Humour and Humanity

[mayer]

Humour is so central to the way we view stuff

And similar has been said previously, and by other posters many times.

But is that really true? It's been said so many times without anyone really explaining what they mean by it or backing it up with anything. Sure, we laugh a lot, and people seek humour in many things. But people do lots of things in life that we would hardly say was central to the way we view life.


I'd argue that pleasure is far more important than laughter, and getting one's rocks off (in whatever manner) is far more essential (in the classical sense) to humanity than comedy. Such ideas would probably mark me out as a hedonist, and such an argument seems less refined than the elevation of comedy, but I'm not sure why that should be.

Laughter releases endorphins (I believe), which makes you feel good. Comedy thus is derived from pleasure (one could argue). I'm just interested in a debate on the nature of humour/comedy and why it's so important to humanity, if indeed it is.


EDIT: Ryan Adams once sung "To Be Young Is to Be Sad, Is to Be High ", nothing about laughter there, but that seems to sum up "stuff" a lot more for me than comedy.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

It's been said so many times without anyone really explaining what they mean.

With me, it's just a reaction to the received idea that laughing is the opposite of 'taking something seriously'. Because I'd argue that they're the same thing - if anything, the more you laugh at something, the more seriously you're taking it. After all, if you weren't taking it seriously, you wouldn't bother making jokes would you? I never know what people mean when they say 'subject x is too serious to make jokes about'.

I've also never really agreed that comedy is a luxury. I think that attitude results in very bland comedy being tolerated - 'it made me chuckle a few times, and that's good enough for me'. I think genuinely excellent comedy is almost a visceral experience - it gets inside you and makes you look at stuff completely differently. Obviously, you can say that about art and music as well, but I'll always make a special case for comedy. I'm not sure why - probably because it's often assumed to be trivial, and that annoys me.

[mayer]

Hmmm, pop music is equally assumed to be trivial (barring a once-yearly article in the broadsheets about how it is in fact important, but only in its social and cultural context, never in and of itself) really.

Because I'd argue that they're the same thing - if anything, the more you laugh at something, the more seriously you're taking it.

I dunno, the last scene of comedy I was genuinely laughing-so-hard-I-could-hardly-breathe at was Stewie, Brian, Chris and Peter throwing up non-stop for ages. I don't think I was taking it seriously though.

I've also never really agreed that comedy is a luxury. I think that attitude results in very bland comedy being tolerated

But it is a luxury! Like pop music too! I really can't see how you can dispute that. Like in the sports thread, it's not going to get you fucked or fed, it can change your outlook on life, sure, just like a painting or a sonnet, but Comedy isn't a Human Right, not anymore than any other field of art.

People snobbishly pointing out that comedy is a luxury may result in bad comedy, but you can't start judging your definitions of things on what the consequences of those definitions will be.

Pro-Choice supporters are "people who support ending the existence of foetuses not yet born in their mother's womb, stifling and preventing a new life being born". I can't deny that just because yelling that from megaphones will have some horrible consequences once the "Pro-Life" nutbars hear me and get wound up.

So, whilst I think that comedy (and pop and art) is a "luxury" (in the sense that we don't need it, and comedy certainly isn't more necessary than visual art or music for me), I wouldn't yell it from the rooftops, but I wouldn't deny it because of the possible consequences of accepting what appears to be true to me.

With me, it's just a reaction...

Is a lot of it. I think maybe you're a bit too reactive/ionary sometimes old chap.

I'll always make a special case for comedy. I'm not sure why...

Cos it's your "thing", which is fine. I'll always make a special case for pop, my athlete friends will always make a special case for Sport and Competition, my science mates will talk of the essential beauty of Mathematics.

We're on a comedy website, so I understand why the focus is on Comedy here, but I maintain that whilst that's what we're here for, it's not as "special" as you and a few other posters have claimed repeatedly.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

I sometimes wonder what life would be like without humour and comedy. I get the idea that not only would it be unbearable, but that it wouldn't make sense. In fact, I can't imagine such a world.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

Is a lot of it. I think maybe you're a bit too reactive/ionary sometimes old chap.

How am I reactionary?

[Ulp]

But it is a luxury! Like pop music too! I really can't see how you can dispute that. Like in the sports thread, it's not going to get you fucked or fed, it can change your outlook on life, sure, just like a painting or a sonnet, but Comedy isn't a Human Right, not anymore than any other field of art.

Yeah, but there's different degrees of 'luxury', isn't there?  If you're talking about just managing to survive then OK - you can't throw a stand-up set in the oven and bake for 40 minutes.  But if you're talking about a social luxury, you'd be talking about something that 'society' just dumps on top of itself with no need (so to speak).  And the concept of humour isn't that, is it?  It's integral to quite a lot of social interaction.
But this is different to saying that the comedy 'establishment' play such a crucial role, I suppose.

I once read about a pygmy tribe who, instead of warfare, used to settle grievances through ridicule sessions.  So they'd take the piss out of each other instead of fighting - perhaps not a bad system, when you consider ours is normally take the piss and then fight.  

Of course, the irony is that the site of pygmies fighting would probably be quite funny.  Yeah, that's definitely irony.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

Is this thread dead then? I was just getting interested.

[The Mumbler]

People are often amazed by, for instance, reports from parts of the world with distressing poverty yet the people have smiles on their faces, and can laugh along with visiting Comic Relief celebrities.  Which kind of suggests that humour isn't a luxury at all - it's a central pillar of life itself.  No matter how bad things get, a sense of humour is always vital.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

I still can't imagine what on earth a world without humour would be like. Would we be able to make sense of things? I mean, I can't even picture some 1984-esque hellhole as being humour-free, because - if I found myself in such a place - my immediate instinct would be to take the piss out of it. An apparently humour-free society would, after all, be totally ridiculous.

[The Mumbler]

Well, of course, there are so many forms of humour, both intentional and unintentional.  Humour's an integral part of the imagination, of pure instinct (babies laugh long before they can form words), the very essence of creativity/play involves humour.  

Comedy on DVD may be a relative "luxury", but the idea that humour in itself is a bonus is absurd.

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

Is it possible to imagine a world without music? It's certainly easier - for me, anyway. I mean, music is obviously present in all natural sound, but it's quite easy to imagine a world without music as an artform.  It'd be a drab world, but it would still make sense.

A world without humour though? How would that work? Would we all be like Mr Logic in Viz? No, because that would involve being funny.

[DuncanC]

Pleasure is really a functional thing - sex and eating food are pleasurable because seeking those things out is essential to our survival, so we need to want to do them, evolving a carrot-on-a-stick "pleasure" system. But that didn't start with us, life of Earth as a whole seems to work on that basis too. Humanity seems to be different because we're capable of wanting so much more than the bare minimum required to ensure another generation - art, philosophy, science, exploration, none of these things are particularly useful for the tight short-term goal that evolution is geared towards, but through some wonderful fluke (or God or whatever, you know) our goals became a lot wider and weirder than "stay alive long enough to fuck, stay alive long enough to fuck..." And humour is part of that.

Sorry, rambling thought-dump there. This is something I've been thinking a lot about recently.

[Labian Quest]

I once read about a pygmy tribe who, instead of warfare, used to settle grievances through ridicule sessions.  So they'd take the piss out of each other instead of fighting - perhaps not a bad system, when you consider ours is normally take the piss and then fight.  

American gangsters are supposed to do that as well, they call it 'capping' and they take the piss out of one another's mothers as an alternative to fighting, the loser being the first one to take offence. I suppose that is one of the important social functions of humour - diffusing tension and allowing people to talk about things that are normally off limits, plus it helps with social cohesion - if two people laugh at the same thing, it's a way of showing you agree about same thing/share values, etc.

[Almost Yearly]

Hahahahaha. You have to laugh.



Edit: Please don't think I'm just being facile there. Facile is just one of the things I'm being. Ooh - avatar caption.

And further to ELW10's post - yeah, we don't say "You have to sing" or "play" or "dance" or "paint" do we.
.

[bithez]

comedy is just being surprised in a good way, isn't it? so a world without comedy would be a world where every new event just makes everything worse.

no, wait, that would be funny too. damn it.

[mayer]

I sometimes wonder what life would be like without humour and comedy. I get the idea that not only would it be unbearable, but that it wouldn't make sense. In fact, I can't imagine such a world.

It's like one of those Primary School "Reasoning" books to me though.

Humour is to Comedy what
Language is to Literature what
Sound is to Music


[EDIT: Flicking through these posts I can accept that] Humour is an ever-present for what makes us (mentally well) humans, as is Sound to (sighted) humans, and language but "Comedy" and "Music" and "Literature" aren't essential at all.

They're artistic manifestations of those essential parts of humanity, which need not exist for us to be humans. All too often I think you confuse "Comedy" and "Humour".

[mayer]

Is a lot of it. I think maybe you're a bit too reactive/ionary sometimes old chap.

How am I reactionary?

It often seems that many of your opinions/posts are not formed out of quiet contemplation on a subject, but instead are a direct reaction to your annoyance/response to other people's opinions which irk you.

but I'll always make a special case for comedy. I'm not sure why - probably because it's often assumed to be trivial, and that annoys me.

- Your opinion is a direct reaction to your annoyance at other people's opinion

With me, it's just a reaction to the received idea that laughing is the opposite of 'taking something seriously'.

- Your opinon is a response to the received wisdom.

[mayer]

Is this thread dead then? I was just getting interested.

Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but I was out and about.

[alan strang]

It often seems that many of your opinions/posts are not formed out of quiet contemplation on a subject, but instead are a direct reaction to your annoyance/response to other people's opinions which irk you.

Because other peoples' responses, especially when they become part of a staid critical 'consensus' often directly influence and affect the actual quality of the subject in hand.

- Your opinion is a direct reaction to your annoyance at other people's opinion

And the way they directly influence and affects the actual quality of the subject in hand.

- Your opinon is a response to the received wisdom.

And the way it directly influences and affects the quality of the subject in hand.

'Quiet contemplation of a subject' would be a smashing state of affairs, certainly, but it really isn't possible, especially when a panicky, wounded industry attempts to turn something into a cash cow in order to sell it (and by extension themselves) to a mass audience. And when, as a result of this, an artist modifies their project in order to hit that same target audience it just looks painful. You really shouldn't attempt to seperate the art from its cultural baggage - why not contemplate all the factors that went into making it good or bad?

You often put on your 'aloof hat' and claim not to be affected by other peoples' opinions on a subject. But even if you truly believe this to be the case you're still contemplating the visible end-result of other peoples' opinions / received wisdom / panic, etc. You're still ultimately affected by it, even if you claim you can't see it.

[mayer]

Back on topic.... Humour vs. Comedy.

Humour in the essential-to-humanity sense that I think ELW10 and The Mumbler are talking about isn't all that relevant to comedy in the discussion at hand.

You really shouldn't attempt to seperate the art from its cultural baggage - why not contemplate all the factors that went into making it good or bad?

In this thread, I'm not. I'm separating Art from an Essential Aspect of Humanity (apparently).

According to the internet children laugh on average 400 times a day whilst adults laugh 15 times a day. I for one don't believe that, but I laughed a good hundred times yesterday without consuming a single second of "Comedy" in the sense of "The Industry".*


Humour, that thing The Mumbler calls "a central pillar of life itself", and what ELW10 believes the world would be a literally impossible without, is what we're talking about, and it is separable from "Comedy", which is what you're talking about.


My criticism of ELW10 was that in his thoughts on this essential-to-humanity, incomprehensible almost, eternal thing called "humour", he's letting his internal and external wranglings over "Comedy" (i.e. that thing your industry churns out), affect his judgements.


If I was writing a thesis on how the human brain reacts to certain chords and melodies, writing about the NME hyping The Strokes would be somewhat off-topic, wouldn't it?


____________________________________________________

* I tell a lie, I saw an episode of a Viz cartoon last night, but I didn't laugh at any of it, so it doesn't count.



(EDIT: Grammar)

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

It often seems that many of your opinions/posts are not formed out of quiet contemplation on a subject, but instead are a direct reaction to your annoyance/response to other people's opinions which irk you.

What's wrong with that exactly? I could make the same accusation about you (Exhibit A: this very thread which you started).

I think other people's opinions provoke me, and then I go away and quietly contemplate them.

[Almost Yearly]

Cambridge Dictionaries Online doesn't even start to get as literal about the word as you claim you were being mayer. A bit odd actually - no Newton there at all.


Another reason for posting Hahahahaha was that these What Is Humour discussions genuinely amuse me. However I'm still joining in, like it or not...

babies laugh long before they can form words

I've only had the one, but I had the privelege of getting the first smile out of him. I was just about to throw the little fucker across the room I swear, when he quickly stopped screaming and pulled off a grin/chuckle to save himself. This goes to the root of it, doesn't it: the chimp showing his teeth out of fear thing. Except he had no teeth, of course.

[mayer]

What's wrong with that exactly? I could make the same accusation about you (Exhibit A: this very thread which you started).

I think other people's opinions provoke me, and then I go away and quietly contemplate them.

You could.

To be fair, there's nothing wrong with that really, but you're so pissed off by some things out there that you jump in with a load of stuff that wasn't really what I was getting at at all in the thread-starter.

I thought it was pretty clear that this thread was about comedy with a small "c", or Humour with a capital "H", that eternal human thing, but within one post you were ranting about the usual.

[mayer]

Cambridge Dictionaries Online doesn't even start to get as literal about the word as you claim you were being mayer.

Well, I didn't actually use the word "reactionary", I typed it, and thought better of it, replacing it with "reactive/ionary".

reactive
adjective
reacting to events or situations rather than acting first to change or prevent something:
Unfortunately, the police have dealt with the problem of car theft in a reactive rather than a proactive way.

Actually, I'm wrong. Very very wrong. Sorry.


Instead of reacting to the question at hand (Is this thing Humour essential to humanity?), ELW10 has acted first to prevent us discussing it and turned this into another of his pet-threads.

[DuncanC]

I've heard somewhere the idea that humour is necessary to deal with absurdity, and if we couldn't do that we couldn't have achieved what we have as a species. I can't remember how it goes fully though.

[mayer]

So, now we're back on topic...

The brain is a weird and wonderful thing. I remember seeing a program on television about a bloke who was brain damaged, and totally incapable of emotion. He said he loved his wife because he knew that was appropriate, but he blatantly felt absolutely nothing, and the poor woman could tell.

Other than this he was a fully functional, if terribly dull, man.


Are there any similar cases of people not finding anything humourus? Kind of like Data in Star Trek, they get all the double-entendres and whatnot, but they find nothing "funny"?


Further to ELW10's comments on the topic earlier in the thread, would he be able to even function in society? The bloke with no emotions wasn't in an institution, he could survive living his same life. It seemed that he understood empotions on an intellectual level, he just didn't feel them.

Do you think that someone with this affliction (genuine humourless-ness) would be driven to suicide by  the absurdity of the world and the alleged impossibility of their being able to make sense of it? Could they watch Yes, Minister and appreciate the witty puns intellectually without actually finding them "funny"?

[Emergency Lalla Ward Ten]

I agree about the distinction between humour and Comedy, but there's a fine line that separates them.

After all, if Comedy (the industry) disappeared, comedy the artform would continue. Laughing at a bloke slipping on a banana skin is natural humour, but a bloke telling jokes in a pub - that's performance. So is the latter a mere luxury? I'm not sure.

[mayer]

I still think it is, in the way that humour I accept (from convinving arguments from yourself and The Mumbler) isn't.

Not a day goes by without  comedy (small "c")  being part of my life. I'll fall around laughing at something my friend says or a silly t-shirt, or a funny-shaped vegetable. Going back to the language/literature analogy, again, not a minute goes by when I don't use language, at least in my head.


But I can (and embarassingly have) gone the odd week without reading anything. It's certainly possible and not even absurd. I've gone longer without experiencing any Comedy too.

The other analogy... There was jokes and laughter before the pop industry or the invention of the guitar, and even people listening to birdsong and waterfalls and thinking "nifty".

comedy will be around forever, no matter what the state of Comedy is in any one place and time.


Obviously good Comedy is a joy! Like good pop music or a good book. It's fantastic art and a way we've evolved to enjoy things more and more I suppose.

(Of course when we talk about Art there's that complex Art/Industry  relationship you and strang are again bringing up, but, honest to goodness, I wasn't getting at that, or criticising that, or even contemplating that when I read your post and thought "oooh, maybe an idea for a short thread that".


Maybe this would've been better in GD?)

[chimpoo]

The other analogy... There was jokes and laughter before the pop industry or the invention of the guitar, and even people listening to birdsong and waterfalls and thinking "nifty".

This seems a like contradictary statement to me, i.e. if evolution evolved neural responses to music prior to humour then does that not mean music came first?  The first thing the foetus ever hears is the mother's heartbeat.....boom...du..du...boom..du..du...boom.  Music is all rythym.  The egg came before the chicken dammit!

Re: Humour being essential to the world...

I see humour as being a vital weapon in undermining some of the most disastorous traits of the human race:  arrogance; ignorance; fear; hate; violence; pessimism; blind optimism; idiocy; laziness and all our other evolutionary hangovers.   Humour deconstructs these things in seconds and brings us back down to a happy, smiling earth.  Its funny, for me, being a dickhead.  Characterised by an inherent inability to mock oneself.

First one to call me a hippy wins a cream egg.

[mayer]

Hmmm, but there are cunts who laugh at inflicting misery on other people, from mobile-phone-attackers to rapists.

Humour sometimes enhances bad traits, instead of undermining them.

The cliché of the villain is his evil laugh, is it not?