The Jokes Men Tell
Babies, Mr. Chappelle, and a few words on sensitivity
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Dear Bolu,
At that moment she was a contortionist of sorts, twisting her face into different forms by sticking out her tongue, making weird movements with her eyes, and willing her facial muscles to take on different configurations. She was putting on a show for her audience of one—a baby boy who seemed lost and confused by her theatrics. He was interested enough to be fixated on the performer who he was meeting for the first time on this bus ride but unmoved by her efforts to amuse him. The more she tried to elicit a more encouraging reaction, the more confused the audience seemed. She was embarrassed and he couldn't care less.
There is a temptation to make funny faces when we meet a baby for the first time. We might be terrible at making jokes amongst our peers but babies offer us a chance for redemption. The bar for making them laugh is so low that it requires neither wit nor any sort of imaginative exercise. We need only make our face into the most ridiculous form, and at once, we could have our audience in stitches. Other times, however, it doesn't go as planned and our infantile audience is left quite befuddled, wondering what an adult of our age is doing. It could go either way—one never really knows. But when the infant isn't thrilled by your performance, the blankness on their innocent faces betray the thoughts on their mind; "Oh, another idiotic mammal" or "No honey, don't do this to yourself; you're a mother of two!". And even when they laugh, sometimes, there is a sense that they play along simply because they don't want you to feel bad. And the curtains close with you feeling proud of your abysmal comical display.
As babies grow, their awareness improves and they become more receptive to other forms of humour. Sounds, for instance. Silly sounds. A loud fart or some armpit noise might amuse them, for some reason. They age and their visual and auditory sense of humor takes on an intellectual side. They can think about and understand ironies, puns, and metaphors. The layers of subtexts in a joke become increasingly clear to them. Their knowledge base expands and they can relate to a variety of contexts and scenarios.
They might even learn to tell good jokes like a certain Dave Chappelle. If you've not seen Mr. Chappelle's latest show on Netflix, The Closer, I suggest you do. Mr. Chappelle is evidently a master of his craft and his ability to weave various social commentary into his jokes is enviable. While the public might have reservations about some of the things he says, I think there is consensual agreement that he's a great comedian.
In the aftermath of Mr. Chappelle's show, there have been calls for him to be canceled and outrage over some of his jokes about the LGBTQ community. To be fair to Mr. Chappelle, he did say a lot of things about several people and groups as comedians are wont to, but he seemed to really strike a nerve with the LGBTQ community. They seemed to consider his jokes harmful to their community. And that begets the question; how do we draw the line between a harmful joke and a harmless one?
I once had a conversation with a friend where she mentioned that she didn't fancy insensitive jokes. Now, I think that's a very noble thing as we should all have some respect for one another. But the problem with that is the fact that there is almost no good joke that isn't conceivably insensitive. You can take some time to think of any good joke you've ever heard, and you will, almost assuredly, be able to imagine someone getting hurt by it. If I made a joke about letters of the alphabet, someone suffering from dyslexia or the parent of a dyslexic child may find it more hurtful than amusing. If I made a joke about drunk driving, someone who lost their entire family to a road accident because of a liquor-influenced driver may find it more disdainful than funny.
Does the fact that a joke is conceivably insensitive make it a harmful joke? Is that singularly enough to delete the joke from my archives? I'm not sure it is. And I'm not sure it isn't either. Men, women, children—we all have valid feelings and we should rightly try to respect them. And people say the world has gone soft, hence the increasing sensitivity to issues of "little" import. They might be right, but I think it is also important to emphasize the role of the connectedness of the modern world.
If you told a terrible joke at a show 100 years ago, I may never hear of it if I am on the other side of the Atlantic. There would be no point reacting or avenue to even react to it. But odds are that if you said the same joke today, I may be streaming the performance live or privy to a recent recording of the show. Of course, I'd be more compelled to express my displeasure knowing fully well that you'd hear about it and that there is a caravan of people who would eagerly lend their voices and limbs to my cause.
Again that begets the question; is it a numbers game? And honestly, it seems like it is. You're more likely to apologize for hurting the feelings of a hundred people when you tell a bad joke than that of a single soul. Does that make the feelings of the one less valid or less valuable than that of the hundred? Probably not. But that's just what it is. That said, the space between a harmful joke and a harmless one is much easier to navigate when we're among a group of friends or loved ones because we're more alert to their sensibilities and dispositions. It's easier for them to confront us about a joke we said that was hurtful and that should somewhat caution us when we're next tempted to say a similar joke.
For us, the audience, who are hurt by a certain joke, perhaps we should try a bit more to see the humor in comic relief. Not all jokes about us are affronts to our lives, livelihoods, and sense of self. Some paint realities that we contend with but do not necessarily agree with. Some exaggerate stereotypes that are not necessarily true. Some are, well, simply nasty. And some are marks of genius. Whichever category the joke falls into, there is usually some conceivably insensitive aspect to it and it can't always be helped. Regardless, comedy is an art form worthy of appreciation and I believe we all merit a good laugh every now and then. There are many acts out there and at least one of them has a joke that would leave you gasping for air rather than feeling bad about yourself.
If we took away all the "insensitive" jokes from the face of the earth, we'd be left with a largely humourless world. That'd be quite sad and I don't think we want that. Nonetheless, we shouldn't embrace the extreme alternative, which involves intentionally saying jokes to hurt others. We should try to carefully navigate this space—this in-between—and the first step, I believe, is being conscious about the effect of our jokes on the people immediately close to us, dear friend. I only just realized that is a letter about a joking matter that is also a serious matter. Haha, I do hope you appreciate the irony, my audience of one.
Fin.
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Write you soon, merci !
- Wolemercy
Life already is an insensitive joke. Maybe we cancel its creator.