Why Aren't Conservatives Funny?

[Quixote1818]

This came to me in an email. It's more proof that the only kind of humor Republicans understand is mean spirited and contains physical harm to someone:



This test only has one question, but it's a very important one.
> >
> >By giving an honest answer, you will discover where you stand morally.
> >
> >The test features an unlikely, completely fictional situation in which >you
>will have to make a decision.
> >
>
>Remember that your answer needs to be honest, yet spontaneous.
> >
> >Please scroll down slowly and give due consideration to each line.
> >
> >Answer honestly!!!
> >
> >You are in Florida , Miami to be specific.
> >
> >There is chaos all around you caused by a hurricane with severe flooding.
> >
> >This is a flood of biblical proportions.
> >
> >You are photojournalist working for a major newspaper,and you're caught >in
>the middle of this epic disaster
> >
> >The situation is nearly hopeless.
> >
> >You're trying to shoot career-making photos.
> >
> >There are houses and people swirling around you, some disappearing under
>the water.
> >
> >Nature is unleashing all of its destructive fury.
> >
> >Suddenly you see a woman in the water.
> >
> >She is fighting for her life, trying not to be taken down with the >debris.
> >
> >You move closer. Somehow the woman looks familiar.
> >
> >You suddenly realize who it is.
> >
> >It's Hillary Clinton !
> >
> >At the same time you notice that the raging waters are about to take her
>under forever.
> >
> >You have two options-you can save the life of Hillary Clinton ,or you can
>shoot a dramatic Pulitzer Prize winning photo,documenting the death of one
>of the world's most powerful women.
> >
> >So here's the question, and please give an honest answer.......
> >
> >
> >
> >Would you select high contrast color film, or would you go with the >classic
>simplicity of black and white?




Why Aren't Conservatives Funny?
John McQuaid
Bio
Yes, this is a serious question.

And no, I'm not saying there aren't funny conservatives. Just that, generally speaking, "conservative humor" tends to be an oxymoronic term.

Sometime early in the Clinton presidency Rush Limbaugh appeared on David Letterman. Letterman was pretty generous (as opposed to his more interesting, confrontational approach to Bill O'Reilly), and lobbed some easy setups Limbaugh's way. Though Limbaugh obviously considers himself to be a witty fellow, he ignored them. The whole segment wasn't even amusing, just weird. Limbaugh gave a skeptical, somewhat bemused audience his take on Hillary Clinton. Letterman did his "dumb guy" impression.

One answer is that a sense of grievance underlies much of the conservative media. Limbaugh, Fox News and many in the right-wing punditocracy trade on the sense of being excluded and demeaned by elites, who are thus deemed to deserve nothing but scorn and mockery. So their attempts at humor - at least, the ones that get broadcast - tend to be pretty blunt and obvious, sometimes mean-spirited. That is, not funny. Dennis Miller seemed to lose it when he put himself in the Bush camp and started announcing his fervent desire to blow our enemies up. Ha ha!

Surnow, to his credit, seems to recognize that harshness doesn't do it. But he's got a long way to go.

So how is it liberals - at least some of them - are funny? The idea that there must be a "liberal humor" vs. "conservative humor" smackdown is the same false dichotomy you find comparing "Doonesbury"and "Mallard Fillmore." "Liberal" may be a degraded term in the political sphere, but In America today "liberal" is a broader, more protean category than "conservative." Jon Stewart is a liberal, but neither he nor the Daily Show view things purely through a left-wing prism. Their goal isn't the care and feeding of a single, narrow political constituency. Thank God.
>

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-mcquaid/why-arent-conservatives-_b_41256.html

[liberal N proud]

1. Because FAUX didn't tell them to laugh

[C_U_L8R]

2. That's just being meanspirited

It easy and it's not funny.
Conservatives are essentially lazy SOBs
and conserving brain activity is what the do best...
that and their pitiful loathing of freedom and humanity.

[CBGLuthier]

3. All a matter of perspective

The EXACT same joke has been posted on DU with RW targets and been proclaimed the funniest LMAO spit-take inducing material ever.

The truth is that most humor is based on cruelty, pain and suffering. Even the oldest most elemental joke of someone slipping on a banana peel is based in pain.

[elfin]

4. Becauseit takes a three digit IQ

to both craft and "get" satire.

[rock]

5. Because they're stupid

Stupid people are humorless. Sure they think they're funny, but remember point #1: they're stupid.

[Clark2008]

6. That joke was originally told with George Bush's name.

Or, at least, that's the way I heard it about two years ago.

[Ron Green]

12. That's right, and it's a funny story depending on how it's told:

It's meant to echo a "moral dilemma" choice, and the punch line of course reinforces the notion that the subject (Bush, or Hillary in this case) doesn't deserve a moment's thought of being saved. This joke works only when the audience shares the viewpoint of the joke teller. More effective humor happens, I believe, when the joke wrenches the audience out of the comfort of a previous position and forces them, through laughter at the absurd or even the obvious, to expand their thinking.

[NewJeffCT]

39. I first saw it with Osama something, what's his name?

He's not that important, but that is whose name I saw with that joke.

[ComerPerro]

46. its been around forever

[Birthmark]

7. It's hard for them to be funny.

You try being funny with a big ol' stick up your ass!

[soothsayer]

8. cuz they're terrified and terra-ized. We're braver.

[Richard Steele]

9. Stunted emotional growth- they lack the ability to "self examine" necessary to grasp true HUMOR.

So they're limited to the slapstick and name-calling which
most of us mature beyond in our adolescence.

[Klukie]

13. Exactly

[Lydia Leftcoast]

10. Years ago, when Life of Brian came out, I saw an interview with

Graham Chapman, in which he discussed the making of the movie. The interviewer asked him about complaints that the movie was "blasphemous," and Chapman said that they explcitly made fun of religious fanaticism, and not of Jesus.

They had no particular objections to making fun of Jesus himself, but they found that the jokes just weren't funny.

The reason, they decided, was that humor is best directed at people who are somehow ridiculous or at deflating the pompous and hypocritical or getting in digs at the powerful. Since Jesus was moral and well-intentioned and had no official status in his world, humor directed at him came off as mean and shallow.

The right wingers live in an upsidedown world where good is bad and bad is good. They worship the powerful and despise the less powerful. Their humor, therefore, is directed at precisely the wrong targets, the less powerful members of society.

[KittyWampus]

21. Your post reinforces my supposition- the inherent hypocracy of the Right makes easy targets

while the Left generally seems to stand and act on principle. And our perspective is one of inclusion.

[Marr]

26. I think that's it.

Humor- especially good satire- is directed at people with influence or status. It's a tool that the powerless use against the powerful.

It's one thing for an old woman to punch a big man in the face. It's a completely different thing if the big man punches the old woman in the face. I expect some people would find the latter quite funny, and they'd probably love Bush's ways, too.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

30. I knew some Soviet emigres when I was in grad school, and their

humor was about getting the better of the officials or exaggerating their true feelings about an undesirable situation.

It wasn't about the KGB agent who tortured the dissident.

[ComerPerro]

47. which is exactly why Dennis Miller became so unfunny

I used to like him, in the 90s. And he made fun of Conservatives. But he also made fun of Dems and Clinton, becuase, face it, we had power.

But then he turned into a BushBot schill.

He forgot that when you make fun of those out of power to get laughs from the powerful, you are not a satarist. You're a court jester.

[youngdem]

11. Because anger isn't funny

You can always tell the motivation of a Winger telling a joke...it is to insult someone weaker than they are so they can feel ok about their stubby dick.

Pain isn't funny, even though all comedy is pain. The fine line is to make the humor apparent while negating or hiding the pain.

I have heard many jokes from Red State assholes, and jokes at someone's expense who is weaker than the person telling it is simply sad and mean. Nothing funny about it.

Plus, most Repukes I have met simply LACK a sense of humor, and their perception of humor is passive aggression. They are just a little less human, to me. They lack a sense of irony, hypocrisy or humor. Simply, they are monkeys with Bibles.

[KittyWampus]

19. Ever hear one of Lewis Black's rants? He usually comes across as pretty angry, IMO

[youngdem]

31. Yes, he rants, but he is smiling underneath

Interviews with him really show it. He says he isn't that angry and that he doesn't write his stuff. He is a performer, and his character is angry, and I can easily see he is happy, even laughing under the anger.

Repuke humor is different, both in tone and purpose. The tone is mean, not funny, and the purpose is insult and hierarchy, not humor.

By the way, my favorite comedian is Bill Hicks, who is the King of Anger. However, he is a master of his trade, and even then, occasionally would leave the audience behind with being so angry he became difficult to follow.

Anger is a comedy spice. NOT the protein. When it becomes the dominant reason for the attempt, it has failed, at least to me.

Nice to meet you by the way. Hope to see you around.

[mmonk]

14. Hate lacks a certain humor.

[Bitwit1234]

15. I have noticed that republics

have the type of humor that mocks people. The bigger the "put down" the better the like it. Just look at all their attempts and you will see. This new show that is "supposed" to be their answer to Jon Stewart. The whole clip and segment is a put down of Obama.

And I have stopped watching Leno any more. The only thing funny is his headlines. He spends more time putting down Clinton in sex jokes than any thing. He is stale and repetitious. With all the material he has especially on bush why does he repeat and repeat Clinton put downs. Even the audience doesn't laugh any more.

[TheCowsCameHome]

16. Because the joke is on them. They are too stupid to understand that.

[Kber]

17. "One answer is that a sense of grievance underlies much of the conservative media"

Jews, on the other hand, have had one or two successful comedians who have turned their sense of grievance and underdog status into some pretty funny stuff.

So I don't think that's it completely.

[CJCRANE]

28. I'm not an expert on Jewish humor

but I would have thought the best kind is self-deprecating, i.e. the underdog makes fun of themself, but the RW kind of humor is (verbally) attacking someone else...

[Kber]

48. True.

And maybe actually being an underdog, as opposed to just playing one on TV, helps bring perspective.

I think in the case of genuine underdogs, it's sometimes a choice between laughing or crying. In the true conservatives' case, it's a choice between laughing AT or hitting.

[MindPilot]

18. The difference is that while real humor sets up a situation

then looks at it way that people will find funny--"Who's on First" may be the very best example of how that works. "Republik humor" starts with a prejudice and tries to fix the joke around it. In short RW humor panders to the lowest common denominator.

[GoneOffShore]

20. The joke above was circulating last year

But Bush was the one in the water.

[Marr]

27. I think that really proves the point.

If you accept that humor is a tool the powerless use against the powerful, then the same joke could be funny or not funny depending on who's in the water. Hillary Clinton has influence and status, so she still makes the joke work as far as I'm concerned. Not as funny as Bush, but that's just my opinion.

Put... say... Lassie the dog in the water and it's just nonsensical cruelty. And that's where most conservative "humor" comes from- it's the establishment mocking individuals or groups that have no power. It just comes off as juvenile and cruel.

[Quixote1818]

22. Does anyone here think "BO" is funny?

I didn't even think BO or "body oder" jokes were funny in elementary school yet Conservatives will center a whole show around Elementary School humor?????

God they suck! :eyes:

[CrispyQ]

25. The canned laughter was my first clue that it was humor at it's finest!

NOT!

[NYC Liberal]

51. BO doesn't stand for Barack Obama! It stands for Bill O'Reilly!

;):hi:

[KittyWampus]

23. Also, perhaps there's a current of Empathy than runs through the Left that is absent in the Right

IMO, Humor depends on empathy.

[CJCRANE]

29. I'm not sure if this

is LW or RW but I tend to like people who can laugh at themselves (i.e. maybe expose a weakness) more than people who make fun of others (i.e. verbal putdowns).

[CrispyQ]

24. When I asked my rw mother how she could listen to a man who called

women who want equal rights 'feminazis' she told me I have no sense of humor. When she gave me a copy of one of Ann Coulter's books & I told her I wouldn't read that hateful spew if I was paid to, she told me I have no sense of humor. Any time I call her out on the mean spirited, hateful emails she forwards, I have no sense of humor.

So you see, it's liberals that have no sense of humor. :sarcasm:

[Az]

32. Humor simply does not work from the conservative point of view

It has to do with the nature of comedy. Comedy at its best is the powerless speaking to the powerful. It is pointing out the absurdity of the system. It is revealing the man behind the curtain. All of these things are progressive in nature. Conservative typically is the power. It is wealth and entitlement. It is all the things humor pokes fun at.

When people try humor from the conservative angle it typically amounts to joking about another's plight. Haha, he can't fend for himself for reasons beyond his control. Its just not funny. Humor based on conservative views is going to come off as cruel and vindictive. Since they can't rely on insight for their wit they often turn to juvenile insults in order to inject humor into their observations.

[MiniMe]

33. Its hard to be funny when you have a stick up your butt n/t

[Initech]

34. To quote Bill Hicks - "Religious fundamentalism breeds no irony."

They take everything literally.

[gravity]

35. Conservatives lack wit

Their jokes don't have any substance to them besides hate for liberals, and have not evolved over the past 30 years from the standard liberal stereotypes. They fail to see the irony in politics, so their political humor ends up being on the same level as dick jokes. Satire is on a much deeper level, allowing subtle criticisms of the obscurities in our world that they would be unable to do without humor. Thats why the Daily Show, even if though its 'fake' news, is more informative than the actual 'real' news shows.

Also the best comedians often make fun of themselves, which Conservatives are usually too defensive and uptight to be able to criticize themselves.

Can anyone imagine a conservative Steven Colbert, making subtle jokes against liberals?

[WinkyDink]

36. Because, as Elaine Boosler (IIRC) once said: You need to be INTELLIGENT to be funny.

[deutsey]

37. Twain said humor comes from sorrow, not joy

He didn't mean that it comes from INFLICTING sorrow and gloating about it.

[DuaneBidoux]

38. Face it, it's hard to make a funny racist, homophobic joke...or any kind of joke that depends on

attacks as the central theme of the humor. Conservatives tend to make fun of people because of who they are, or what they look like--and they rarely make fun of themselves, something liberals regularly do. It also tends strongly toward violent physical attack or pain where someone is actually injured or killed.

Another thing is that liberals tend to make fun of people because of their actions or words, not because they are black, or an immigrant, or French, or whatever that is not under their control.

Daily Show, or Colbert regularly make fun of democrats and liberals if they have done something funny or stupid. We recognize the foibles of all human beings whereas conservatives always divide the world into "us" and "them" and then "them" becomes the butt of the joke simply because they are not "us."

[BuyingThyme]

40. We laugh when our truths are exposed.

Conservatism is the art of concealing one's truths.

[Democrat 4 Ever]

42. Because it hurts to laugh when you have a stick up your ass 24/7.

Shove a lump of coal up a repug's ass and you would have a diamond in a week. Uptight, narrow-mindedness is not conducive to finding anything funny.

[LTR]

41. Because humor often comes from rebellion

Conservatives aren't rebellious - they're too establishment. Often, when conservatives try to be funny, it comes across as condescending and whiny.

Realistically, the only funny conservative that really comes to mind is P.J. O'Rourke. While I completely disagree with his politics, I think his writing is hilarious. Unfortunately, most conservatives come across more like Mallard Fillmore. Meaning that it's often a feeble attempt at something called 'humor'.

[MindPilot]

50. I agree with you about P.J. O'Rourke--I've liked him since the NatLamp days.

One of my favorite quotes is very apropos to this administration. "Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."

[NoGOPZone]

43. because a good sense of humor is a sign of intelligence nt

[NewJeffCT]

44. It's how they try to satirize things

Both sides have the powerful & the elite that they try to poke fun at - we have Bush, Cheney and other elite Republics like Giuliani, Frist, DeLay, etc and Republic media personalities - Rush, O'Reilly, Coulter, Hannity, etc.

On our side, we have "Hollywood" liberals like Michael Moore, Barbra Streisand and we have Ted Kennedy.

Our side is usually trying to get people to change and open their minds. We're willing to debate the other side. Conservatives, on the other hand, just want to destroy liberals.

Have any leading progressives called for assassinating/killing all conservatives? Yet,people like John Bolton and Ann Coulter have called for mass killings and assassinations. Imagine if a leading liberal had wished the 9/11 planes had hit the Fox News building instead? Judging by the weeks of outrage over the obscure Ward Churchill, the person would have been drawn and quartered while being shuttled between Gitmo & Abu Graib.

[shadowknows69]

45. You have to have a soul to have a sense of humor?

Just a thought.

[Hoping4Change]

49. Humour undermines authority, it ridicules power. The essence

of Conservative worldview is to maintain authority structures and ensure continued deference to those structures, humour totally undermines these goals.