A Serious Discussion of Humor

It has been noted by more than one anthropologist studying this subject that Native Americans don't get jokes.
They seem to be really into pitfall style humor.
"Why did the chicken cross the road?"
"To get to the other side."
Will get you an unflinching stare.
A man slipping in a pile of buffalo flop and landing on a cactus is hilarious.

Wow, solipsism at age 15. I commend your social studies teacher. Seems appropriate, aren't teenagers solipsists? Glad
you liked it.

Love the vids guys.

So to recapitulate:
We defined humor or humour... it's origins, did a bit of philosophical speculations and dissected it under the steady hands of spygeek and DISRAELI. Humor in art, literature and music, also did a bit of comparative humor. What else have we left out? Why do I get the feeling that we just hit a wall?... Well, we did get a few laughs... so, it isn't fun talking about humor even half-seriously?

originally posted by: MaxTamesSiva
What else have we left out? Why do I get the feeling that we just hit a wall?... Well, we did get a few laughs... so, it isn't fun talking about humor even half-seriously?

well, there's also antihumour, or ironic, deadpan, "is he joking or not" humour..

for instance:
three blind mice walk into a bar.
they are unaware of their surroundings,
so to derive humour from their story would be exploitative.

three men walk into a bar,
one of them is a little bit stupid,
and the whole scene unfolds,
with a tedious inevitability.

a hindu, a jew, and a catholic walk into a bar,
the barman says, "what is this? some kinda joke?"

similarly, there's also the long con; a joke that takes a ridiculously long period of time to tell, full of apparently significant details and a complex plot, only to resolve in a groan-inducing one-liner punchline, usually a pun, that makes you want to hit the joke teller in the face; Have you heard the story of the two prawns, Christian and Mitchell....?

i'm running out of examples.. i find skunkape's point quite interesting, going to look in to it more. the difference in humour between cultures is quite facinating, especially when there is an apparent deficiency of one knid of humour or another..

a reply to: spygeek
Anti-humor, I love it. Much like Dadaism is about anti-art. Found this. Isn't anti-humor sometimes borders into inappropriate jokes that the PC crowd will protest?

Here's some hilarious one-liners from another thread.

originally posted by: MaxTamesSiva
a reply to: spygeek
Anti-humor, I love it. Much like Dadaism is about anti-art. Found this. Isn't anti-humor sometimes borders into inappropriate jokes that the PC crowd will protest?

Here's some hilarious one-liners from another thread.

haha, thanks for the links, very good =D

there is indeed a lot of anti-humour floating around that the pc crowd like to take major offence to:


going back to the long con, here's a "joke" that doesn't so much make you laugh as make you angry..

There once were two prawns, Christian, and Mitchell. They were best friends. They grew up together, were classmates in prawn school and stayed close right through prawn college. They even kept in touch after Mitchell graduated with a degree in oceanography and moved to another state, where he gained employment with the city council, got married, and had four children.

Unfortunately, the marriage did not last, Mitchell caught his wife one day in bed with his supervisor, and the loss of his job, along with the resulting 8 year matrimonial dispute and settlement bankrupted him. He lost everything, including his kids, and eventually returned to his hometown, depressed and destitute.

Upon returning to town, Christian helped him find work at the local fishmongers, let him stay at his bachelor pad until he could get back on his feet, loaned him money and eventually helped him move in to a new studio apartment downtown. They caught up for a beer at the local tavern "Fishy Joe's", every friday after then, played pool and snooker and reminisced over old times.

One friday, after a particularly heavy session at Fishy Joe's, they were swimming home arm in arm, and they saw a shark swim past them on the other side of the finpath. "Look at that Christian!" said Mitchell, "A shark! Wow. That is a magnificent creature". "I dunno Mitchell", said Christian, "I find them pretty scary".

"But just think mate, how amazing would it be to be a shark?! King of the sea, feared by all, able to go anywhere and do anything you want. No need to go to college, no need to work yourself to the grave for some arsehole who will only steal your wife and sack you from your job and leave you penniless. I would love to be a shark. That would be AMAZING!"

"Yeah, I guess you have point", replied Christian, "But we are prawns, living the prawn life, and nothing will ever change that". "I know", said Mitchell, "But still. One can dream. One can wish. I wish I was a shark".

At that moment, a bolt of lightning shot down through the ocean, and struck Mitchell directly in the heart. He was transformed into a shark. "Holy crap!" exclaimed Christian, "You're a shark dude! I'm outta here, you'll eat me if i stick around!". Off Christian swam, as fast as he could, leaving Mitchell to ponder the possibilities his new form could grant him.

Months pass, and Mitchell swam further from the town than he had ever been. He terrified the other sealife, he ate fish, human surfers and fishermen, squid, and even a few prawns. He felt guilty about eating prawns, but he just had to know what they tasted like.

One day, as he was lazily basking in the ocean after a particularly large helping of fish and molluscs, his mind drifted back to his earlier life, his prawn life, and his estranged friend Christian. He began to feel regret for how the friendship ended, with Christian running for his life from the closest friend he has ever known. He felt guilty for not trying to chase him and reassure him, he would never eat his best friend, shark or no.

"Ah damn", Mitchell sighed, "This solitary shark life is rather sad and lonely. If only i could return to the place i grew up and reconnect with my old friend. If only there was a way to reverse this twist of fate. I wish I was a prawn once more."

At that moment, a bolt of lightning shot down through the ocean, and struck Mitchell directly in the heart. He was transformed back into a prawn.

"Oh my God!", he exclaimed, "This is unbelievable! What luck!". He swam all the way back to town, a journey of many days, as fast as his little prawn legs could take him. He arrived on friday evening, and made a beeline straight for Fishy Joe's Tavern.

"Hey Joe! How's it going? Long time no see!", he said as he sat at the bar and ordered a beer. "Wow, i heard you'd turned into a shark and turned your back on us. Gone off eating people, terrorising the ocean, and such", said Joe as he poured a salty larger. "Oh, well, I did Joe, but now i have returned, and I want to catch up again with Christian. I miss the old fella, and have so many stories to tell him. Where is he? It's friday night, he never missed a beer and a game of pool on a friday night".

"Well Mitchell, i'm sorry to say, that when you transformed and left the town, it hit him very hard. Harder than when you moved upstate for work. The guy's a recluse now, he has no friends, he's even given up chasing tail. He's just not himself since you left. It traumatised him pretty bad".

"Oh no," worried Mitchell, "I better go over to his place and see him. Set the record straight. Take care Joe, see you next week".

So off downtown Mitchell headed, to Christian's apartment. He eagerly pressed the buzzer, excited to be reconnected with his old friend. "Who is it?" Christian called out timidly through the intercom. "It's me old friend! It's Mitchell! How have you been? I heard you've become a bit of recluse and I want to take you out on the town, just us boys, like the old days!"

"Bugger off", Christian called back fearfully, "You're a stinking big scary shark! You just want to eat me!". "Oh no, not at all mate. I'm back in town, i'm no longer a shark, i just want to pick up where we left off", Mitchell persisted.

"You're trying to trick me!", Christian rebuffed, becoming increasingly distressed, "Go away and never come back!".

"But, mate, please! Just buzz me in!", cried Mitchell, now himself becoming distressed and upset over how badly this had all effected his poor friend. "Just open the door, for God's sake mate, open the door so you can see...

...I'm a prawn again Christian".


I am so, so, sorry Max. That is not humour.

a reply to: spygeek
Loved the punchline on that Rick & Morty clip, I think I spilled a bit of coffee on my shirt. I like the Christian & Mitchell joke too, it's funny in an anti-climatic way. Somehow it reminds of this:

Not sure if it's anti-humor.

So to be an anti-humorist one has to be some sort of a metaphysical comedian guru where the telling of the joke is more important that the punchline? To hell with the audience whether they find it funny or not?... which is funny in it's own way. I'm still researching on anti-humor.

originally posted by: MaxTamesSiva
a reply to: spygeek
Loved the punchline on that Rick & Morty clip, I think I spilled a bit of coffee on my shirt. I like the Christian & Mitchell joke too, it's funny in an anti-climatic way. Somehow it reminds of this:

Not sure if it's anti-humor.

bwahaha! i haven't seen abbot and costello in years, thank you so much for sharing that clip, i think it would qualify as antihumour, they do present the sort of self deprecating, self awareness that often characterises antihumour.

reminds me of this:

So to be an anti-humorist one has to be some sort of a metaphysical comedian guru where the telling of the joke is more important that the punchline? To hell with the audience whether they find it funny or not?... which is funny in it's own way. I'm still researching on anti-humor.

very well put, that is an accurate description. it's very meta and a lot of people don't like it, but i personally find it highly amusing.

a reply to: spygeek
Wow! Just think of the profound and vast implications if we take everything that we hear, read or watch as anti-humor. There will be an existential paradigm shift. Everyone will be a comedian, everything will be a joke, but maybe only few of us will be laughing. All of us will be searching for that elusive truly funny punchline.

Either that or we will live in a less serious world full of levity that will eradicate violence... hopefully.

a reply to: MaxTamesSiva

There's a good podcast about stand-up comedy - The Comedian's Comedian Podcast. The host, Stuart Goldsmith, is a stand-up and interviews others from all over the world. They don't tell each other jokes, they talk about where they find their humour and what makes them tick. It's not as dry and dull as I just made it sound; it's a clever and funny show.

Another one is quite new to me even though it's been out for years now. It's Jimmy Pardo's Never Not Funny show. Some of them are bit too pointless, but the ones with vet comedians like Conan O Brian and others chatting about the history of comedy are good.

Some of Rogan's older shows are pretty good when he's talking with comedians about making up new bits.

@ - Spygeek: The anti-humor thing is cool. There's a guy called 'Bernard Righton' from years ago who told politically-correct jokes to take the piss out of old-fashioned racist-style comedians thus mocking both styles. Some of it has aged and might not travel too well either.

originally posted by: Kandinsky
a reply to: MaxTamesSiva

@ - Spygeek: The anti-humor thing is cool. There's a guy called 'Bernard Righton' from years ago who told politically-correct jokes to take the piss out of old-fashioned racist-style comedians thus mocking both styles. Some of it has aged and might not travel too well either.

haha, brilliant, thanks for the video, i wasn't familiar with bernard.
the only bernard i know well is bernard black xD

a reply to: spygeek

WTF?? The video won't play saying 'content from Channel 4, who has blocked it in your country...'

This is the UK...home to Channel 4 and Black Book.

Moran is interviewed on Comedian's Comedian and it's a great show.

originally posted by: Kandinsky
a reply to: spygeek

WTF?? The video won't play saying 'content from Channel 4, who has blocked it in your country...'

This is the UK...home to Channel 4 and Black Book.

what is this? antihumour?

Moran is interviewed on Comedian's Comedian and it's a great show.

i quite like his stand up, very cynical and deadpan. total opposite to bill bailey, though he's brilliant too..

a reply to: spygeek

I love cynical comedians and Moran is three quarters cynic and one half romantic.

Bailey was quality but I haven't heard anything new for a long time.

I'm trying to recall the funniest thing I've ever seen.
The first memory to come to mind.
A guy, really drunk, leans against a fence to balance himself to vomit.
The fence collapses under the weight of his fat ass.
He falls with the fence into his neighbors yard.
Simultaneously pukes, burps, and rips a huge wet fart.
Then the neighbors dog runs in and starts humping the back of his head.
All witnesses present were laughing so hard it was painful.

Thank you to all your contributions guys. That was fun.

a reply to: MaxTamesSiva

Thank you for hosting such a cool thread, it has been a lot of fun xD