Ok one hand, yeah you shouldn’t try to hurt individual people for fun.
On the other hand, everything must be up for ridicule, it is the snarky sibling of valid criticism. Without it the person, or ideology, or belief system, etc. Is given an enormous amount of power over everyone.
That is not compatible with a democracy, everyone and everything must be able to bear ridicule and criticism or it has no place in it.
This reminds me about the time I went to church with an ex and her parents. When it was time to get up for communion, she asked me if it even meant anything to me. I whispered back “well I didn’t have breakfast”. She was ex- about a week later
George Carlin, who I think is still widely regarded as one of the greats, had a “rape can be funny” bit that I doubt would fly today because a whole lot of us have a better understanding of how rape jokes harm victims. Doing harm to such a group is, or at least should, never the goal of a quality comedian. That’s why they’re not generally made by comedians except the “you just can’t take a joke” type.
You can absolutely criticize without doing harm to open wounds. There’s space between not being allowed to criticize and not being allowed to joke.
Maybe you need something like the more power a group has the more they need to be able to bear being the target of joking. That’s why a white, Christian, American man is a far cleaner target.
The danger of ‘you can joke about anything’ is that tribalist cranks hear ‘all jokes are valid.’ They refuse to understand that meaning matters more than subject. How you make fun of something can be terrible, no matter what you’re making fun of. So expect to hear ‘you can joke about anything!’ spat back at you, when someone points out they’re espousing sincere bigotry through amusing turns of phrase.
I call this is the Yo Mama hypothesis. Some kids got genuinely angry when classmates made fun of their mom, and were told ‘calm down, it’s a joke.’ By outward appearances they got it. They stopped yelling. But internally, they learned that jokes are lies you’re not allowed to get mad at. Like it’s a socially acceptable format for abuse you have to shut up and take.
This was absolutely infuriating while Dave Chappelle was torching his reputation. ‘He’s a comedian!’ was constantly parroted as if that meant his opinions were beyond criticism. Even when pointing out the many times he said the exact same shit, out loud and in public, with no audience and no punchline.
These people genuinely do not comprehend there’s a part of the joke that you mean. ‘Eat the rich’ is a joke about wealth and cannibalism… but it’s only joking about the cannibalism.
Ok one hand, yeah you shouldn’t try to hurt individual people for fun.
On the other hand, everything must be up for ridicule, it is the snarky sibling of valid criticism. Without it the person, or ideology, or belief system, etc. Is given an enormous amount of power over everyone.
That is not compatible with a democracy, everyone and everything must be able to bear ridicule and criticism or it has no place in it.
This reminds me about the time I went to church with an ex and her parents. When it was time to get up for communion, she asked me if it even meant anything to me. I whispered back “well I didn’t have breakfast”. She was ex- about a week later
Damn, that’s a pretty valid point.
This lacks a lot of nuance that is needed.
George Carlin, who I think is still widely regarded as one of the greats, had a “rape can be funny” bit that I doubt would fly today because a whole lot of us have a better understanding of how rape jokes harm victims. Doing harm to such a group is, or at least should, never the goal of a quality comedian. That’s why they’re not generally made by comedians except the “you just can’t take a joke” type.
You can absolutely criticize without doing harm to open wounds. There’s space between not being allowed to criticize and not being allowed to joke.
Maybe you need something like the more power a group has the more they need to be able to bear being the target of joking. That’s why a white, Christian, American man is a far cleaner target.
The danger of ‘you can joke about anything’ is that tribalist cranks hear ‘all jokes are valid.’ They refuse to understand that meaning matters more than subject. How you make fun of something can be terrible, no matter what you’re making fun of. So expect to hear ‘you can joke about anything!’ spat back at you, when someone points out they’re espousing sincere bigotry through amusing turns of phrase.
I call this is the Yo Mama hypothesis. Some kids got genuinely angry when classmates made fun of their mom, and were told ‘calm down, it’s a joke.’ By outward appearances they got it. They stopped yelling. But internally, they learned that jokes are lies you’re not allowed to get mad at. Like it’s a socially acceptable format for abuse you have to shut up and take.
This was absolutely infuriating while Dave Chappelle was torching his reputation. ‘He’s a comedian!’ was constantly parroted as if that meant his opinions were beyond criticism. Even when pointing out the many times he said the exact same shit, out loud and in public, with no audience and no punchline.
These people genuinely do not comprehend there’s a part of the joke that you mean. ‘Eat the rich’ is a joke about wealth and cannibalism… but it’s only joking about the cannibalism.