Silver Adept (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
silveradept) wrote2014-03-18 01:03 pm
silveradept) wrote2014-03-18 01:03 pm
Entry tags:
Shadow Idol - If I don't laugh, I'll commit homicide.
Welcome back to Shadow Idol - same prompts as the LJ Idol, but not necessarily on the same schedule, and there are no eliminations to have to worry about.
Here's the topic: Jayus - a joke so poorly told and so unfunny that one cannot help but laugh.
There are several I can think of off the top of my head. Here's one: Did you hear the joke about the conservative party that believes the poor should die if they can't afford the cost of health care?
Or the one about that same party that thinks it's great to make women drive hundreds of miles to get family planning services, because they believe that all doctors performing family planning need admitting privileges at a nearby hospital?
Or the ones that say women need special insurance in case they get pregnant and need to terminate their fetus, and that the only people who can get that special insurance are those already in employer-provided health care?
I could go on all night about just that one conservative party. Not that what passes for the liberal party is that much better - they're not the kind that torture women for kicks, sure, nor are they the kind of people that would pass laws making being QUILTBAG a crime (at least, they aren't now), but they're definitely all on board with the idea that other countries should defer to them in how to run the world. And they're certainly not agitating for upending the social order that puts amoral corporations in charge of democratic functions. They happily seek solutions that leave the corporations in charge and bring them new customers by fiat, because they don't always appear to believe in what their values supposedly are. And they're far too willing to go to war than they should be.
Jayus is politics, as anyone who has to deal with it quickly realizes.
Jayus is also my own provincial upbringing, the kind of place that had quite the buzz going about when an actual black person moved to the community and started attending school. (Oh, the stereotypes we had.) Where nobody was openly gay or lesbian (although there were plenty of people who were very close to out), but there was plenty of joking about people who were, and crude remarks about masturbation using soda bottles, because no man could satisfy that particular ice queen. The one that didn't laugh at the misogyny.
The place that took the fictional organization NO MAAM - the National Organization of Men Against Amazonian Masterhood - and proudly displayed their logo in one of the classrooms.
It instills a desire to be unique and different than the generic default, because they get noticed and you get forgotten, without serious thought to what the consequences of being disprivileged are and how exoticizing others is just another way of Othering them.
Jayus is the joke that we can gather hundreds of thousands every week to watch collegiate football, but the people protesting the illegal war were less than ten at any given time. Jayus is the Pentagon budget compared to the SNAP budget.
Jayus is the joke where not doing anything and blaming the opposition for it is thought to be a serious tactic that will win votes.
Since they're not supposed to be funny, maybe we can stop telling them?
Here's the topic: Jayus - a joke so poorly told and so unfunny that one cannot help but laugh.
There are several I can think of off the top of my head. Here's one: Did you hear the joke about the conservative party that believes the poor should die if they can't afford the cost of health care?
Or the one about that same party that thinks it's great to make women drive hundreds of miles to get family planning services, because they believe that all doctors performing family planning need admitting privileges at a nearby hospital?
Or the ones that say women need special insurance in case they get pregnant and need to terminate their fetus, and that the only people who can get that special insurance are those already in employer-provided health care?
I could go on all night about just that one conservative party. Not that what passes for the liberal party is that much better - they're not the kind that torture women for kicks, sure, nor are they the kind of people that would pass laws making being QUILTBAG a crime (at least, they aren't now), but they're definitely all on board with the idea that other countries should defer to them in how to run the world. And they're certainly not agitating for upending the social order that puts amoral corporations in charge of democratic functions. They happily seek solutions that leave the corporations in charge and bring them new customers by fiat, because they don't always appear to believe in what their values supposedly are. And they're far too willing to go to war than they should be.
Jayus is politics, as anyone who has to deal with it quickly realizes.
Jayus is also my own provincial upbringing, the kind of place that had quite the buzz going about when an actual black person moved to the community and started attending school. (Oh, the stereotypes we had.) Where nobody was openly gay or lesbian (although there were plenty of people who were very close to out), but there was plenty of joking about people who were, and crude remarks about masturbation using soda bottles, because no man could satisfy that particular ice queen. The one that didn't laugh at the misogyny.
The place that took the fictional organization NO MAAM - the National Organization of Men Against Amazonian Masterhood - and proudly displayed their logo in one of the classrooms.
It instills a desire to be unique and different than the generic default, because they get noticed and you get forgotten, without serious thought to what the consequences of being disprivileged are and how exoticizing others is just another way of Othering them.
Jayus is the joke that we can gather hundreds of thousands every week to watch collegiate football, but the people protesting the illegal war were less than ten at any given time. Jayus is the Pentagon budget compared to the SNAP budget.
Jayus is the joke where not doing anything and blaming the opposition for it is thought to be a serious tactic that will win votes.
Since they're not supposed to be funny, maybe we can stop telling them?