# Jokes that, in the future, will need explaining **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** comedian-jokes\ **Created:** [December 18, 2020, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335 "2020-12-18T13:53:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/1 "2020-12-18T13:53:22Z")
We’ve already got an excellent thread on [jokes that, nowadays, need explaining](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-nowadays-need-explaining/921466/909). What are some jokes circulating _today_ that will need explaining to people who hear them in the future (say, 20 years or more from now)? Obviously there will be a lot of jokes with references to current events that will eventually fade from memory. However, many of these references will be pretty easy to look up – for example, jokes about the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal might not make any sense to people born in the last 20 years, but as long as the joke mentions either Clinton or Lewinsky by name, it should take a dedicated reader only a few seconds of Googling to get the necessary background information. What jokes circulating today would this approach not work for? As an example, here’s one of the most popular jokes circulating in Austria right now: [![](https://i.redd.it/jgwg7zpfr1151.jpg) ](https://i.redd.it/jgwg7zpfr1151.jpg) The three items in the photo are labelled “grain of rice”, “world’s smallest computer”, and “Austrian baby elephant”. The humour comes from the fact that for the last nine months, the government has been telling everyone to practise social distancing by standing at least “one baby elephant” away from each other, but many people have been ignoring this advice when queuing in the shops. Twenty years from now, young Austrians will probably be aware of, or could easily learn about, the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, but this joke gives no explicit clues that it’s about the pandemic, and searching for “baby elephant” isn’t going to turn up anything relevant. No, I think that those future young adults will require a verbal explanation from someone who actually lived through the pandemic. ---
**Author:** ![Si\_Amigo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/si_amigo/32/2877_2.png) [@Si\_Amigo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Si_Amigo)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/2 "2020-12-18T18:52:25Z")
Nm… ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/3 "2020-12-18T19:08:45Z")
And now I’m wondering how “baby elephants” came to be the standard unit of distancing. I don’t think they’re any more common in Austria than here. Here, whenever I’ve seen a visualization of the needed distance (as opposed to just “six feet”), it’s been “far enough that you couldn’t touch fingertips with arms outstretched”. Which, I’d think, would be a familiar concept worldwide. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/4 "2020-12-18T19:09:24Z")
I wonder how many meme-type jokes will survive decades into the future?My guess is that something like “distracted boyfriend” will probably last forever, because it’s so obvious what’s going on. > **[Distracted boyfriend](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distracted_boyfriend_meme)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > Distracted boyfriend is an Internet meme based on a 2015 stock photograph by Barcelonian photographer Antonio Guillem. Social media users started using the image as a meme at the start of 2017, and it went viral in August 2017 as a way to depict different forms of disloyalty. The meme has inspired various spin-offs and received critical acclaim. > The stock image was taken in the city of Girona in Catalonia, Spain, in mid-2015 by the photographer... Whereas something like “doge”, not so much. > **[Doge (meme)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doge_(meme))** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > > > Doge (usually /doʊdʒ/ DOHJ, /doʊɡ/ DOHG or /doʊʒ/ DOHZH) is an Internet meme that became popular in 2013. The meme typically consists of a picture of Kabosu, a Shiba Inu dog accompanied by multicolored text in Comic Sans font in the foreground. The text, representing a kind of internal monologue, is deliberately written in a form of broken English. > The meme is based on a 2010 photograph and became popular in late 2013, being named as Know You... ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/5 "2020-12-18T19:15:20Z")
Is there really anything to “understand” about Doge, beyond “here’s a picture of a cute dog”? I imagine that cute animal pics will be with us for a long time. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/6 "2020-12-18T19:28:39Z")
I’ve long wondered about how the proliferation of things like the Internet Archive, Know Your Meme, and literacy/mass media in general will impact how history on this period is done. It seems like there will be a staggering amount of data, even if only a tiny proportion survives, for them to work from. They should have a pretty solid idea of what our time was like. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/7 "2020-12-18T19:55:22Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Is there really anything to “understand” about Doge, beyond “here’s a picture of a cute dog”? I imagine that cute animal pics will be with us for a long time. > [@Chronos](#): > > Is there really anything to “understand” about Doge, beyond “here’s a picture of a cute dog”? I imagine that cute animal pics will be with us for a long time. Maybe it needs explanation _now_. The most famous Doge is the Duke of Venice, I suppose. Is that supposed to be at all related? If not, what’s the joke? ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/8 "2020-12-18T19:59:06Z")
> **[Doge](https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/doge)** > > Doge is the nickname given to Kabosu, a Japanese Shiba Inu who rose to online fame in 2013 as a fictional character featured in image macros captioned with grammatically awkward phrases in the Comic Sans typeface. ---
**Author:** ![Riemann](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/riemann/32/3133_2.png) [@Riemann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riemann)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/9 "2020-12-18T20:05:37Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Is there really anything to “understand” about Doge, beyond “here’s a picture of a cute dog”? Yes, this is not just a random cute doggie. Like all internet memes, this particular image is always used in a specific way. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2020, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/10 "2020-12-18T20:11:42Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > And now I’m wondering how “baby elephants” came to be the standard unit of distancing. Part of it is an attempt to make social distancing seem a bit more “fun”, and thus to get more people to cooperate. Picturing baby elephants between everyone in a line is, at least for some, a welcome bit of comic relief in a time that is fraught with danger and onerous personal restrictions. You don’t get the same sort of relief from an abstract reckoning of distance in feet or metres, or even from imagining outstretched arms. As for why a baby elephant in particular was chosen, this may have been influenced by Kibali, a real elephant who was born in Vienna’s zoo shortly before the pandemic began and who was frequently featured in local media. The free tabloids were full of Kibali pictures, particularly on slow news days. ---
**Author:** ![Author\_Balk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Author\_Balk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Author_Balk)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/11 "2020-12-19T13:55:29Z")
I think a lot of 2020 jokes may not make sense. We see 2020 to include toilet paper shortages, murder hornets, social distancing, masks, etc. Similar jokes about 1918 wouldn’t make sense. And who was Karen? ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/12 "2020-12-19T14:21:17Z")
In the future people will need an explanation for why people laugh about Kevin and the Tesla Space Station. That’s in the distant future though, the incident with Kevin and the space station hasn’t happened yet. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/13 "2020-12-19T15:09:56Z")
::sigh:: … Kevin… ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/14 "2020-12-19T15:31:42Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > In the future people will need an explanation for why people laugh about Kevin and the Tesla Space Station. That’s in the distant future though, the incident with Kevin and the space station hasn’t happened yet. It will be tragic but that was the absolute funniest thing to happen in space since the Gemini 6 “Pull my finger” incident ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/15 "2020-12-19T16:42:02Z")
Related to this, I often wonder: What things do we do now that won’t make sense in the future (due to changing mores/technologies)… but we’ll still have linguistic ties to it? (In other words, our great-grandkids will SAY it, but they won’t know why) Example: I lent my little bare-bones car to my daughter. Manual transmission, manual everything. One of her friends asked “How do I get the window up?” “It’s that handle.” As her friend rotated it, she said “Ohhh, THIS is why people talk about _cranking_ up the window on a car!” Same with _dialing_ a phone number. But heck if I can think of a joke that uses tech that won’t make sense… oh, maybe the “Swipe Right” jokes I’ve heard on late night shows. Those may not make sense in ten years. Really, almost any social media/pop culture jokes. “Unfriending” someone or “Voting them off the island”… ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [December 19, 2020, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jokes-that-in-the-future-will-need-explaining/928335/16 "2020-12-19T18:09:32Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > Part of it is an attempt to make social distancing seem a bit more “fun”, and thus to get more people to cooperate. Picturing baby elephants between everyone in a line is, at least for some, a welcome bit of comic relief in a time that is fraught with danger and onerous personal restrictions. You don’t get the same sort of relief from an abstract reckoning of distance in feet or metres, or even from imagining outstretched arms. > > As for why a baby elephant in particular was chosen, this may have been influenced by Kibali, a real elephant who was born in Vienna’s zoo shortly before the pandemic began and who was frequently featured in local media. The free tabloids were full of Kibali pictures, particularly on slow news day This. Around here the local “mascot animals” are our wild **[green sea turtles](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_sea_turtle)** whose females come ashore to bury eggs in shallow pits on our beaches. So at the boardwalk, pier, parks, etc., all along the beach the signs say to socially distance 6 feet. Or 3 turtles-worth. With a cute drawing of of 3 turtles with outstretched flippers almost touching and two people flanking the group.