A Bit of Humor

Wow, it's been a while since I last wrote something.

I was watching a short comedy sketch from The Whitest Kids U' Know, a comedy troupe. I generally don't watch them, so I don't know that much about it.

The sketch went something like this. A guy comes to a cube, and asked the person working there how things went the previous night. The guy said he had a pretty quiet night. He hung out with his girlfriend.

Then, the guy asks "did you do your girlfriend"? This is probably a thought that occasionally comes across people's minds but one they don't say in polite company. The guy says he feels uncomfortable answering this question, and in any case, the guy asking is his boss, and his boss never hangs out with him, so why is he asking.

The boss then says he better tell him or he'll be fired. The guy says "this is weird, but OK, OK, yes, yes, I did have sex with my girlfriend". The boss is enjoying the answer to this question, and then asks him to draw what happened.

Now comedy works in a number of ways. There's comedy of recognition. Sometimes it's shameful recognition. For example, some comedians noted that, as kids, one was asked to climb a large rope, and that in the process, this rope might actually turn a person on, given its proximity to certain parts. Most kids imagine they're the only ones that go through this, but once they realize other kids have too (usually as adults), they can mine it for comedy gold.

Then, there is the escalation of some idea way beyond what is perceived as normal.

This sketch heads in that direction. I changed the channel because the routine was getting a little uncomfortable to watch, but switched back out of curiosity. The boss is sketching out on a white board. He is drawing a picture of himself in self-pleasuring. The employee is shocked. He draws a picture of the couple in bed.

He then draws a window, and the employee says "You were watching us last night?", and the boss is telling him to shut up, and he's not done yet. He then draws himself imagining he's sleeping with his employee's girlfriend. "You were imagining yourself with my girlfriend?!".

The boss tells him to shut up, that he's not done. He draws additional people. The employee goes "you invited other people to watch?". He again tells him to shut up and draws a camera. "You filmed us?!". Again, shut up. He draws the word "Internet". "You put us on the Internet?!".

Now the idea for this sketch has at least two parts to it. One is the idea of asking someone something personal, and seeing if they'll react to it. The other is the idea of escalating this craziness by sketching the idea on a board. The sketching part is pretty impressive because you have to imagine how to reveal the various parts. Of course, the employee screaming incredulously helps explain what is going on.

Ultimately, a lot of this edgy humor comes from humor of recognition. It explores darker sides of the human psyche and pushes the notion into absurdity, but almost recognizable absurdity.

If humor succeeds, especially sketch humor, it often keys in on insights of people. To be fair, much of this humor is cultural, and cultural humor may make sense (in a way) in one culture, but not in another.

What seems shocking, in hindsight, is rather clever, requiring a kind of perverted insight.