Back in the good old days when the rand was so strong it gave the pound a run for its money, Van der Merwe went on holiday in the United Kingdom, taking his vrou with him.

As they were strolling down the streets of London one morning, they stumbled upon a handful of white men digging a trench with their pickaxes and shovels.

Once Van der Merwe had recovered from the shock of seeing white people performing what at home would be black people's duties, he shook his head and walked away.

The following day, the couple took the same road and encountered the same group of white diggers, who had made some progress on their trench . Compared with yesterday's 4m length, it now looked to be at least 6m.

Van der Merwe was thoroughly pissed off.

"Wragtig, these pommies are lazy! It's taken them two days to dig about two metres. You know, bokkie," he said turning to his wife, "At home, you give me six kaffirs and I will dig you a 100m trench in one day!"

This joke, which was told to me years ago at a predominantly white party, came back to me this week when I heard a story that got me thinking about racial and cultural stereotypes ... once again.

Bad Boy T and his sidekick Flo, loudmouth deejays from Metro FM, were this week suspended from the station after they told a joke about how Xhosa women are in the habit of stealing men from other women.

It's a common joke that plays on the perceived kleptomaniac habits of Xhosa people in general and Xhosa women in particular (history books are littered with stock thefts on the Xhosa frontier, remember? The white settlers were the victims, of course. Well, who wrote the history anyway?).

Proud Of Her Roots : Bongo Maffin's Thandiswa Mazwai says she takes pride in being a Xhosa woman. Does that mean she's a man-stealer who's also on the make?

Not only are Xhosa people perceived to be kleptomaniacs, but they are also freeloaders.

Sample this:

So this woman, Xhosa obviously, is giving her new lover directions to her flat at number 42 Beehive Street in Berea, Johannesburg: "At the security gate, use your elbow to press my flat number, 201, so I can buzz you in. Walk across the foyer, nod at the security guard behind his desk as you can't shake his hand."

"Once you are inside the lift, use your elbow to press the button for the second floor. I'll probably be in the shower by the time you get here. But I will leave my door ajar, so you can just use either your foot or your elbow to push it open."

"Okay, sweetie," says the guy. "The directions sound pretty simple. But why do I always have to use my elbow?"

"Tyini!" screams the woman, "Don't tell me you're coming here empty-handed!"

Freeloaders and unashamed of it.

The above anecdotes are of course stereotypes that, in a multicultural society such as ours, will always exist.

The funny thing is that the Van der Merwe jokes go down well if told by an Afrikaner person to his own people. An outsider telling the same joke to Afrikaners is bound to be given a stony reception - if not stone-hard fists.

Darkies tell some really terrible jokes about themselves, to their own people, jokes that are entirely not appreciated when told by outsiders. I guess people like to laugh at themselves, but not to be laughed at by outsiders.

Zulus tell countless jokes about the habits of taxi drivers and hostel dwellers among themselves, but they don't appreciate it when the kleptomaniac Xhosas or the colour-confused Shangaans or the cowardly Swazis tell these jokes.

I guess telling these jokes among ourselves is therapeutic as we are trying to come to terms with some shameful deeds committed by some of our people.

Sacha Baron Cohen says a lot of cringeworthy things in his movie Borat - stuff that a Fred Khumalo can't repeat without being labelled anti-Semitic.

In the telling of these stories, I guess, Cohen is asking his fellow Jews to question their self-righteousness, to undergo some introspection on issues that they have come to own - victimhood, for example.

So, when the Metro FM deejays told the story about Xhosa women being menoklepts (I've just created this word to refer to people who steal other people's men; after all, a person who steals books is called a biblioklept) they are opening a debate about a perception.

Maybe, given a chance, the men-stealing Xhosa women would respond: "Yo, sana, we don't steal no people's men. Meh be we are just so irresistibly beautiful that other people's men are prepared to dump their spouses and boyfriends in preference to us. Ewe, mfondini!"

The spoilsports at Metro FM had no right to suspend the twosome for such innocent, albeit thought-provoking, banter.

Stereotypes will cease being stereotypes when we pick them up, throw them up into the air and shred them to pieces with the sword of reason and common sense.

We can't outlaw them, for that will only help them fester and turn into truths. I think the Van der Merwes out there will agree.