It didn't take long for the Michael Jackson jokes to start circulating. In fact they may well be the reason Google virtually ground to a halt last Thursday night as rumours spread about the star's tragic demise. I won't repeat any of the gags of varying sickness here – you can find plenty yourself by googling the phrase "Michael Jackson joke". Or alternatively just think of the the words "children", "cosmetic surgery" and "thriller", add or alter various song lyrics and you'll probably be able to come up with your own.

There is a phrase that comedians use when they deliver a bad taste gag about a topical story – "too early?". I don't think some of the gags about Michael Jackson's death could have come any earlier if they'd come when he was still alive and moonwalking. My problem however, is more to do with the quality of the quips than their morality.

It has been said that at the forthcoming Edinburgh Fringe Michael Jackson gags are now going to be vying with expense claim gags for topic of the month. But at the moment the wisecracks are causing a bit of a kerfuffle. Partly thanks to the continued fallout of Sachsgate no-one seems to want to take any risks. An episode of C4 comedy TNT was cut because of references to Jackson, while Frankie Boyle has reportedly stopped writing his Daily Record column because the paper refused to print his pithy one-liners. And in America the new movie Bruno has reportedly been swiftly edited to cut out an irreverent interview with LaToya Jackson.

But is it too soon for Michael Jackson gags? Even immature and silly ones as well as malicious heartless ones? Well, if you were a close friend or a member of his mourning family you might not want to hear them. but then they've had to live with Wacko Jacko gags for the last two decades. And while Jackson's death is very sad and shocking, it does not feel quite as numbingly shocking as the death of Princess Diana, which came absolutely out of the blue. Yet humour may just be a way of coping with Jackson's death. My first reaction on hearing about Jackson's death was that it was a publicity stunt, but then I'm a journalist, I'm paid to be cynical. And on reflection I don't really think that most of the gags are intentionally nasty or mean-spirited. They are just the way we cope with traumatic events.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see how the comedy world deals with Michael Jackson now. Will old comedy routines such as Bo Selecta's cruel rubber-faced spoof or Lenny Henry's OTT pop video send-ups be discreetly forgotten? The new jokes will no doubt continue. I don't have a problem with them as long as they exercise a decent amount of wit, but then again, as far as I know I'm not related to Michael Jackson. Let's just hope that some of them are more funny than the ones that are clogging up cyberspace at the moment.