Please know that no disrespect to anyone is intended, but I find it fascinating that I have yet to hear any jokes about the 9/11 tragedy. Oh sure, you may hear people making jokes about Osama Bin Laden, or terrorism in general, or even the Anthrax scare, but the actual collapse of the World Trade Center? nothing.
I only bring this up because I remember that within days of the explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger there were already tasteless jokes circulating around the schoolyards and office coolers.
There are those who believe that the telling of tasteless jokes about great tragedies are a natural part of the healing process.
So, my questions are:
Are there events so tragic that they are off-limits for all time? (Unlikely, imho, as one still hears holocaust jokes, and that was one of the most tragic events in human history)
Are they being circulated, only I personally havent heard them yet? (My own personal opinion, as just the other day my very best friend and I found ourselves making a few “taboo” jokes, felt guilty and yet strangely relieved that we had moved on to this step of the grieving process. But note that so far I’ve only joked with my closest friend, so maybe the jokes are on a path to become more widespread, and its just the severity of the tragedy that causes the expansion of 9/11 jokes to be so slow.)
Yes, there are events so tragic that it’s hard to make fun of them. The only people who spout holocaust jokes are generally racist assholes. Likewise, I can’t remember hearing too influenza epidemic jokes.
I’m sure there are some circulating somewhere. Probably among the assholes.
I think that another issue is simply how short a time ago 9/11 was. Being so fresh in peoples’ memories probably does a lot to shore up against jokes. And humor about such things is generally VERY distasteful, IMHO.
I think you are exagerating. In this board plenty of people made jokes about Malvinas War. Also about the propensity of the french to surrender, etc. My feeling is that as long as it happens to someone else it is funny.
I am not an asshole and I know plenty of 9/11 jokes, I also know a couple about the holocaust. I am only human.
Narrad has got it: 9/11 jokes, Holocaust jokes, etc, work in the realm of “private” black humour, but would be considered extremely rude in “public” humour (for instance, the network censoring a Drew Carey Show skit about incompetent airport security). Besides, the events that followed allowed us to switch to “war humor”, mostly insult-jokes about Bin Laden & co.
I think the complexity of the attacks has made the jokes about them be more complex. The Challenger disaster was just an explosion caused by a malfunction. The September 11 attacks had a multitude of causes, effects, and results. So you aren’t going to see many simple Q and A jokes about it.
And to the name callers, might I simply suggest that people deal with tragedies in different ways, and I’m willing to bet that the vast majority mean no disrespect.
I started hearing 9/11 jokes within a few weeks of the attacks, though I can’t remember any of them at the moment. I don’t think that there are any events that are so awful that they are beyond the realm of humor, and as has been mentioned here, they help with the healing process.
And Sam’s comment about those who spout Holocaust jokes remind me of a South Park episode… I forger the details, but Kyle was on a football team, and the announcer kept spouting comments in extremely poor taste - one of them, in reference to Kyle running from tacklers, was, “I haven’t seen a Jew run like that since, Poland, 1939.” Call me a racist asshole, but I laughed my ass off. There’s something about the tastelessness of a joke that makes it funnier - it’s the taboo nature of it. You know you’re “not supposed” to find it funny, which makes you laugh harder.
Jeff
To keep the South Park theme going, didn’t they have an episode where AIDS was funny, but only 23.5 years after the fact? Or maybe 18.7 years. Some number close to 20, anyway.
Kind of like The Producers. Springtime for Hitler was great in the 60s, but in 1947, it’s just not so funny. Actually, it’s still not the kind of song you want to sing in public.
I wasn’t saying that you had to be a racist asshole to laugh at some extreme humor. But rather, there’s a certain brand of racist asshole who delight in such jokes, as a cover for just being an asshole.
I admire comedians who can tread that line, like Parker and Stone, not only because it’s really difficult to do, but because the stakes are so high. If your joke misses, the audience doesn’t just get bored - it actively dislikes you. A few ‘shock’ comedians have crashed and burned horribly when they misread the audience and went too far.
I would not make a joke about 9/11 itself – it is just too horrible. I haven’t heard any jokes about it – not that I have been looking.
What should be joked about is how all the 24 hour news networks have abused the 9/11 tragedy for their own commercial gain and the absurb lengths they will go to tie 9/11 into almost everything they do.
To the OP – it will only be a matter of time before someone accuses you, by simply posting this question, that you were “baiting” for jokes.
