Falling off a trampoline, getting kicked in the nads, slipping on a banana peel. Those home videos of people getting hurt make us laugh but why? Getting kicked in the balls is not funny if its you!
<a href=“http://www.lyricsondemand.com/soundtracks/a/avenueqlyrics/schadenfreudelyrics.html”>Schadenfreude!</a> (mind the pop-ups).
Eheh. Ah… you’re probably just happy it isn’t you. And it should be noted that while seeing someone getting kicked in the nads is funny, seeing them getting their head bashed in with a hammer is not. It’s only funny when it’s not serious.
Argh. That’s the second time in a row I’ve done that to links. I fail at message boards.
It is unexpected (normally you don’t shoot a home movie thinking it will be on America’s Funniest Home Videos) and it usually happens very quickly. It takes you by surprise and it’s over and done with in a moment. The show’s narrator is apt at speaking at a leisurly pace: “There’s nothing like an afternoon at the County Fair…” Then the punchline… (as person walks away from petting farm, goat pulls at shirt causing the person to fall and hit their head) "Sometimes you just can’t leave!
[QUOTE=csharpmajor, seeing them getting their head bashed in with a hammer is not. It’s only funny when it’s not serious.[/QUOTE]
Well alot of people were laughing at people getting seriously hurt/killed in movies like Sin City and Devil’s Rejects
C#Maj, [url=] is your friend. <a href=" "> is not.
I think the fun is in the slapstick angle. WHOOOAA LOOKIT THAT GUY JUST FELL OFF A BRIDGE!!1! :eek: You’re distanced from the consequences. If you had to sit thru a 1/2 hour docu on his struggle to regain a normal life despite being brain-damaged and twisted like a pretzel, you wouldn’t be laughing.
Yeah dude,
Wish I had video of &#@(( #%^& $@(@ but it was timeless. 
Have to agree with that “At leat it wan’t me!” viewpoint. That about says it.
Maybe it’s just cause people are horrible little monkeys and enjoy watching other people in pain? I’m including myself in this. Hell, I’ll join in the fun with a vaseline-slicked baseball bat.
That’s just sad Chill out duse, 
I meant dude. Sorry Ia Am DRUNK!
At least you didn’t end a sentence with a comma,
This gets into WAG territory…
One theory of humor is that laughing is tied to relief: laughing accompanies the release of built-up tension.
Watching somebody getting, or about to get, hurt = tension
which is followed by relief when we realize they’re not really hurt that badly
or we realize, because of the context, that it isn’t real damage to a real person, so nobody really got hurt
or we identify with the person about to get hurt, and expect to be hurt ourselves, and then laugh with relief when we’re unscathed.
An interesting question and one I can’t begin to answer. I do not enjoy such humor. I have never been a fan of slapstick and just don’t “get” why people laugh at this stuff.
However, to try to give an answer, Heinlein said that Man is the animal that laughs because it hurts too much to cry.
(Yes, the link violates the two clicks rule, but since it comes from the hompage, I figureded it doesn’t matter. After all, this is an authorized use, and is only a clip.).
Do people actually slip on banana peels in real life??
In my understanding, (and I am not a pyschologist) the thing that makes things funny is that they are scary. We laugh as a way of dealing with this scary thing and “show our conquest” of it within our psychy.
Which if valid, provides some interesting debates.
Two gay men had just had sex and one gets up to use the restroom, saying “Lie on your belly until I get back, no masterbating without me.” But coming back a few minutes later, sperm is dripping from the ceiling. Angrily he says, “You whacked off!”
“No I didn’t. I farted!”
So, if you find that joke funny, does that imply that you’ve still got a good bit of homophobia in you, for instance.