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Technology Stocks : WAVX Anyone? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nancy McKinney who wrote (6551)	4/24/1999 12:39:00 AM
From: Marty Lee	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 11417

Nancy. OT: No Offense (nor apology) Intended. Humor has rules and politics. There must be some unremarked rule that all sexually sadistic humor be made only in reference to the abuse, humiliation, and mutilation of the male gender. Nothing's so funny as a kick to a man's crotch, prison jokes referring to homosexual rape, and, of course, the epitome of humor - the idea of a man's having his penis or testicles cut off. Plenty of maliciously "good humor" for feminists to be found there. Some of humor's "rules" reside within fashionable indignations. Here they determine who and who's not to be considered a "worthy victim." (Read a bit of Noam Chomsky on this subject) Humor concerns our censors and is involved with “negative” thinking. Scornful scolding and derisive laughter serve to prohibit as they switch on our negative learning machinery. (until we learn to scorn or laugh back after doing or saying something wrong, which is our own cute little way of saying “go to hell.”) Where scorn and frowns are involved, the result is usually the effective suppression of humor. Where laughter at our mistakes and wrong thinking is involved, the effect is to produce censorship; an ongoing loop of debate that recounts our ability to say we shouldn't think “that” but we'll titillate ourselves with the prohibition anyway. Why we fail to recognize the negative character of humor is what makes humor possible. It informs us of what is “wrong” and makes its own intent invisible at the same time. This is why so much comedy is really just a sermon covered over with a thin film of laughs. So what's funny? Anything we decide to humor ourselves with. For most respectable folks, humor is “stanardized.” For others, humor is a more creative endeavor; playing with the intellect, imagination, and limits of standard humor. Where the rule is that we've ruled joking behavior out as unacceptable, “sick,” dangerous, or whatever (and therefore it's possibility of becoming common and standard) some material is “just not funny.” In the final analysis, nothing is funny. Comedians are a "joke." They tell us little tales of tragedy, mental error, naughtiness, puerility, prejudice, nonsense. A joke's power comes from a description that fits two different frames at once. The first meaning must be transparent and innocent (like me) and the second meaning is disguised and negative - if not reprehensible - in character. Thus, jokes are often about things which really “just aren't funny;" about things which you're not to think and aren't supposed to be: Consider intellectual trauma. Ten is nearly eleven. And eleven is nearly twelve. So ten is nearly twelve. If I keep on reasoning this way, then ten must be nearly a hundred! Humor is like a knife, the blade and handle of which are one and the same. Ouch! Rats! Ha! Ha! You idiot! Certainly, we'll not expect the ladies to take rape laying down! Nor to even “Take it like a Man!” Nevertheless, some laughter at themselves and their own moralistic angst about their “issues” would be a refreshing sign of self-overcoming. Who believes that women today are honestly interested in the Truth about themselves? If ever they should find something out about this Truth, it would be for all the “wrong” reasons – mostly resentment. Harold Lehman is logically correct. He and I may not be PC, we may even be a little morally not-quite-right, but it will be to our pleasure that the final "joke" will be on the rest of the world of joking behavior as everyone who says, “You can't say that,” will be “caught” and found hypocrites in the end. Nobody lies like the indignant do. Truly, Marty