I've Tivo'ed a number of recent programs on Winston Churchill recently, and have noted that he had a remarkable gift of showing leadership and building solidarity through the use of humor in times of crisis, i.e., WWII. He would often sort of poke fun at Hitler and the Nazi and thereby cut them down to a size where the British felt that the Germans were beatable as well as bolstering British morale that they must eventually prevail. Reagan too, was able to do this during the Cold War by poking fun at the Soviet economy (like the old jokes about the giant nail or the electrician appointment ten years hence "in the afternoon"). These were both deadly serious times, but somehow both Churchill and Reagan could use humor to unite their countries and humanize the enemy by bringing them down to size.
My impression is that the humor has gone out of politics, especially on serious subjects. If so, why is that? One explanation could be that politicians these days are essentially humorless--they are so heavily stage-managed and scripted that there is no room for humor. Or second, could this be another casualty of partisanship and the 24-hour news cycle? My impression is that attempts to use humor today, especially about serious subjects, run the risk of being pounced upon and brandished as evidence of a lack of "seriousness" or "concern" about the subject matter. Third, perhaps there is something about the type of threats we face today (terrorism, for instance), that mean that they are simply are not amenable to humor in the same way as WWII or the Cold War.
I don't know the answer, but watching Churchill, it is amazing how he could use humor to deflate very tense discussions--you simply feel a deep relief when you smile and laugh along with him. For many reasons, it seems like we could use that sort of influence today in politics.
If anyone has any thoughts on this, I would be interested in hearing them.
But I'm just being devil's advocate here. I really agree that it probably has more to do with an overwhelming sensativity and seriousness in the press. Heck, Arnold's tried to be funny, but it's hard to tell whether or not he's just not funny or the press isn't being fair to him.
I think the reason that Ahnuld flops is that his jokes, while not all related to his movie roles, tend to either have something to do with his films or bodybuilding. While they might have been able to elicit a chuckle in the beginning of his political career, after time, they grow stale because the subject matter is the same each time. He's just got to get some new material.
Perhaps another reason might relate to one of the underlying purposes of humor, which is to counteract fear. Although many people might feel some background anxiety about terrorism, I'm not sure that a lot feal genuine fear; certainly not the fear of Londoners during the Blitz. My memory fails, but I wonder what Giuliani was saying to New Yorkers in the days after 9/11. I would not be surprised to find a higher humor quotient there.
Just look at the reaction to Bush's jokes about the missing WMDs at the press dinner. Yes, it's a slightly different situation than the type to which you referred. But it's a forum where campy humor is expected and yet Bush is getting hammered for making a few self-deprecating jokes.
Of all presidential candidates, successful or unsuccessful, it looks to me like John Kerry is the first humorless one we've had since Richard Nixon. One thing that I see as a clear differentiation between the reasonable left and the unhinged loony left is that the latter will seize on every cheerful self-deprecating little witticism coming out of Bush and scream, "AHA!!! HE HAS ADMITTED TO HIS IDIOCY!!!" Those of us who are not deranged react by edging slowly away while thinking, "no, hon, somebody just admitted to idiocy all right, but it ain't Bush..."
cathy :-)
Personally, I've found that irony and satire are lost on liberal friends. They just don't get it.
-Sen. Everett Dirksen
* cameraman for local network affiliate who covered a campaign stop of Bill's back in '92. Bill made sure he wasn't taping before telling a joke.
Everything we "see" is filtered by the biased media, who are on a mission to portray conservative leaders as humorless. We're in a culture war.
There is plenty of self-deprecating humorous content happening out there that is not getting reported, i.e exposed to the American public.
John Podhoretz at NRO reports that Albert Brooks is working on a picture where he plays a US comedy actor/writer/director on a mission from the US government to determine what the Muslim world finds funny, to be called "Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World." I initially thought that was quite brave until I remembered that he already has a fatwa pending for his 1996 movie "Mother."
An interesting science fiction story can be written about a society where humour has become taboo. There's surely a colourable argument that terrorism and other evil share in common their humourlessness.
Think of all the supervillains in the comics and the movies. They cackle and laugh, but never at anything funny. Only at suffering or the anticipation of suffering.
I could sure go for a knock knock joke right now.
My favorite Churchillism is that, upon seeing Clement Attlee in the men's room, he said "get away from me, Clement. Every time you see something big, you want to nationalize it." But this is behind-the-scenes humor. I don't think his radio addresses, or FDR's fireside chats, were very funny.
"All humor is conservative"? My goodness, is that really even said? If so, is it said with a straight face, or tongue in cheek? Carlin would be somewhat surprised to hear that, I think. So might Lenny Bruce. So might Pryor, and Cosby, and Chris Rock. It's possible that whoever wrote that
a) doesn't think liberal or progressive or radical or outrageous comedy is funny, and
b) thinks conservative humor is very funny.
But people who feel that way, or the reverse, aren't right. They're just subjective. Here's an area where "lefty" universal subjectivism is really true: like sex, humor is utterly and inherently subjective. That's why, Internet lore to the contrary, there's no agreement on what is really the world's funniest joke.
Who was it up here who said everything was depressing? Man, are you in need of medication? How about a hug? Drugs? Roller derby? You need to snap out of it. Unless it was sarcasm, in which case please use [sarcasm] tags, or smileys. We on the Internet are Humorless, as you know, and miss such subtlety.
I was depressed by 9/11, more than angered, after I got done being afraid. I was depressed by 2/1/2002 as well. Also by the disastrous presidential elections just past, and the one before that. But I pick myself up, and hope in my heart that the country will survive even this, and make plans for today and tomorrow.
Humor lets people get by in tough times.
I think that was the point of this post.
Some liberals may not be laughing lately. They should. It's a scary time, with a lot of very self-important and very deluded folks out there. Someone mentioned Michael Moore. I would tentatively agree, although he can be funny, and add a number of righty blowhards.
I don't think Churchill was my kind of genius. Historical figures, like humor, are subjective.
Scott's comment was pretty funny ("three terrorists, JFK, and Jason Alexander walk into a bar"). Here's my response:
Three traitors, Karl Rove, Michele Malkin, and Ann Coulter walk into a bar. So Karl turns to the other two...
Basically, we've reached the point where we can't offend our opponents by not taking them seriously.
In Soviet Russia, jokes tell you.
The only solution is to remove more and more issues from the realm of politics by radically restricting the scope of that which is a legitimate concern of government. Restrict the number of political prizes and you reduce the fighting over them. But that would require massive repeal of legislation, every bit of which has created consituencies with interests that would be harmed by repeal, so I'm not optimistic.
The difference with today's leaders is that we're living through their actions, in real time, not reading a condensed summary of 'em fifty years hence, in which only the non-boring significant stuff is related.
I could be wrong, of course. Maybe politicians really were funnier 50 or 150 or 1,500 years ago. But a priori I sorta doubt it, since it's asking a lot for mere technological changes in information flow to fundamentally change the way we human beans like our leaders to act, after umpty years of evolution have wired it up in our DNA.
I'd say this premise needs a lot better evidence than a vague feeling that "things were better in the past," which is, ah, hardly a unique sentiment for introspective middle-age folk to spontaneously express.
The Democrats, however, continue to joke a bit. Remember Hillary's recent Alfred E. Newman "joke?" Howard Dean is also quite the commedian.
Although I disagree with his politics I think Al Gore can be quite funny when he's not on the campaign trail. I understand that Bob Dole has a devastatingly funny dry and self-depreciating wit. I'm also sure that part of Clinton's legendary charm is an ability to be "one of the guys" which would naturally involve some good humor. My understanding is that Bush is also quite the charmer and quite a regular guy but probably not as understated as Dole or as genial as Reagan.
I recall watching the Daily Show a few nights back and they showed the freeze frame of the time several years back when in prep before coming on the air Bush casually flipped off the camera. Needless to say it was not presented in a "here's how George acts up when blowing off steam and releiving tension in himself and with the people he's working with" it was presented as childish and immature and unpresidential. Which in some ways it was (of course I think the clip was from when he was either the Governor of Texas or running for Governor) but it was also not done for public consumption. Then, as has previously been mentioned, there's the flack President Bush got for the WMD jokes.
So I think that in a few years people are going to be remembering and realizing the GW had a few good humorous moments too.
(2) Even when we do (at least) get extremely frustrated with another country, the friend/enemy lines are not as strikingly drawn. France is an ally, but was a temporary political/rhetorical enemy re Iraq; there were certainly French jokes going around, but it would be dangerous for a politician to make one (just as Chirac's anti-British jokes have recently gotten him into trouble). Arafat was a very frustrating foe, saying one thing to our face and the opposite to his friends, but we couldn't afford to make public jokes about him while trying to be an "honest broker".
(3) Whatever is said today by the president (or other high officials) of the US gets broadcast around the world. Reagan found that out with his "we begin bombing in 5 minutes" joke; it's even more true today. If we're trying to win hearts &minds of potential terrorists, making jokes about them (and/or their favorite leaders) that they're sure to hear is probably a bad idea.