# Humor that doesn’t age well **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** comedian-jokes\ **Created:** [August 29, 2021, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723 "2021-08-29T13:07:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 10
**Author:** ![Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a8b319/32.png) [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disgruntled_Penguin)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2021, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/181 "2021-09-05T23:40:21Z")
> [@Martini\_Enfield](#): > > When I was a kid, there used to be jokes about “useless inventions” like [helicopter ejection seats](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamov_Ka-50) and [solar powered torches](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar-powered_flashlight) too. Except both those things exist now, and work, and in the latter case are extremely common. A relevent line from Steve Martin which matches but it still plays a part in my inner monologue because I still agree with the absurdity. “Whenever I blow a dollar on a bottle of water I have Perrier.” ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/182 "2021-09-06T00:45:10Z")
> [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](#): > > A relevent line from Steve Martin which matches but it still plays a part in my inner monologue because I still agree with the absurdity. > > “Whenever I blow a dollar on a bottle of water I have Perrier.” After he hit the big time, Martin splurged: a fur sink; an electric dog polisher; a $500 pair of socks. “And then, I bought some _stupid_ stuff!” ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/183 "2021-09-06T00:57:44Z")
> [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](#): > > A relevent line from Steve Martin which matches but it still plays a part in my inner monologue because I still agree with the absurdity. > > “Whenever I blow a dollar on a bottle of water I have Perrier.” Coulda sworn that was Robin Williams, spoofing how Gore Vidal would go about being a pitchman. ---
**Author:** ![Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a8b319/32.png) [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disgruntled_Penguin)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/184 "2021-09-06T01:16:08Z")
Very possible. I’d listen to both these guys religiously( actually for the joke telling patterns not the actual jokes. )Joke fits both guys. I was probably misremembering. Let me restate: A relevent line from Robin Williams which matches but it still plays a part in my inner monologue because I still agree with the absurdity. “Whenever I blow a dollar on a bottle of water I have Perrier.” ---
**Author:** ![Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/q.q.switcheroo/32/5713_2.png) [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.Q.Switcheroo)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/185 "2021-09-06T01:26:40Z")
Time has not been kind to this one: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/bHTazxaQ9bs/maxresdefault.jpg "Allan Sherman - The Let's All Call Up A.T & T And Protest To The President March") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHTazxaQ9bs) ---
**Author:** ![Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a8b319/32.png) [@Disgruntled\_Penguin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Disgruntled_Penguin)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/186 "2021-09-06T01:28:16Z")
IMDB brings up this Robin Williams joke which I remember - [Robin Williams](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000245/?ref_=tt_ch): [as he drinks from a glass] A little sip of Perrier here. I had to stop drinking alcohol, because I used to wake up nude in front of my car with my keys in my ass. Not a good thing. [as a bystander] [Robin Williams](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000245/?ref_=tt_ch): Hi, can I help ya? [as himself, drunk, turning an imaginary key in his ass] [Robin Williams](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000245/?ref_=tt_ch): No thanks. It’s just flooded. I’ll be okay. and this one: - [Robin Williams](https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000245/?ref_=tt_ch): [taking a sip of Perrier] The first purpose of alcohol is to make English your second goddamn language. Eventually, you may be quite fluent; you may be a Nobel physicist! But not the joke in question. Proves nothing of course but I think the buck joke is as good as these others and I’d think should be included. The IMDB link first link for “who said whenever i blow a dollar on a bottle of water i have perrier” and the second is the only other one that directly addresses the subject. It goes “Whenever I blow a dollar on a bottle of water . . . I buy Perrier” Google it, my friends 🙂 - Reality, What a Concept - List item No, I googled it. Your quote can’t be your citation. Anyway, I don’t have my albums anymore and can easily see both guys saying it. Who knows? Wait, wasn’t Gore Vidal hawking Thunderbird wine? I kinda remember that bit. Kinda. Vidal’s wiki verifies that much: In the 1970s, in the stand-up comedy album _Reality … What a Concept_ , [Robin Williams](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Williams) portrayed Vidal as a drunken shill in a [Thunderbird wine](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbird_(wine)) commercial. ---
**Author:** ![Bonum\_Legatum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bonum_legatum/32/6183_2.png) [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/188 "2021-09-06T11:44:34Z")
Humor with Nazi’s as buffoons. There was once a sketch on a Benny Hill show where a “bird” (British slang for female model) came out in a quasi Nazi uniform (with miniskirt) and goose-stepped around the stage. I forget the point of the sketch, but it was a real “what were they thinking” moment. “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” had the sketch with the the “boncentration bamps” and the “retired window cleaner”. Then there was Hogan’s Heroes. although that was lambasted for poor taste during it’s production. (Even the Mad Magazine parody of Hogan’s Heroes ended in the worst of bad taste.) You might consider “The Producers” part of this change too. ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/189 "2021-09-06T11:46:14Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > Time has not been kind to this one: > > [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHTazxaQ9bs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHTazxaQ9bs) Another song on this album which would fit the topic is: “Oh, what have you done, Billie Sol, Bille Sol Oh, what have you done, charming Billie You took almost every cent, from the US government Which you spent on fertilizer, which is silly.” [Billie Sol Estes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billie_Sol_Estes) (1925-2013) made headlines briefly in the early 60’s - quickly disappearing from the scene. ---
**Author:** ![F.U.Shakespeare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aca169/32.png) [@F.U.Shakespeare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/F.U.Shakespeare)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/190 "2021-09-06T12:52:34Z")
> [@Bonum\_Legatum](#): > > “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” had the sketch with the the “boncentration bamps” and the “retired window cleaner”. The “Mr. Hilter” sketch still cracks me up. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/191 "2021-09-06T13:02:49Z")
> [@F.U.Shakespeare](#): > > > [@Bonum\_Legatum](#): > > > > “Monty Python’s Flying Circus” had the sketch with the the “boncentration bamps” and the “retired window cleaner”. > > The “Mr. Hilter” sketch still cracks me up. - Same with [The Swanning About Squad.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2ecasPqhgk) ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/192 "2021-09-06T14:13:07Z")
I don’t want to harp on, but I think this is important to cover. > [@cmkeller](#): > > I don’t think it makes the scene funnier. I do think it makes it less out of synch with the prevailing culture’s more modern sensibilities, but it’s my opinion and does not represent any authoritative knowledge of exactly how broad or deep those sensibilities are. It very, very much isn’t. The only talk I’ve heard in modern day about that scene is how transphobic it is, and how that exact same joke was the rage at the time. No matter how you frame it, a guy saw that a hot woman had a penis, and found it so offputting that he needed to throw up. Then so did everyone else. The very idea of a woman with a penis is apparently that horrible, as is the idea of ever possibly being attracted to said woman, or having any relations with her. Perhaps this will help: imagine if, instead of a woman with a penis, it was that they realized a hot man had been circumcised, and then they shot a bunch of women having that reaction. Would any of the things you said make that any better? Not all circumcised people are Jewish. But all women with a penis are trans. It’s one thing not to be attracted to someone because of a trait, but another to be completely grossed out by it. Making that a joke only makes it worse. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/193 "2021-09-06T14:59:32Z")
I don’t want to live in a world in which making Nazis look like idiots is wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/194 "2021-09-06T15:19:22Z")
> [@E-DUB](#): > > Humor generally doesn’t age well. I rewatched “Stalag 17” a while back. The dramatic parts still hold up damn well but the humor is wretched. I still enjoy some of the comedic aspects of _Stalag 17_, including this: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/LvtI5zdkzfs/maxresdefault.jpg "Little Adolfs - Stalag 17") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvtI5zdkzfs&t=0m25s) ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/195 "2021-09-06T16:19:50Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > But all women with a penis are trans. Perhaps all WOMEN with a penis are trans. (Although these days, with “genderfluid” and “non-binary” and other new labels, who knows if that statement still holds true.) But not all people presenting themselves as women are trans. Were Jack Lemmon’s and Tony Curtis’s characters in “Some Like It Hot” trans? No, they were cis men who disguised themselves as women to hide from the mob, and did it so well that they attracted (apparently heterosexual) male admirers. Let’s say that Osgood Brown (the guy attracted to Lemmon in drag to the point that he proposed marriage) reacted to Lemmon’s revelation that he’s a man by dumping him, with some degree of disgust (appropriate to the tone of the film, that is. Ace Ventura is very exaggerated. That’s the kind of physical comedy that Jim Carrey did, no matter what the nature of the scene). Would that have been transphobic? ---
**Author:** ![abcdefghij](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/43a26b/32.png) [@abcdefghij](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/abcdefghij)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/196 "2021-09-06T16:22:17Z")
It was OK in the 50s, so it can’t be transphobic? ---
**Author:** ![cmkeller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cmkeller/32/118_2.png) [@cmkeller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmkeller)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/197 "2021-09-06T16:23:10Z")
In that movie, he actually DOESN’T react that way. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/198 "2021-09-06T16:27:03Z")
Something I personally lament: that the purging of “punching down” humor took out gallows humor too. I was fine with purging “sick” humor like Chester the Molester. But not all sick humor celebrates evil: mostly it simply acknowledges it. I think Lenny Bruce was pointing to a great truth with his “don’t cast the first stone if you can’t take the hot lead enema” routine. Sick humor is based on the premise that we’re a fucked-up species, although not all of the aspects of that condition are funny. Some black humor gives us distance from the dark void, some embraces it. But for the irony-blind, that distinction is lost. During the Cold War, it was permissible to make black humor about nuclear war and its aftermath (even in Mad Magazine, with a song about machine-gunning your neighbors to keep them out of your fallout shelter). Laughing about that was crazy, but so was living with it; and that was the point But now the source of doom is different. The selfish mean people who persecute minorities, exploit the poor, carbonize the air, etc. are the enemy, and we are the good guys. We are not just stamping out racism, sexism, etc. wherever we perceive it, but all human badness. Laughing about it and living with it are now both unacceptable. In the 21st century, the stakes are too high to tolerate human badness. In the bloody, corrupt 20th century that was my cradle, human badness was a proven constant, and gallows humor was how we dealt with it. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/199 "2021-09-06T16:55:30Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > Let’s say that Osgood Brown (the guy attracted to Lemmon in drag to the point that he proposed marriage) reacted to Lemmon’s revelation that he’s a man by dumping him, with some degree of disgust (appropriate to the tone of the film, that is. Ace Ventura is very exaggerated. That’s the kind of physical comedy that Jim Carrey did, no matter what the nature of the scene). Would that have been transphobic? Sure, and homophobic too. The whole point of all such humor is the premise that a penis on somebody who presents as a woman is horrific and disgusting, and to think that a man could be sexually attracted to anybody with a penis is unnatural and absurd. It doesn’t matter whether the unexpectedly revealed penis belongs to somebody who is actually transgender or homosexual, as opposed to merely cross-dressing for plot purposes. The joke is rooted in the assumption that transgender identity and/or same-sex attraction merit horror and disgust. Similarly, it used to be considered a standard comic trope of American culture for a white person to be shocked and dismayed upon learning that a potential romantic partner (for themselves or a family member) was Black. That kind of humor is fundamentally racist, irrespective of whether the potential partner’s Black racial identity turned out to be real or faked. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/200 "2021-09-06T19:02:38Z")
I was watching a movie from the early-'70s called _The Hot Rock_. Near the end, a character is hypnotized to obey someone who says a particular phrase. The phrase is “Afghanistan banana stand”. That didn’t age well. Afghanistan doesn’t generate quite the yuks that it once did. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [September 6, 2021, 10:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723/201 "2021-09-06T22:29:16Z")
> [@Q.Q.Switcheroo](#): > > Time has not been kind to this one: > > Allan Sherman - The Let’s All Call Up A.T & T And Protest You want something that time has not treated kindly? Try this. [![](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/TFF_cover.jpg) ](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/9a/TFF_cover.jpg) > [@Wikipedia](#): > > According to several sources, stand-up comedian [Lenny Bruce](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenny_Bruce) went on with his November 22 nightclub show as scheduled. Just hours after Kennedy’s death, Bruce walked onstage, stood silently for several moments, then said, “Boy, is Vaughn Meader fucked.”[ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723.md?page=9) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/humor-that-doesn-t-age-well/949723.md?page=11)