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Good comedy punches UP. Bullies punch DOWN.


Dr. Mechano

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I love to laugh. Having a sense of humor is key to making the most out of life, and it's good to be able to laugh at yourself. However, I feel there's a clear line in the sand between clever, thought-out comedy and unfunny, witless bullying.

 

When I see people making crass jokes about racial minorities, women, LGBT people, or the disabled, I make a point to call them out on it. They may have the freedom of speech to joke about whoever they please, and I defend their legal right to say what they want, but I also have the same freedom of speech to call out their words for the bigoted bile that it is. And I always do. The response, often, is something along the lines of, "C'mon, lighten up! Get a sense of humor!"

 

And to them, I say that I do have a sense of humor, and in my view a far better one than they have. You see, I feel good comedy and satire punches upward. It pokes fun at the powerful, the entitled, the institutions. A good irreverent and offensive comedian still stirs the pot, but he or she does it at the expense of institutions and repositories of power, not the disadvantaged. Anyone can make fun of the disadvantaged, and no real comedic skill or cleverness is required to do it.

 

Bullies, conversely, punch downward. You don't have to be particularly edgy or clever to spot a marginalized group in society and simply reinforce society's stereotypes about them by regurgitating tired old jokes about that group. Jokes that trivialize slavery and segregation are not clever. Jokes that belittle rape victims are not clever. Jokes that make light of bullying and hate crimes committed against LGBT youth are not clever. It doesn't take much thought to look at an oppressed person and simply go, "HA, SUCKS TO BE THEM." That isn't wit, that's an unclever attempt at shock humor at the expense of the underprivileged.

 

When I see fellow MLP fans engage in this unfunny tripe, I cringe. It's awfully hypocritical of certain subsets of this fandom to complain about not being accepted or tolerated for their individual differences (such as liking a show outside of their demographic), yet perpetually spout bigotry and intolerance, often under the guise of "humor." MLP fans, you're better than this, I know you are. It's time we stop condoning prejudice (whether it's supposedly "humorous" or otherwise), and start being the loving, tolerant, inclusive fandom we claim to be. I'm all for irreverent - perhaps even potentially offensive - comedy, but let's make sure we punch up rather than down with it.

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But sometimes making a (borderline or not) racist, sexist or antisemitic (etc.) joke is made to parodise the stigma that is on talking about topics like that. I think, that jokes like that can and should be made ( I would have to lie to say i dont know a lot of them ) because the alternative ( making no jokes on that topic and having it be super-serious ) would make the topic even more frowned upon and eventually noone would dare talk about it, which in my opinion is not a good thing to have.

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No group should be off-limit from poking fun at, Chris. I'm perfectly fine with people telling jokes poking fun at the groups I'm part of (white people, men, Christians, and so on) as long as the joke is accurate.

 

"I feel good comedy and satire punches upward. It pokes fun at the powerful, the entitled, the institutions."

1. The NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, GLAAD, Planned Parenthood and the National Organization For Women are all powerful, entitled institutions that desperately need to be punctured by the comedian's savage wit. The ADL and GLAAD in particular have developed well-deserved reputations as bullies.

2. More to the point, what matters is not whether someone is part of a "powerful, entitled group". What matters is: "have you done something worth making fun of?" If women, homosexuals and racial minorities do something that warrants poking fun at them, then we should poke fun at them. Simple as that. They are not sacred cows.

"Jokes that trivialize slavery and segregation are not clever. Jokes that belittle rape victims are not clever. Jokes that make light of bullying and hate crimes committed against LGBT youth are not clever."

No they aren't, but it apparently has not occurred to you that we can tell jokes that poke fun at women, racial minorities and gays without being outright cruel to them. I fail to see how woman jokes like this "belittle rape victims", for example.

 

You are right about one thing: sometimes it's funny to mock the powerful. Which is why I found Tova Reich's novel "My Holocaust", which pokes fun at the Jewish elite for its culture of victimhood despite being the wealthiest and most powerful ethnic group in America, to be very funny.

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