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[This grew out of my comments on a post by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
calanthe_b.]
A lot of my sense of humor tends toward the silly, including puns and free-association. For example,misia just headed a comment on people who had added her to their friend's lists "how'd there get to be 212 of you?" I responded with a silly remark based on US area codes. One of the things I like about this kind of humor is that it doesn't seem to be based on, or involve, cruelty.
I think I have a slightly non-standard sense of humor, one that some people would consider defective (because it's different from theirs). Specifically, I find the "comedy" of embarrassment painful rather than funny; also, sometimes when I realize people are joking/teasing and try to joke back in the same vein, they say "I was joking" in a way that makes it clear that they thought I wasn't. This is irritating, because there's nothing I can do in this context that will be counted as acceptable: if I take them seriously, they say "I was joking" in ways that imply I'm doing something wrong, and if I don't take them seriously, they say "I was joking" in ways that imply I'm doing something wrong. It seems to be more acceptable to also be amused by things that the other person doesn't find funny than to not be amused by things that they choose to joke about in my presence. Part of that may be they don't even notice some of my obscurer silliness because they don't know the references (as I don't know some of theirs), but another part, I suspect, is that they can dismiss my obscure jokes as me being weird, but someone not getting their jokes (anyone's own jokes, including mine) can feel like a failure. After all, "s/he doesn't have a sense of humor" is, as Calanthe pointed out in her post, generally a condemnation, a statement that there's something wrong with the person, and "that's not funny" can be as painful as being told that you're hopelessly ignorant, badly dressed, or otherwise not eligible to be part of the social group in question.
That said, while I don't think it's a defect to not have a sense of humor, I don't think I'd be me without one. The person I'd be instead might be just as good a person, but she'd be different, I think more different than a me without my (intermittent, and I think below-norm) sex drive [something elsecalanthe_b talked about not having, in that post] would be. If I somehow woke up one day with a different sense of humor—say, a great liking for slapstick and no interest in wordplay—I'd also be a different person, but I might not find the difference as jarring. (This is, of course, an unlikely event and an untestable hypothesis.)
Also, I suspect that if I lost either of those characteristics, I'd wish for them back, because I'm used to those being aspects of myself. That is, I don't think they're essential to being human, but they may be essential to beingredbird. I don't miss certain musical talents, or an interest in football or fashion, because they were never there in the first place. I do miss having eyes as good as they were when I was a child, but that's a measurable deficiency and a noticeable change: something that I remember having, using, and enjoying.
calanthe_b.]A lot of my sense of humor tends toward the silly, including puns and free-association. For example,
misia just headed a comment on people who had added her to their friend's lists "how'd there get to be 212 of you?" I responded with a silly remark based on US area codes. One of the things I like about this kind of humor is that it doesn't seem to be based on, or involve, cruelty.I think I have a slightly non-standard sense of humor, one that some people would consider defective (because it's different from theirs). Specifically, I find the "comedy" of embarrassment painful rather than funny; also, sometimes when I realize people are joking/teasing and try to joke back in the same vein, they say "I was joking" in a way that makes it clear that they thought I wasn't. This is irritating, because there's nothing I can do in this context that will be counted as acceptable: if I take them seriously, they say "I was joking" in ways that imply I'm doing something wrong, and if I don't take them seriously, they say "I was joking" in ways that imply I'm doing something wrong. It seems to be more acceptable to also be amused by things that the other person doesn't find funny than to not be amused by things that they choose to joke about in my presence. Part of that may be they don't even notice some of my obscurer silliness because they don't know the references (as I don't know some of theirs), but another part, I suspect, is that they can dismiss my obscure jokes as me being weird, but someone not getting their jokes (anyone's own jokes, including mine) can feel like a failure. After all, "s/he doesn't have a sense of humor" is, as Calanthe pointed out in her post, generally a condemnation, a statement that there's something wrong with the person, and "that's not funny" can be as painful as being told that you're hopelessly ignorant, badly dressed, or otherwise not eligible to be part of the social group in question.
That said, while I don't think it's a defect to not have a sense of humor, I don't think I'd be me without one. The person I'd be instead might be just as good a person, but she'd be different, I think more different than a me without my (intermittent, and I think below-norm) sex drive [something else
calanthe_b talked about not having, in that post] would be. If I somehow woke up one day with a different sense of humor—say, a great liking for slapstick and no interest in wordplay—I'd also be a different person, but I might not find the difference as jarring. (This is, of course, an unlikely event and an untestable hypothesis.)Also, I suspect that if I lost either of those characteristics, I'd wish for them back, because I'm used to those being aspects of myself. That is, I don't think they're essential to being human, but they may be essential to being
redbird. I don't miss certain musical talents, or an interest in football or fashion, because they were never there in the first place. I do miss having eyes as good as they were when I was a child, but that's a measurable deficiency and a noticeable change: something that I remember having, using, and enjoying.Tags: