Recently I saw a rerun of a How I Met Your Mother episode, in which Barney tells Lily a joke that is so dirty, vile, and offensive that Lily refuses to hang out with the gang for several weeks (a contrived explanation for Alyson Hannigan’s maternity leave, but I digress).
We the viewers never get to hear the punchline. It’s possible the writers had one in mind, but I think more likely they wanted to leave it to our imaginations.
The joke begins thusly: * “What’s the difference between peanut butter and jam?”*
It’s not a fake joke at all. It’s just not a particularly good one.
I can’t even bring myself to spoiler the punch line. But a quick google on the setup (or a search of the archives here) should bring enlightenment to you,
OK, you’ve successfully filled me with shame and embarrassment for not Googling first.
I jumped to a conclusion, thinking it would have been more clever of them to create a fake setup with no known punchline.
And ass-u-me-ing this to be the case, I turned to the Dopers in the hope of providing a few laughs on a dull Wednesday.