Angelic Conversation 𖥔ꗃ⋆.

Blog 03: The Revealing Nature of Humor


Something I've noticed is that a lot of people tend to tell jokes that don't really have a punchline. They're just being mean. Of course, "being mean" can be funny sometimes. The problem is that a lot of people don't seem to know when that time is. People will say whatever sounds funny, even if it means disrespecting someone else in the process.

If you tell someone that something they said isn't funny, you get called too sensitive. I hate this. It's a classic example of somebody putting the blame on you even though they're the one being insensitive. A lot of people say it's "just a joke." They'll say a slur, call something "gay" in a negative way, etc. The thing is, it's not just a joke. To simplify something with history down to "just a joke" is wrong. People aren't uncomfortable with certain jokes for no reason. (Ones that disrespect history, that is. If somebody's just being loud or something like that, it's really not a big deal. It becomes a big deal when you start to act like a bad person in the name of "being funny" and don't recognize how obnoxious you're being).

Claiming that something is just a joke oftentimes is completely throwing aside something that cannot be thrown aside: that's why it's bad. A slur, for example, is used exclusively to ridicule certain groups deemed "inferior" to the person speaking the word. This is why groups can "reclaim" slurs; as the people being discriminated against, they have the right to use that word and hopefully bring it up from its negative roots into a more positive term. Only they, however, have the right to do that (I have other opinions of right to keep a word to yourself, but that's a topic for a different article). This is why it doesn't make sense when people use something like the N word and say, "It's just my way of saying bro!" It can't be your way of saying "bro" because the creation and use of that word was used only to discriminate against black people. To suddenly use it differently—even though it has no other meanings—is just incorrect (morally and contextually).

What people are willing to joke about is an indicator of what they're comfortable with. Even if you don't believe something, but you joke about it, you are subconsciously exposing yourself to that idea—willingly, might I add—and consequently starting to see that idea as acceptable, even if you didn't previously think it was. For example, weight jokes. Weight jokes have been huge recently. I make them with my friend, but we make sure to tell them in ways that aren't harming anyone. There's a big difference between saying, "big and greedy," and then just laughing because someone is fat. There is a fine line, but it's a line either way. I made these jokes around a certain person I know that wasn't originally comfortable with weight jokes. However, the manner in which I did made it clear that I wasn't harming anyone—and if I was, I'd like for someone to tell me to shut up so I realized what the heck I was doing. My friend was comfortable with this. They, however, took a different approach; they started joining in on these jokes but would particularly poke fun at the concept of being fat, not eating a lot. I think the whole "bigback" joke on the internet is a huge factor that's contributed to this. You can joke about the fact you eat a lot, but it's not right to just make fun of people that are overweight. My friend, for example, started calling people around us "fat" and saying they "look like they can't put down the burgers." I understand that if two friends who have struggled with eating disorders and have agreed that they don't mean anything can be joking—as in, there are certain situations where jokes about weight can be acceptable. Or if an overweight person joked about it. They actually have the right to. Although it's very telling of how they view overweight people, they still can. However, when you're targeting innocent people who have nothing to do with it, it becomes a problem. I don't care how much you don't like someone and I don't care how rude a person has been to you. You do not have the right to make fun of another person's appearance. (Unless they have done it to you first—I think holding people accountable is extremely important. They were in the wrong, so just showing somebody how what they're doing is wrong doesn't say anything about your own morals.)

Simply put, people can get a little too comfortable with what jokes they tell. What type of jokes somebody says is very telling of how they view right and wrong. This is pretty much common knowledge to a lot of people, but I just wanted to explain a little further. A lot of people have trouble articulating their thoughts into words, so I thought this would be a nice thing to explain a bit of.