I don't mean to kill the joke, but I wonder what the true wordplay here is. I've heard rubber as a condom before, but never as rubber bands. Unless you know someone who calls rubber bands "rubber"; I've never heard it.

Blindga said:

I don't mean to kill the joke, but I wonder what the true wordplay here is. I've heard rubber as a condom before, but never as rubber bands. Unless you know someone who calls rubber bands "rubber"; I've never heard it.

The original joke is wa gomu > gomu > kondo-mu—that is, rubber band > rubber (eraser) > condom. The Japanese use gomu, the loan word for "rubber" (from the Dutch gom) as slang for "condom" just like American English uses "rubber" the same way. Granted, 'Bono's at fault for not specifying what kind of rubber object, because it can ALSO be used to mean "rubber eraser", the way British English uses "rubber".

Moonspeaker said:

Granted, 'Bono's at fault for not specifying what kind of rubber object, because it can ALSO be used to mean "rubber eraser", the way British English uses "rubber".

Also, Ushio thinks "rubber (eraser)", but after Kashima explicitly says she interprets it as "condom", Ushio doesn't even try to correct her, so Ushio holds some responsibility, too. (And she doesn't ask why he needs 680 erasers?)

NWSiaCB said:

Also, Ushio thinks "rubber (eraser)", but after Kashima explicitly says she interprets it as "condom", Ushio doesn't even try to correct her, so Ushio holds some responsibility, too. (And she doesn't ask why he needs 680 erasers?)

Ushio thinks the Admiral meant condoms too. The box by Ushio's head says 0.02 on it.