Thoughts about "comedy"

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02 Nov 2010, 4:44 pm

Empathy relates to knowing and understanding others emotions.

YOUR embarrassment at a situation has nothing whatsoever to do with the person actually IN the situation.

Janissy
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02 Nov 2010, 6:14 pm

seriousfoolishness wrote:

Can anyone tell me a joke that DOESN'T make fun of SOMEONE?

D

Puns

When is a door not a door?

When it's ajar.

That's a lame one, but it didn't make fun o anybody. Puns never do.

Galactus
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02 Nov 2010, 6:26 pm

Actually, I can't resist laughing when someone gets hurt foolishly, but only if it's for fun, and they realized what they did was stupid. :lol: But I can't stand it when someone gets hurt because someone did something foolish on them.

ediself
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02 Nov 2010, 6:29 pm

i get the same feeling, and it doesn't stop at intended comedies. i clearly remember my sister and i watching a tv show similar to "britain's got talent"in france, and we spent most of the show each of us hugging our knees on the couch, using our knees as shields against the embarrasment we felt on behalf of the people unaware that they were singing out of tune, and sometimes when it got unbearable, HIDING behind the couch to block the view of the poor fellows. We had to change the channel from time to time to cool down, but went back to it as if it was a scary fun fair ride. we were teens at the time.
now that i'm a grown up i can't stand to see these shows. i just switch the channel.It's painful.

seriousfoolishness
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02 Nov 2010, 6:45 pm

I'm not sure puns count as jokes.

From what I read, another Aspie trait is affinity for them and I'm no different.

Chama
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02 Nov 2010, 8:55 pm

It depends on the joke for me, but I find most things pretty hilarious. If it's something where someone REALLY is hurt, physically or emotionally, it's definitely not funny, not even a little bit. But there are a lot of things that are kind of mean that I'll laugh at anyway. I guess... if it's something I'd laugh at if it happened to ME, then I'll laugh if it happens to someone else. I can't explain it right. It's not a mean kind of laughter. It just depends on the context of the joke and the intention of the person making the joke. (Which can be hard to figure out, but I naively always assume the best of people, which hasn't hurt me much so far.)

Maolcolm
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02 Nov 2010, 9:00 pm

seriousfoolishness wrote:

Empathy relates to knowing and understanding others emotions.

YOUR embarrassment at a situation has nothing whatsoever to do with the person actually IN the situation.

Thanks. Yes, that makes it more clear for me.

When I watch embarrassing things, it's true, I'm not giving any thought to whether or not the person concerned is embarrassed and I have no idea if they are or not. I just know I feel extremely uncomfortable. So I guess you're right and that this feeling doesn't arise from empathy.

wavefreak58
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02 Nov 2010, 9:37 pm

seriousfoolishness wrote:

I'm not sure puns count as jokes.

From what I read, another Aspie trait is affinity for them and I'm no different.

Really? I drive people crazy with puns.

leejosepho
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02 Nov 2010, 10:16 pm

seriousfoolishness wrote:

But that's my point. You may be able to "take a joke" as the saying goes and see that people are laughing because they can relate your misfortune with a similar situation in their own life. Which is why some of us get embarrassed or squirm when we see it on the movie screen or TV.

Some people choose to believe they are laughing "AT" you. In which case, they just get mad.

That is a slightly different matter where someone tells a story and is essentially blind-sided by unanticipated laughter. In a situation or case like that, it is up to the rest of us to learn to know it is *not* okay to thoughtlessly laugh at something just because we find it humorous until we actually can laugh *along with* the story teller ... and we cannot do that if/when s/he is *not* laughing.

Now differently, and assuming at least a little mutual trust: You or I might "poke a little fun *at*" the other of us in such a way as to "get a laugh" from others -- and everything does have a price, remember -- but even that is not the same as actually "making fun *of*" someone (shaming, embarrassing or in any way diminishing the individual for the sake of a self-serving laugh).

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seriousfoolishness
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03 Nov 2010, 5:26 am

wavefreak58 wrote:

seriousfoolishness wrote:

I'm not sure puns count as jokes.

From what I read, another Aspie trait is affinity for them and I'm no different.

Really? I drive people crazy with puns.

One of my father's favorite "jokes" is...What's the difference between "unlawful" and "illegal"?

One is against the law and the other is a sick bird.

I enjoy puns. I just don't enjoy having to explain them to NT's.

Bunneth
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03 Nov 2010, 6:09 am

BluePuppy wrote:

Hope I'm posting this in the right part of the forums. It's a little random.

Basically, there are two types of immensely popular types of comedy I can't stand – standard romantic comedies and "cringe" comedy – and it occured to me the explanation may be my aspie brain processing things differently, specifically how I deal with emotions. I wanted to run this by some other people to see how much sense this makes.

When I watch something that involves someone being embarassed in a "funny" way, I find I feel the embarassment, and it's painful, not funny. I know the rationale is that it's supposed to be cathartic, like facing a fear and letting it go, but if that's true I don't know how to get to the "letting go". That squirming feeling will stay with me for days. I don't have the same reaction to physical slapstick.

When I watch romantic comedies, I find them immensely frustrating because the plot will usually stir up lots of humiliation and betrayal, and I have *never* gotten the sense that these are adequately addressed. Maybe I just don't have the social receptors to recognise the (what seems to me gimmicky) reconciliation moment as expressing any kind of true caring, trust or emotional connection.

Does anyone else feel like this, or am I talking out of my posterior regions?

Hey BluePuppy.

I feel exactly the same about cringe/physical comedy. Things like American Pie, etc where your supposed to laugh at the person's pain, I instead feel as if I'm experiencing it myself and it completely freaks me out. I usually have to pretend I'm going to the toilet and then lock myself in there and cry. It's so bad that I can't go to the cinema to see a comedy in case it has something in it that causes me to have a freakout in public (something that I've so far managed to avoid) and there are lots of comedies that I'm terrified of seeing in case it has that effect. It also stays with me for days afterwards and I can find myself having lots of mini shutdowns over it as I can't get the image and associated feelings out of my head.

I just got diagnosed with AS (I'm 30) and up until now I just thought this was some freakish thing alone that I experienced. It feels really cathartic to know I'm not alone!

Robdemanc
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03 Nov 2010, 6:19 am

One of the worst "comedies" I have seen was "Shallow Hal". After watching I could not believe that it was classed as a light comedy. The message I got from the film was: "If you are fat, then you must be a nice person otherwise you will have nothing going for you."

Hardly a good message I thought.

Minky
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03 Nov 2010, 6:24 am

I'm a comedian who writes romantic comedies. I think most comedians are outsiders of some kind and many have Aspie traits. Being outside of society allows you to observe it and point out absurdities that others may not have noticed.
When I watch films I can't bear characters getting later and later for things (watching John Cleese in 'Clockwise' is my idea of hell') or people in physical pain, being tortured etc, but watching other people get social interaction wrong is kind of cathartic for me. I feel I'm particularly good at writing it ...wonder why?! I agree however that the moral scales of many romantic comedies are unbalanced and that they lack content.

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