It corresponds to our everyday experience that there are situations in which a roar of laughter would be quite inappropriate and laughter would be taboo. On the other hand, there are many jokes that intentionally break taboos and thus successfully irritate the stomach. This dialectical relation between laughter and taboos is taken up in this paper, and various theoretical differentiations of the field of laughter are discussed with regard to taboos. In the context of the so-called incongruity theory, taboos can be seen as a challenge to the condition of harmlessness. This is evident by many cases of black humor. When looking at taboos, one must also distinguish between different functions of laughter. Laughter does not always mean that someone would be satirically made fun of. Often laughter expresses that the taboos laughed at are nonetheless part of life. Then, Freud’s suggestion of a differentiation of the phenomena comic, joke and humor via the psychic energies becoming effective in each case is fruitful for the taboo discussion. It seems that taboos are particularly relevant in humor and jokes because these phenomena, like taboos, are based on emotions and inhibitions. Finally, the differentiations made are used to comment on some examples of limericks regarding their relation to taboos.