What do the following images have in common?
If you answered 'they are funny', you're half right.
If you answered 'they are funny and they are awkward', you're getting closer.
If you answered 'they are funny because they are awkward', you are bang on the money.
Yet it seems to me that this whole 'laughing at that awkward thing that just happened' is a rather new phenomenon. I clearly remember watching Napoleon Dynamite for the first time: though I was laughing hysterically, I felt inCREDibly uncomfortable watching all this awkwardness on telly.
Why uncomfortable? Because I felt manipulated by the film to laugh at a 'character' rather than at a 'situation'. Napoleon was like the weird kid at school, and viewing the movie made me like the bully. By positioning the audience in this manner the final dance scene becomes a triumph over the viewer and oppositional characters alike.
This movie proves that you and I are a bunch of jerks, showing that all along you've been complicit in laughing at this kid, who is evidently cooler and hipper than we could ever hope to be. Those dance moves own all over anything you have ever done. That thesis you just finished? Rubbish. Your ability to translate French? Worthless. Your recent foray into pussy-bow blouses? Lame. Unless of course you're rocking that shirt with some sick Jamiroquai dance moves.
So today, while I was meant to be studying International Marketing for a terribly scary exam on Friday (50%?!), I instead thought about why we find things funny. Some of the most brilliant internet memes of the moment (should I say mement? No... no I shouldn't) centre around these amazingly awkward situations. Think fmylife, think failblog.org, think awkward family photos. Each more painful and hilarious than the last. From 'Flight of the Conchords, there's Mel's vlog. And of course Arrested Development: Gob is a genius, brilliant, shining example of the 'awkward funny'.
Traditionally, 'satire' is used to "ridicule, expose and criticise people's stupidity or vices". However, it is only considered truly satirical if this humour is targeted at an individual in a position of power. Humour is the great leveller, able to stump politicians and mock the powerful, as in this image by W. Heath, "Waist and Extravagance", which ridicules the fashion of circa 1830 (a topical image for you all, I'm sure).
However, these awkward-funny moments and situations are not aimed at powerful figures of society. Indeed, it is the teenage kid, the unemployed magician, the anonymous working drone, and the unfashionable mullet/handle-bar mo bearer who now cops the brunt of our jokes.
If indeed it is the least empowered individuals who are now our laughing stock, is this humour still satirical, and more importantly, ethical? And what does this reveal about contemporary human nature, that we feel that laughing at the underdog is not only culturally acceptable but entertaining? Is this a new form of humour? Have awkward situations always seemed this hilarious? Or is popular culture highlighting a malicious and hurtful aspect of our individual personalities?
Oh, heck, this is just too hilarious for words OR analysis!
Love love,
Centine.
I was actually thinking about it this morning! It seems so harsh but yet its too funny to ignore it. But so unethical! But so tempting! And then realised, we have made everything in life so complicated! We can't laugh at something that we think is funny without feeling guilty! And then I went downstairs to get my coffee.
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