# Do you like the Three Stooges? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 18, 2009, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410 "2009-02-18T16:43:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![gaffa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e68b1a/32.png) [@gaffa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gaffa)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/41 "2009-02-18T23:01:14Z")
48 year old male, and I’ve never found them funny. Too much empathy, I guess. I see someone hit on the head, and I just imagine being hit on the head. I see someone goosed with a blowtorch, I imagine the pain of being burned. Eyes poked? Being slapped? What in the hell is supposed to be funny about these things? ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/42 "2009-02-18T23:38:22Z")
44 year old male. I’ve never seen any humour in their act. ---
**Author:** ![Julius\_Henry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/8797f3/32.png) [@Julius\_Henry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Julius_Henry)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/43 "2009-02-18T23:45:55Z")
I liked them when my age was only a single digit, but not since. My sister (who, unlike me, is not a guy) does like them, so I guess we balance each other out that way. By the way, am I the only one who thought Shemp looked like Ronald Reagan (who, at the time, I knew from Death Valley Days, not from the news.) ---
**Author:** ![Zeldar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/b77776/32.png) [@Zeldar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeldar)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2009, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/44 "2009-02-18T23:51:10Z")
> [@Julius\_Henry](#): > > By the way, am I the only one who thought Shemp looked like Ronald Reagan (who, at the time, I knew from Death Valley Days, not from the news.) I like the way you think! I never thought Reagan’s hair looked right on him and I think you have nailed why I felt that way. Does Larry Fine remind you any of Bobcat Goldthwaite? ---
**Author:** ![BrassyPhrase](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ea666f/32.png) [@BrassyPhrase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrassyPhrase)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/45 "2009-02-19T00:00:56Z")
Female 39 Thought the Stooges were very funny when I was young. I haven’t watched it again in about 30 years. I think I’d still giggle a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/46 "2009-02-19T02:02:30Z")
> [@Daddypants](#): > > Love the Stooges. My wife just shakes her head and walks out of the room. (Male) I’ve always liked them, and some moments are pure gold. I also get a kick out of the crudeness of some of the “effects”, and the cartoonish nature of the characters. It’s sort of a good-because-it’s-bad thing. ---
**Author:** ![lizardling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f4b2a3/32.png) [@lizardling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lizardling)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/47 "2009-02-19T02:08:05Z")
Female, 30. Meh. Never really thought they were funny. ---
**Author:** ![Fiddle\_Peghead](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fiddle_peghead/32/3506_2.png) [@Fiddle\_Peghead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiddle_Peghead)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/48 "2009-02-19T06:28:58Z")
While never an avid watcher of the Stooges growing up, I did see them every so often. I don’t think I ever laughed at them, not even once. ---
**Author:** ![Mudshark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f04885/32.png) [@Mudshark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mudshark)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/49 "2009-02-19T08:42:37Z")
23 male here, can’t stand them. (Unless it’s in It’s A Mad Mad Mad Mad World, then it’s kind of funny, but it isn’t like they do anything there. It’s just seeing them stand there for two seconds dressed as firemen) ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 9:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/50 "2009-02-19T09:04:16Z")
55 year old male. Don’t like their brutal humour and never really did. I don’t (and never have) particularly liked Laurel and Hardy, the Marx Brothers or Buster Keaton. I have not seen enough of Fatty Arbuckle to give an opinion. I still do like Chaplin. Some of his moments are still gold. ---
**Author:** ![Sublight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Sublight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sublight)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 10:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/51 "2009-02-19T10:34:12Z")
> [@jayjay](#): > > Love the Stooges. Male, 37. And they weren’t always slapstick…the one where they’re teaching a roomful of pretty young women is actually one of the ones that always stick in my mind… “See-say-say, see-say-see, see-sigh-icky-ai-icky-ai-ay, Sicky-say-see-say-so, sigh-icky-ai-say-so…” > > Or something like that. This one? ![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/M8Pk1UYkB3I/maxresdefault.jpg)https://www.youtube.com/embed/M8Pk1UYkB3I?feature=oembed&wmode=opaque I was ambivalent toward them as a kid, but very recently I’ve started watching some of their old routines on Youtube, and I’ve found they’re actually really funny, even without the slapstick parts. Example: [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/sxAk3B_zS5k/hqdefault.jpg "Curly Takes the Stand") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxAk3B_zS5k) ETA: Male, 37. ---
**Author:** ![Buford\_was\_no\_angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Buford\_was\_no\_angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buford_was_no_angel)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/52 "2009-02-19T12:29:52Z")
30 year old male here. I’ve always loved the Stooges. Shemp is far and away my favorite. **Moe** : Remind me to kill you later. **Shemp** : I won’t have time later. ---
**Author:** ![Cliffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/59ef9b/32.png) [@Cliffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cliffy)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2009, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410/53 "2009-02-19T15:32:38Z")
Like **Sublight** , I was indifferent to them as a kid but a couple years ago I caught a few shorts on TV and I found them hilarious. I’m now a definite Stooges fan. BTW, the very hypothesis discussed by the OP was the basis for a joke in the most recent Futurama DVD movie. Mom, one of the show’s recurring villains, has three sons who are Stooges pastiches. When they infiltrate the company offices where the main characters work posing as exterminators, Fry finds their antics very funny, while Leela and Amy are unimpressed: “Sex & the City – now _that’s_ comedy.” –Cliffy [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-like-the-three-stooges/486410.md?page=2)