Should I be laughing at this?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I know, I know: There’s no accounting for taste, and that goes for what makes people chuckle. However, it’s almost universally recognized that some things are Just Not Funny, and if you can’t suppress the giggles when confronted with something gruesome, you, my friend, may be some kinda psycho.

Well, I know a couple folks I’ve kept in touch with since my grad days who are truly sick individuals. Not sick like they need to be put away, but still gleefully pushing the bounds of what is socially acceptable whenever the opportunity presents. I look forward to some of their emails with a combination of joy and dread. Joy, because what they send me is often incredibly funny, and dread because the stuff so violates some common standards of decency I worry I’m fundamentally as disturbed as my friends are, and I’m just enjoying derangement vicariously.

Well, I dare not link to any of the videos to which I’m referring, but the common theme is “Stupid people injuring either themselves or other stupid people, for fun.” I mean, some of this stuff is really in Darwin Award contention. One video has a guy who volunarily lets another guy drive a golfball at his half-naked body. Various videos feature people either accidentally or purposefully lighting themselves on fire. In one a guy in a motorcycle helmet lets his buddies fire a powerful Roman candle at him.

One real gem features a fellow using a very powerful slingshot to fire a wad of lipstick at high velocity into a sleeping “friend’s” forehead. You should have heard the poor guy. Dude, I’m serious…the guy first goes “AAAAAAAAHH!” and then flails around for like a minute trying to figure out what the hell hit him. Oh, man, it was so wrong…I had tears coming out of my eyes…

Errrrr, ahem, I mean…ehh…Hey! That looked like it really hurt! Somebody could lose an eye or get a concussion or something! What kind of friend deliberately inflicts excruciating pain on his chums and laughs at their misfortune? Is that the kind of example we want to set for our young people as they learn how to be productive and compassionate members of a just and lawful society?? It’s an outrage!

Or, rather…I suppose it should be. But I can’t help it: I just about wet myself with mirth over some of these clips. I probably should just tell my sick friends to quit it with the sadistic links, but whether I watch or not, I already know I laugh my ass off while viewing the pathetic combination of idiocy, danger, and non-lethal agony.

So, is this video documentation of abject stupidity one of those Just-Not-Funny things, and I should consult a head-shrinker trained in dealing with anti-social personalities, or is it all, despite the obvious cringe factor, Just Plain Funny?

2

I’ve got a couple of cow-orkers like you. I’ve watched the stuff, and some of it IS a guilty pleasure, but then there are some that just turn my stomach. I dunno where that line is, but seeing the helmet cam footage of a guy basejumping off a dam, not having his chute open, then sliding all the way down and hearing him in pain as he GETS UP after hitting the ground was way way WAY over the line.

3

The male kind.

4

I guess I see a profound difference between your two examples. Letting your buddies shoot golf-balls at you from five feet? What a dumbass. I can understand a few giggles.

Shooting a sleeping person with lipstick? That seems almost psychotically cruel to me. The victim has no control over events, and it just violates every sense of decency in normal social discourse that I have. It’s just cruelty without humor to me, and I don’t see why people find it funny.

5

False premise.

6

Ditto.

7

You mean things like this?

8

Agreed. I came here just to post you started off with a false statement.

9

I believe it was George Carlin who said, “Everything can be funny. Even rape. And if you don’t think rape can be funny, try this: picture Elmer Fudd raping Porky Pig.”

10

Rape is one of the most frequently used (just out of) sight gags.

Watch any goofball comedy, and chances are you’ll see a “bad guy” getting assraped by a great ape. Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls ends with this joke. Trading Places has it as well.

There is no subject in the universe that can’t be made into a comical situation. Isn’t there a whole category of “dead baby” jokes?

And has nobody ever seen Jackass or Wild Boys or anything? Good lord people, go buy a sense of humor, stat!

11

Oh, I’d say there’s no “almost” about it, which is the whole reason I started this thread.

Now, I have seen a video where some poor slob’s buddies wake him him up using a weird, and very loud, electronic alarm. The guy springs up from the bed, screaming like a terrified banshee, and looking ready to burst into tears from the fright. In just a couple seconds, he realises he’s not about to be eaten by Godzilla, and slumps back onto the sheets, annoyed, but otherwise unharmed.

Cruel? Yes. Sick? Probably. But nobody got hurt, so I’m not so troubled that I found this funny (my descriptions really don’t do the visuals justice).

The lipstick incident, though…That I did laugh at, hard, and someone did indeed get hurt. Probably not seriously, but you could tell the guy was in a lot of pain. It’s just, well, his reaction was so comical. It’s was difficult for me to be completely mindful of the poor victim’s suffering while he flailed about wailing like a cartoon character. No question, though, it was a real prank, and a real person got a hell of a wake-up wallop while in a completely defenseless position. Not cool. Probably should not be funny. But, I must admit, my first reaction belies this attempt at better convictions, which is what bothers me.

12

OK, but we’re talking about Elmer Fudd and Porky Pig.

An example of Just Not Funny might be, say, a video of a real prisoner getting reamed by another prisoner against his will. Is “some things are just not funny” truly a false premise? Or is it more like “I recognize this shouldn’t be funny, but the fact I can’t help laughing doesn’t make me psychotic”?

13

It’s a false premise…people just draw the line at different things. And I firmly believe it’s also our way of dealing with painful things, and the major thing that keeps us sane. Most of the stuff you reference I wouldn’t find funny, but my SO would.

14

Exactly. If we couldn’t laugh at things, or find the humour in life, we’d go insane, but there’s a point out there where it stops being funny.

There’s a good quote about this, by some really deep profound philsopher guy, but in view of someone getting shot by a tube of lipstick I’ll save it for another time.

15

It was the actual lipstick, not the whole apparatus. So, imagine a piece of lipstick, shaped like a piece of lipstick, instantly molded into a flat, circular slug by the impact against some poor bastard’s forehead.

16

…

snrk

:wink:

17

I cringed and laughed at the lipstick thing. It was wrong to do that to a sleeping guy.

Now the two idiots who did a wrestling piledriver off a roof onto a very small trampoline that collapsed, that’s some funny shit. Willfull intentional stupidity, I love it. The guy screaming and holding his lower back, you know an ambulance is in his near future.

I remember Mel Brooks as The 2000 year old man. "If I fall into an open manhole it’s tragedy, if you fall into a sewer and drown it’s comedy. "

18

The declaration “That’s not funny!” clearly is self-contradicting, since it’s virtually never uttered except in reference to something that someone has found to be funny.