The problem is really with people who when they heard this joke, took it to be about racism, rather than about the archaic term "Master".

It is clear that the context for the remark was the ongoing discussion of the appropriateness of the term "master".

What makes it *irony* is that those who were once oppressed are now Fellows sitting at the "Master"s" table. No one is making fun of them, or gloating over their past oppression, Prof. Marcus was commenting on the changed social circumstances from the time when the term "master" would have been taken literally.

Who in their right mind can think that this was meant to be insulting? How? Was he supposed to be "rubbing it in" or making fun of them for belonging to a once enslaved group? Really?!