You have to try hard to be this dense. Yet I keep seeing this meme (I still hate that word for reasons unknown) from so many liberals (you get a lot of this in Greg Gutfeld’s comments – “I don’t find you funny! Why aren’t conservatives funny?”).
If there are some liberals reading this wondering why they don’t find conservatives funny, let me explain this very simply: It’s not fun to be pointed and laughed at.
Why make this complicated? Take liberal and conservative out of the equation. When someone has a completely alien viewpoint to your own, you won’t find that person funny.
KEY HUMOR ASPECT NUMBER ONE: Humor involves shared, unsaid beliefs between who tells joke and who hears it.
If your shared belief is that Bush is Hitler, you will not laugh at the same jokes as people who believe Bush is not Hitler. Your viewpoints are just too askew to share a laugh. Mithras asserts that James Wolcott is funny. The few times I read that guy, I found him about as funny as a burning bus full of orphans (Heh; stupid orphans. That’ll teach them to not have parents – On second thought, a burning bus full of orphans is kinda funny; Wolcott should emulate that more). That doesn’t mean either of us is malfunctioning in the humor department. It just means that on certain issues we are too different to laugh with each other.
This seems so simple to me. Am I beating a dead horse here?
The only thing I’ve seemed to notice as a key difference between liberals making jokes about politics and conservatives making jokes about politics is that conservatives seem to be able to laugh at themselves more. I poke fun of my own beliefs all the time here. Yet, I’ve never seen a liberal making fun of the common liberal beliefs he or she holds dear – even with all the material that’s available! (Just think of Howard Dean alone!)
Then again, I don’t really seek out liberal humor on politics. Can someone point me to a self-deprecating (on the political level, that is) liberal?
Lighten up
IMAO, I used to think I was funny. Friends laughed at my jokes and things I wrote. Then Ronald Reagan got elected president, and for the last 25 years I’ve had to suck in and listen to your knuckledragging friends ridicule and mock liberals. Not make fun of us — no, a little crueler than that. YOUR CROWD has pissed in the communal drinking fountain for decades now, yet you have the balls to accuse liberals of being out of bounds when we return fire?
Maybe we’re not funny, but you weren’t funny first, and 25 years is a charitable timeline. The first Kennedy jokes predate not just Chappaquiddick, but both assassinations.
Mark,
Read the post. What are you responding to?
Mark, lol! That was hilarious! More please.
I think Mark is being sarcastic. Which is kinda funny…I guess???
If he is not being sarcastic, then that is down right hilarious!
RWF,
I’ve never understood sarcasm.
Or irony.
…and in response, both you and Mark go into a frothing rage fueled by your persecution complex.
Trees meet forest, indeed.
(Although I’ve gotta admit that ad for the T-shirt with the hammer and sickle replacing the C in ACLU is a real thigh-slapper! See, ‘cuz civil liberties are for communists, because ‘the state’ is syonymous with liberty! Oh wait…)
Anyway, I’m not quite sure what you mean by self-deprecating. I’m not aware of that many bloggers who write about how they’re stupid, or something. I guess in a political context a self-deprecating liberal would be one who freely admits that our current crop of Democratic politicians are functionally retarded, and that our current crop of liberal politicians is nonexistant. Pretty much everyone does that.
Who are these self-deprecating conservatives? Lileks calling himself an old fuddy-duddy and Instapundit admitting he doesn’t understand something that he links to? Charles Johnson, for example, is about as self-deprecating as Mussolini. Ditto for Misha, obviously…
scar,
I voted for Bush twice and still support him, but I still use the CW that he’s dumb to make jokes. I think the war in Iraq is for high moral purposes, but I love to make jokes about how we’re just there for oil. Other conservative find that funny (I assume since my blog has a decent amount of traffic). Where is a liberal who likes Dean making fun of what a nut he is. Or a liberal making fun of the percieved ridiculousness of the liberal conspiracy theories while still partially believing them?
Goofy liberals. I had to hear a joke someone told me about Bush, after he got his physical. The doctor told him that he had gastro-something or other caused by drinking too much coffee, so he declared war on Latin America for making coffee.
She couldn’t figure out why I didn’t think it was funny. I mean, I knew the joke, but it just didn’t seem very funny, since I don’t think republicans are war-mongerers. Apparently, in Europer, there is a running joke about how Americans kill things they’re afraid of. I mean, I don’t see why it would be stupid to kill things you perceive as a threat. Oh well.
Anyway, I shot back with a similar joke, only it was about Chirac, and instead of declaring war on Latin America, he surrenders to Latin America, and offers them incentive packages to stop using WMD (coffee beans) on Europe. See, I thought it was funny, but she was not amused. And I didn’t expect her to be amused either!
Liberals are dumb, because they don’t see conservatives as people. They see us as mental cases, and think that we don’t understand because they don’t talk loudly enough. I see liberals as people with very poor viewpoints, and I understand why they have those viewpoints. Sometimes it’s easier to just reduce liberals to “crazy people”, but they’re not crazy, they’ve just bought into all the liberal talking points.
I remember when Al Gore invented the elephant joke. I was serving in Vietnam at the time. Did I mention that I served in Vietnam? I was on a swift boat, wearing my magic hat, several miles into Cambodia. It’s seared . . . seared into my memory.
Liberals will not find that funny.
Heh.
I was just wondering how most liberals, who undoubtedly feel that Iraq is all about Oil, and with the price of oil and gas and such, surely are convinced that the oil people will be raking in record profits,.. feel about the oil folks getting BILLIONS in tax breaks with the new energy policy – Lol.
Wow.
I had to see it to believe it. They really don’t understand the nature of the box that defines their worldview. “Open minded” is about the last thing I saw on the other thread – I am not really funny, but at least I can laugh at myself.
BTW – 15 years in the ultimate oxymoron “military intelligence” along with being a non-conformist libertarian in the Army makes for a decent sense of self-value.
I don’t find the other side that funny; I find too many of them willfully uninformed and pitiful. I guess that makes them the joke, eh?
Conservatives have a sense of humor, they just usually don’t get the joke
You’re being a little hard on Wolcott. After all, I find it hilarious that the only basis he has to attack me is that I look like a child molester in the picture with my captain’s hat. I find it ABSO-FREAKIN’-LUTELY hilarious that Vanity Fair considers that witty enough to let him run their magazine.
I’m serious about this — I laughed for an hour and told all my friends about it. At least it had the charm of being original. Roger Ailes, on the other hand, referred to me as Mr. Ed … like I haven’t heard that one since kindergarten.
When political humor consisted only of gags written by Norman Lear, Al Franken and Garry Trudeau, that was funny. Now that we have to compete with the likes of Iowahawk, Cox & Forkum, Scott Ott and Chris Muir … not so much.
Who here has biographical information on Roger Nash Baldwin and Emma Goldman?
Apparently not Messrs. Butcher or Jones…
Norman Lear, what a meathead.
Less debating, more smiting!!
Frank, you stirred up the hornets’ nest this time :p
I thought Gutfield was a liberal, albeit maybe a more moderate one…
So who are the funny right-wing bloggers I should be reading?
Erik,
I think Mithra had a list.
I’m a liberal and I found John F. Kerry’s post funny. But most conservatives find Rush funny and I don’t agree with that kind of humor. He tends to preach to and degrade the targets of his “humor”. I will never find bulling or just being mean something to laugh at (or with), and face it many conservative do.
I think there are some funny conservative voices, but I’m with the other guy when it comes to the “persecution complex issue.” I know a lot of people from all sorts of ideological stripes and it’s true in my experience that the more conservative one leans, the less capacity there seems to be to make fun of oneself.
But that’s probably true of anyone at an ideological extreme, where there can be no room for doubt or question of the ridiculous, or even mildly nonsensical.
Nobody,
I think you hit on a good point there; the more extremist, the less humor inclined (and the less people who share your viewpoint to joke with).
The difference is obvious every time I see a Mallard Fillmore next to Doonesbury. Dumb and mean versus smart and spot-on. Remember, Doonesbury was also critical of the Clinton White House. Do you think the duck would poke fun at Bush?
wanda,
Doonesbury is funny? When did that happen?
To be honest, I’m not that familiar with Mallard Fillmore and was never very impressed – but not for the reason you mentioned. When you said “Dumb and mean,” I first thought you were talking about Doonesbury.
More illustration of my point (or, at least, one of them).
“Can’t we all just get along?”
Hah. There’ll be another Civil War before American society becomes more civil.
First off, Mithra talks about the nation being run by fools and drunks… This is sorta true, congress does have a very large say in everything in this nation. From, oh, I don’t know, going to war with other countries, to appointing people to the Supreme Court, &c.
Besides, Ted never made it into the White House.
Aside from that, I can’t go five seconds (off duty) with out hearing crap like “bible thumper,” “bushitler,” “chickenhawk,” &c. &c. If it’s such a big happy, fluffy bunny deal that certain members of the right-wing like to invoke phases like what Chris suggested, why doesn’t the left stop too? They want to be progressive but seem to be stuck in some weird place between kindergarden and the Marxist meetings Lenin went to.
Most right-wingers find liberals funny because they think that by using complete and utter idiocy, they can make problems go away. How do you end racism? Add it to every part of American life. Who do you blame when your liberal senator voted to go to war in Iraq? You blame Bush because he suggested that it might be in our best national interest to do so. What do you do when your lack of morals and/or common sense create human life that you can’t take care of? Kill it, it’s ok now because the kid is your’s… not like those meanies who say they want to destroy the entire US who are just misunderstood because we don’t let them build nukes in Tehran. That kind of stuff is funny to us because it’s irrational…
ok I’m done…
“Doonesbury is funny? When did that happen?”
I dunno… I know of one funny Doonesbury cartoon. It’s between the President and an aide, from 2002, before the elections.
“Sir, there are still some appeasers popping up on the Sunday shows.”
“What are the appeasers saying?”
“Well, that they want to coddle evildoers, that they favor a munic-style policy”
“That’s so typical of appeasers.”
“Uh… sir?
“Yes?”
“When do we go back to calling them Democrats?”
“After the election. Maybe. Depends.”
Those guys on the left … the further left they are, the dang funnier they are! I mean, c’mon, that Marx was a madcap! And Lenin! Don’t even get me started! And how about Stalin’s hilarious “Now you see ’em, now you don’t” purges! And if that jokester Castro gets me with that “Pull my finger” thing one more time … !
… of course, that Hitler had a pretty good laugh or two in him, too, what with that Holocaust joke!
Yeah, Frank, but that was three deep, and I already read Lileks. I want more.
Frank, you are right as always. A view must be shared to be funny. I also thought wanda was calling Doonesbury “dumb and mean” until I read the next line. I don’t have a freakin’ clue what Mallard Fillmore is. Stalin’s “now you see ’em, now you don’t” purges – Absolutely hilarious.
“Can’t we all just get along?…” –Chris
Not yet. I have a wee problem. We on the left are routinely called traitors these days. In this country, treason is a capital crime. And as we’ve seen, due process is out the window, even for citizens, at the CoC’s discretion. That means a precedent has been set for our summary execution.
I emphatically don’t think it will happen. But words have meaning. If I am a traitor for opposing the war, what follows? Or is this traitor-baiting just meaningless rhetoric about deeply important matters? What would that say about its various purveyors?
“Ridicule, scorn, and constant mockery” are the least I should offer in return.
I think Doonesbury is a prime example of liberals losing their funny. I used to love reading Doonesbury in the ’70s, never missed it.
Then Trudeau used Afghanistan as an example of Communist nations attacking one another (Vietnam was invading Cambodia at the time – Pol-Pot pissed off even them).
It made me realize that not only is he not funny, he’s too stupid to live. The Red Army bulldozing civilians into the ground alive is not an example of a new trend in the behavior of Communist governments vis-a-vis one another.
Then I took a good look at everything else Trudeau was saying and realized that he’s a ‘tard frothing at the mouth because he could make money doing it.
Doonesbury has earned its place on the ashheap of history.
“Follow Me!” says the ‘tard on his way to oblivion. I don’t think so.
Peeperkorn,
Merely opposing the war in Iraq does not make you a traitor. What gains the ire of those on the right is the outragious falsehoods pervayed on the left side of the isle seemingly designed solely to harm the war effort.
Kerry’s and Kennedy’s draft talk, withdrawl talk, the media’s constant filtering out of any good news in Iraq, the lionizing of suicide bombers and terrorists as freedom fighters and miniute men, shameless conspiracy theories about Bush and Rove by senators; none of which is “patriotic” dissent.
You dont agree with the war, thats fine. However, the decision to go to war has been made. If you are not going to help us win it, don’t try to make us lose it just so you can be the party in power.
We would take the left’s complaints much more seriously if we felt they were offered in the spirit of constructive debate and a true concern for the nation, but the past five years democrats have shown that to be the least of their concerns.
That reflects in humor too. We don’t find Bush=hitler jokes to be funny, nor the constant assertions that we are all evil white christian male oppressor homophobes with an axe to grind. I for one use sais.
I can laugh when lefties make fun of other lefties, a la John Stewart and his “Kerry’s face is made of rubber” crack. And when lefties make fun of righties: Some DKos commenter’s mention of Katherine Harris as the Cowpoke in Chief’s personal rodeo clown was hilarious. But this: “conservatives seem to be able to laugh at themselves more”? That’s funny because it’s not true.
If you don’t think that Dean makes fun of himself then you’re too busy listening to what Ken Mehlman/Rush/O’Reily said Dean said. If you listen to what Dean himself says, you’ll find him poking fun at himself every day.
But that is a huge problem in this whole political arena, that we listen to what Bush said that Kerry said, or visa-versa. It’s all spin anymore. In that world, maybe evolution is a crock.
I, too, had the opposite thought about the Mallard Filmore and Doonebury juxtaposition. I stopped reading Trudeau many years ago because one day I suddenly realized I had not cracked a smile over a Doonesbury strip in many years … went from usually funny to boring partisanship. The duck, otoh, can be quite funny, especially when not partisan.
Dean makes jokes at his own expense? Only when others have already been pointing out the wackiness … as an attempt to regain the high ground … and he’s so stiff trying to be funny …. that he is funny. LOL.
Other liberals try to be funny but they’ve lost their way …. Carlin, for exampel …. used to be funny back in his Al Sleet days, but mocking golf clubs because the land could be used for homeless people wasn’t funny the first time. Poor fella’s gone from funny to liberal.
When they’re NOT trying to be, liberals sure can be funny …. the current attempts to spin the Err Hamerikkka stuff is hilarious!
Thanks, Brian,
for a thoughtful reply; lots to disagree with, but carefully worded, and that’s appreciated. The only way to reach people, really.
I don’t wanna hear Carlin today… he could ruin the impression created by his early albums which I so enjoyed as a youth.
I had bad feelings about Air America from day one. So I wasn’t expecting much, and got even less. But to be fair, I’ve only heard a few segments. Mind you, I didn’t go back for more, and I’m supposed to be in a target audience.
The current scandal is getting attention for partisan reasons, which is fine, but I am afraid Republicans are not credible as punishers of corporate malfeasance in general. For those of us who have no vested interest in the network, the story is vanishingly minor, given what occurs unchecked and even approved-of.
I doubt I’ll be back, once I’ve attended to any business I may have started in the other thread.
Heavens, I forgot to attend to Captain Ed.
We’re similar, in some ways.
I think about spiking trees;
you think about pegging cabin-boys.
Wolcott was wrong, though. You don’t look like a pedophile. You look like a drunk. And so do I, by golly! A toast to you!
“Conservatives are all…”
“Liberals are all…”
Anything that starts with one of the above phrases is more likely to be wrong than right.
Both parties are supported by millions and millions of people. Millions and millions more don’t support either party per se, but vote or not based on their personal inclinations.
In this last election, both candidates were wealthy and connected and members of the wealthy social sphere. Both candidates were against gay marriage. Both candidates made a point of mentioning their Christian beliefs. Both candidates supported the war on drugs. Both parties denigrate members of the other party.
Many influential Democrats are wealthy businessmen. The Republican party no long has a lock on the plutocrat demographic.
Some liberals recently wrote a report claiming that conservative beliefs were primarily influenced by genetics and upbringing. They neglected to note that if that is true, the same is also true of liberal beliefs.
The Democrats have their socialists and anti-American, anti-globalists. The Republicans have their extreme fundamentalist Christians and their pro-business plutocrats. Today, the Democrats seem to be struggling more with extremists pulling the party toward their end of the spectrum, but that’s something both parties have to contend with.
Most politicians are corrupt. I’m beginning to believe that Congress should be entirely selected by lottery. Each person would be chosen at random from a specific region to serve for some number of years. Service would not be optional and no one could ever serve more than once. I’m sure that system would have problems, but I think it just might have fewer problems than the one we have now.
There was a clam at the bottom of the ocean, and a sea anemone stretched out one of it’s tentacles to touch it. Then the oyster said, “You dirty old man!”.
In Japan, THAT IS AN ACTUAL JOKE.
About the “laughing at yourself” thing. Its true that Frank does that about his political beliefs more than almost any liberal I know, including myself (though I wasn’t liberal back when I knew Frank in person). However, I also think Frank does that more than any conservative I know. It might not be so much about conservatives vs. liberals, as it Frank vs. insecure people on either side unable to laugh at their own beliefs. In other words, IMAO is a very hilarious outlier.
There is PLENTY of self-mockery on the left, but not of liberal beliefs–unless said beliefs are attributed to leftist radicals rather than themselves. The Daily Show mocks liberals all the time, but rarely do I notice them mock liberalism. The message is “we’re the stupid ones, they’re the evil ones”.
On the other hand, I think there is a certain brand of conservatism that is particularly enabling of self-mockery–a sort of Zen thing that recognizes that things that seem good frequently turn out to be horrible. The liberals believe that life in this world can be improved by conscious effort, and therefore work against bigotry, poverty, sickness, violence, and ignorance. Non-insane conservatives recognize that a non-insane liberal’s goals are good, but believe that liberal methods (e.g. socialism) will bring more evil than the problems they tried to solve. This requires a certain duality of thought–a conservative may find himself opposing a law aimed at all alleviating sickness, even though he certainly is not fond of sickness. That kind of conservative is the kind most likely to escape from the “it’s funny because it’s true” tarpit both sides are so fond of. (Though liberals are much better at escaping from it in non-political contexts). And, indeed, back when I was conservative I made fun of my own beliefs all the time. I rarely do now as a liberal.
I ended up switching sides because it didn’t make sense me to be a member of such an aggressive ruling party when skepticism was the driving force behind my politics. Why bother working to prevent socialism if big-government plutocracy is the only alternative conservatives offer?
Actually, the cartoon “Tom the Dancing Bug” at salon.com occasionally has it in for liberals. So liberals will laugh at liberals, but not for free.