liberal newspaper—such as the New York (NY) Times or Washington (DC) Post or Austin (TX) American-Statesman—would headline the ultimate disaster: “World Ends: Woman and Minorities Hardest Hit.” In one version, “poor and minorities” are hardest hit; in another version, it’s a Washington Post headline describing a nuclear attack on New York City.
 
Comedian Mort Sahl told the joke in 1988 and might have originated it. Conservative talk radio host Rush Limbaugh has used the joke since at least 1990.
 
   
6 November 1988, St. Louis (MO) Post-Dispatch, “Mort Sahl: Truth Funnier Than Fiction” by Rick Richmond, Pg. 2C:
Sahl took out after the liberals by defining the way in which a liberal newspaper might report a nuclear exchange between the United States and the Soviet Union: “World Ends: Women and Minorities Hardest Hit.”
 
New York (NY) Times
The Rush Hours
Lewis Grossberger, who was a columnist for 7 Days, is the author of “Read My Clips: Media Person Cuts Up,” to be published by Random House in the Spring.
Published: December 16, 1990
(...)
“You’re gonna have fun tonight,” Limbaugh tells them. “And at the same time you’re gonna learn some things.” Pacing constantly, he does some jokes that poke fun at the Japanese and the liberal media (Judgment Day comes and The Washington Post banners: “World Ends Tomorrow: Women, Minorities Hardest Hit”).
   
Google Books
What Jesus would say to:
Rush Limbaugh, Madonna, Bill Clinton, Michael Jordan, Bart Simpson, Donald Trump, Murphy Brown, Madalyn Murray O’Hair, Mother Teresa, David Letterman, & You
By Lee Strobel
Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan
1994
Pg. 46:
As the clown prince of conservatism, Limbaugh relentlessly lampoons the political left and chides the liberal media. He once said that if the planet were approaching its last day, the Washington Post’s headline would read: “World Ends Tomorrow — Women, Minorities Hardest Hit!”
 
Google Books
A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper
By John Allen Paulos
New York, NY: BasicBooks
1995
Pg. 59:
...reports a nuclear exchange between the United States and Russia with the headline WORLD ENDS: WOMEN AND MINORITIES HARDEST HIT.
 
Google Books
Cooperative Learning:
Critical thinking and collaboration across the curriculum
By Dennis M. Adams andMary Hamm
Springfield, IL: C.C. Thomas
1996
Pg. 85:
An example of one line in a news headline/subheading “story” by middle school students: “WORLD ENDS: WOMEN AND MINORITIES HARDEST HIT.”
   
15 May 1998, Austin (TX) American-Statesman, Letters, pg. A14:
I expect your next headline to read, “Asteroid hits United States: Women and minorities hardest hit.”
   
Google Books
Letters to a Young Conservative
By Dinesh D’Souza
New York, NY: Basic Books
2005
Pg. 120:
Another “meta story” is Women and Minorities Hardest Hit. You’ve probably seen the headline: “The Bush Economic Program: Women and Minorities Hardest Hit.” Columnist Joseph Sobran notes that, if nuclear war erupts, the headline in the New York Times will read, “Nuclear War Breaks Out: Women and Minorities hardest Hit.”
   
Goliath
May 2005, First Things: A Monthly Journal of Religion and Public Life:
One is reminded of the imagined Washington Post headline: “New York Destroyed by Nuclear Attack: Women and Minorities Hardest Hit.”
 
New York (NY) Sun
The Murdoch Sulzberger Gap
Editorial of The New York Sun | May 15, 2008
We’d heard that Rupert Murdoch was planning to reshape the Wall Street Journal so that it would compete more directly with the New York Times, but we didn’t think he meant it that way. That was the reaction of more than a few Wall Street Journal readers yesterday when confronted with the Journal’s front-page headline, “China Earthquake Exposes A Widening Wealth Gap.” It was reminiscent of the old joke about the New York Times headline when the world comes to an end: Planet Destroyed; Poor, Minorities Hit Hardest.
       
Washington (DC) Times
Too few Watts
4:30 a.m., Saturday, June 21, 2008
There’s a conservative joke poking fun at liberal media that predicts coverage of an impending apocalypse would have the headline “World to End — Poor and Minorities Hardest Hit.” Despite his tenure as a Republican congressman, it seems J.C. Watts never heard that joke. Then again, maybe he did and just didn’t understand why it’s funny.
 
U.S. News & World Report
Mar 12, 2009
Men More Likely To Lose Their Jobs Than Women
By Michael Barone
An old conservative joke: A headline in New York Times reads, “New York destroyed by nuclear bomb.” Subhead: “Women, Minorities Hardest Hit.” But in this recession men are more likely than women to become unemployed.