Is Humor and Satire Dead?
Today is Pearl Harbor day. Next year, it will be the 80th anniversary of the bombing, which is now called a "surprise" attack - rather than a "sneak" attack - in the film they show to visitors. Lots of young people died that day, which is not the slightest bit funny.
Nevertheless, Monty Python did a skit, probably in the 1970s, called "Batley Townswomen's Guild Presents the Battle of Pearl Harbor." The Pythons, all in drag, eventually wrestle in the mud and hit each other with purses. I still find hilarious. Eric Idle introduces the Guild, noting the popularity of their previous reenactment of "Nazi atrocities."
Pearl Harbor funny? Nazi atrocities? Men in drag? Are old women funny wrestling in the mud? Should half of them have been Japanese to avoid charges of cultural misappropriation? Can we laugh at any of this?
What is even more confusing is that it is acceptable to mock some people, but not others. In fact, it depends on who is doing the mocking. The "oppressed" can mock the "fortunate," but the fortunate cannot mock the oppressed.
I used to believe that the funnier something was, the more politically incorrect it could be. That is no longer the case. A bad joke can get you fired; a great joke, if it's directed at the wrong target, can get you fired too. I say there ought to be some slack cut for great humor and satire. Will there ever be funny (and acceptable) Covid and lockdown jokes? Will we ever be able to laugh at men in drag again? Can we watch Blazing Saddles without condemning it while we laugh our asses off?
As an older white man (OK, Boomer), I can be mocked, but I can only mock other Boomers, though not women, African-Americans, gay or trans, or disabled ones, among others. That's too bad, because they are just as hilariously stupid as old white man like myself. I guess I won't say anything.
