Humour and irony are never a problem. Don't ask what we laugh about, that's the real issue
Opinion
Can a tragedy be approached by jokes? Some people certainly would say no, that is impossible to do because in front of deaths and casualties there's nothing to laugh about. But listening to other people, or reading newspapers we could hear and see irony as well as black humour. How many times happens to have people using sarcasm in dealing with natural disasters, attacks, or tragedies such as the Holocaust? A large part of the public opinion feel disgust for jokes on Jews or cartoons where the authors make fun of bad events, but is a fact that a lot of people joke around everything, even the most horrible events. There's nothing funny in death, that's for sure. But Groucho Mark used to repeat that «the only real laughter comes from despair». A paradox, but only apparently. Difficulties as well as tragedies, due to their negativity, sometimes need to be played down, because try to minimize a terrible situation can be the only way to carry on. There's no lack of respect in playing down. On the contrary, using black humour and irony help to exit from the desperation. Of course, only irony is not acceptable: in that case it would be offensive. That's why jokes have to be used carefully and with intelligence.
Let think for a while to movies such as "The great dictator" and "Life is beautiful". In it both Chaplin and Benigni jokes on two of the worst tragedies of the last century: totalitarianism and Nazi concentration camps. There's nothing to laugh on such issues, but they both did. And they did using irony as a tool for criticising all those people who permitted those realities could be possible. But in order to counterbalance all their sarcasm, both Chaplin and Benigni at the end come back to a serious approach of the theme. In "The great dictator" Chaplin offers is serious point of view in his famous final speech, while Benigni - after a first half of the movie made just by sketches - used the second part of the movie to recall the gravity of the concentration camps. Irony is not forbidden. As everything, is its use to be proven right. There's the need of a counterbalance, a pinch of alert seriousness able to leave tragedies in farce. A funny cartoons related to a serious article doesn't make a newspaper politically incorrect. Similarly a joke on Jews doesn't make anyone anti-Semite or a Nazi. Jokes, irony, humour are permitted. It's just another way to recall and to deal with a very serious event. Then it's up to the people ask themselves what they are laughing about.
Can a tragedy be approached by jokes? Some people certainly would say no, that is impossible to do because in front of deaths and casualties there's nothing to laugh about. But listening to other people, or reading newspapers we could hear and see irony as well as black humour. How many times happens to have people using sarcasm in dealing with natural disasters, attacks, or tragedies such as the Holocaust? A large part of the public opinion feel disgust for jokes on Jews or cartoons where the authors make fun of bad events, but is a fact that a lot of people joke around everything, even the most horrible events. There's nothing funny in death, that's for sure. But Groucho Mark used to repeat that «the only real laughter comes from despair». A paradox, but only apparently. Difficulties as well as tragedies, due to their negativity, sometimes need to be played down, because try to minimize a terrible situation can be the only way to carry on. There's no lack of respect in playing down. On the contrary, using black humour and irony help to exit from the desperation. Of course, only irony is not acceptable: in that case it would be offensive. That's why jokes have to be used carefully and with intelligence.
Let think for a while to movies such as "The great dictator" and "Life is beautiful". In it both Chaplin and Benigni jokes on two of the worst tragedies of the last century: totalitarianism and Nazi concentration camps. There's nothing to laugh on such issues, but they both did. And they did using irony as a tool for criticising all those people who permitted those realities could be possible. But in order to counterbalance all their sarcasm, both Chaplin and Benigni at the end come back to a serious approach of the theme. In "The great dictator" Chaplin offers is serious point of view in his famous final speech, while Benigni - after a first half of the movie made just by sketches - used the second part of the movie to recall the gravity of the concentration camps. Irony is not forbidden. As everything, is its use to be proven right. There's the need of a counterbalance, a pinch of alert seriousness able to leave tragedies in farce. A funny cartoons related to a serious article doesn't make a newspaper politically incorrect. Similarly a joke on Jews doesn't make anyone anti-Semite or a Nazi. Jokes, irony, humour are permitted. It's just another way to recall and to deal with a very serious event. Then it's up to the people ask themselves what they are laughing about.
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