Barry provides some thoughtful and thought provoking observations and
hypotheses. While I open to the validity of such, it makes me wonder
if other dynamics and explanations may also be possible.
Ochams Razor would dictate looking for the simplest explanation. If
90% of people polled, or observed on-line, are told "you are angry"
and they nearly universally say, "Well, actually not." And given that
the poller in most cases has virtually no knowledge of the persons in
questions other than a quick observation, a simpler explanation would
be: the observation of anger is incorrect, and the self-reporting by
people who know their own lives quite well, may actualy be more valid
than the poller who has observed them for a few minutes, or read a few
posts of theirs. But it certainly is fair and good to consider both
explanations, as well as others.
Barry's model suggests a generalized dynamic -- a framework from which
other content might be hung. A current observation of mine comes to
mind. As I have posted, I have found several recent posts quite
funny.(1) I have asked in this forum, "Doesn't anyone else see the
humor here?". Not much of a response -- though to be honest, not many
people respond to such broad quesions.
So one or two, of many possible explantions, are that: 1) people on
this list don't have much of a sense of humor. Since there is a lot of
joking around, that doesn't seem to fit. A second explanation could be
2) My sense of humor is different from others. Or 3) The observations
are not funny.
While open to number 3, humor is reflexive. When one laughs at
something, by definition it is funny to them. Thus, if at least one
person is laughing, its hard to tie a solid objective collar on any
"laughed at" observation and say, in absolute terms that it is devoid
of humor. In other words, "popular" humor may be democratic. Sometimes
to the lowerst common denominator.
More people think Jay Leno is funny than say Stephen Wright or
Jeneanne Goroffallo. But it does not follow that Jay Leno is funnier
in an absolute sense. Indeed if there is a "critical theory" for
humor, I would speculate that popular humor may usually be observed as
"lower humor" than humor that is more complex, nuanced and
mult-layerd. Just a a list of blockbuster films is often quite
different from a list of critically acclaimed films.
Thus humor itself is not really democratic. If one person is laughing,
by definition the joke or observation funny to someone.
Given this, it appears to me, subject to further consideration, that
the second explanation fits the evidence best. But in a generalzed
context, not solely specific to me, option 2 raises some interesting
possibilities. Are they laughing because they have a "warped" sense of
humor? For example, a staple of physical humor is near universal
laughter when someone "slips on the banana peel". Why that is is
interesting. But this contrasts with "quite sick humor" -- for
example, someone laughing at a roadside crash. Most would agree that
someone finds a road crash funny is repulsive. Yet, somone is
laughing, so in a universal objective sense, one can't say its totally
humorless. Humorless to most, and perhaps ALL civilized people, but
not humorless to all.
Another local example. Dr. Pete 'apologized" to Tom Pall for his
(Peter's) prior "humor", which Tom felt was distasteful,
innapropriately personal, and referencing posts from many months ago
-- nothing Tom currently said. So while I found no humor in Dr. Petes
orignal "jokes", I found them sort of repulsive, Peter found them
quite funny. Thus it can't be said the "jokes" were humorless in an
absolute sense. Someone was laughing. And props to Dr. Pete, he
apologized to Tom. Yet in the same post, same paragraph as the
apology, he ends by saying something like "now lets get back to talkng
about things of substance -- about gurus boning students." I gasped
upon reading that. Could anyone possibly find that funny? To totally
undercut the sense of seriousness of an apology by placing it in the
same breath as some IMO juvenile "joke.". So different strokes for
diffrent folks. Differnt types of funny bones.
The point being there appears to be no universal and absolute
standard for humor -- though there may be various "critical theories"
just as there are in art, literature and film. But ultimately, some
people laugh, some don't.
Back to the specific, if I am the only one laughing, it is certainly
reasonable, if not imperative, to ask myself, why do I find this funny
and others don't. Is my reflexive humor (reflexive in that one can't
decide whats funny -- one laughs reflexively at some things and not at
others) warped, sick, driven by dark and socialy unacceptable factors?
Could be, certainly a lot of good material for reflection and fodder
for growth of understanding.
Or while the "humor might be seen funny among a wider audience, among
the 5-6 posters (2) who may make observations on humor on FFL, are
there common factors which prevent them from seeing he humor that a
wider audience might see and laugh at? Again, lots for open thinking
people to consider. One possibility for such is that the observation
or joke touches upon sacred cows.
So I find value in Barry's post -- not only for some specific
observations and reasoning, but also for the alternative explanatiosn
-- and invoking some interesting thingsto reflect upon -- parallel
phenomenon -- who and who does not find humor in things -- and why.
======
(1) a) One proclaiming that Brahman writes through their finger -- and
who more and more frequently seems in a cranky mood: "go walk the shor
or long plank or suck eggs" being his recent advice, amongst other,
IMO, gems. I laugh,becasue I think, "It can'tbe a good thing, well for
EVERYTHING if Brahman is angry today."
b) an emphatic, "get some balls / take no prisoners", exposition of
a the true (campfire) credo of life on the "Enlightenment Trail",
followed by several posts that sharply contradicted every point made
in the emphatic creedo. Whether the poster was oblivious to the
contadictions, or consciously breaking boundaries ("if you were so
stupid as to bleive that high yarn rift about he campfire credo, then
wake up!"), both options, to me are quite funny.
(2) (This assumes that of the dozen or so regular posters -- about
half generally don't bother to comment much on humor or ideas
presented, they laugh or find insight, or they don't -- but don't
usually post "funny joke!" or "Insightful post!")
--- In [email protected], TurquoiseB <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> This issue of one or more persons (sometimes the
> majority of active posters) perceiving one partic-
> ular poster as consistently angry, and abusive
> because of that anger, suddenly "clicked" for me
> this afternoon. I had known that it reminded me
> of something, but I had not been able to figure
> out *what* it reminded me of.
>
> Bingo! Got it. It reminded me of visiting America
> recently, my first trip back in over two and a half
> years.
>
> Unless you've lived *outside* the country for a while,
> and are just re-entering it, you really aren't going
> to get (or believe) what I'm saying, and in fact you'll
> get angry about it, and say to yourself, "He's full of
> shit." I know this going in, because that's the very
> phenomenon I'm talking about.
>
> I would say that MOST (and by "MOST" I mean 80-90% of
> the people I interacted with during my week in America
> were ANGRY. The *first* thing that hits you, if you've
> been away for a while is the level of F E A R in the
> air. Almost everyone is afraid, all the time. And if
> you mention this perception to them, they'll tell you
> they're not. And THEN they'll get angry at you for
> having noticed that they're afraid. And THEN they'll
> deny that they're angry.
>
> It's just the weirdest thing. Why I think it relates
> to issues here on FFL is that a number of the posters
> whom a lot of people agree are out-of-control angry
> DENY that they're angry. Well, I don't think that they
> KNOW consciously that they're angry. Anger is their
> *baseline* state, the thing they settle back *down* to
> and "relax" into when their out-of-control moments settle
> down. Anger is so much a part of their lives, so much
> the "background soundtrack" of those lives, that they
> think it's normal. So they get even angrier when some-
> one points out that they're angry, because they don't
> want to admit that they're angry all the time.
>
> Sadly, this is my (and a lot of Europeans') view of
> America and Americans at this time. They're so afraid
> all the time that it makes them angry almost all the
> time. But they cannot admit either the anger or the
> fear to themselves because that would be...uh...like
> Un-American or something. :-)
>
> And even more sadly, that is the scenario in and around
> a lot of spiritual traditions in which people have been
> pursuing enlightenment for 20-30 years with no real sign of
> progress. They can't really *admit* the lack of progress,
> because that would be "off the program" and would make it
> sound like they were doubting the all-holy teacher and
> tradition, but they're very *aware* of their own lack
> of progress. ESPECIALLY if someone comes around and
> talks about a basically normal, everyday experience of
> enlightenment, something that really *should* be normal
> and everyday in a real happening tradition. The people
> hearing this often get really, really, really, really
> PISSED OFF.
>
> And in my opinion that's what you're feeling around FFL
> right now.
>
> This is just my opinion, and I'm just throwing it out there
> for other people to bounce off of. I'm not going to get
> involved in defending these ideas or arguing them with
> some self-styled spiritual drama queen, just because
> they're in need of an argument today to make them feel
> alive . They're just ideas. Do with 'em what you want...
>
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