Think back to the last time that you flew on a plane. Did you pay any attention at all to the safety announcement? Probably not.
But one time when I was flying home on a Friday night the flight attendant surprised me by turning the speech into a comedy routine. What surprised me even more was that I listened.
Apparently flight attendants aren't the only ones who have gotten in touch with their inner comedian. Over one million people follow the TSA on Instagram. Fashioning itself as "Teller of Travel Trips" the feed recently posted a photo of a bazooka rocket launcher found in luggage at the Raleigh-Durham airport. (You really can't make this stuff up.)
My favorite post so far was the one where they picked up on "Dude with a sign," because I'm a fan of his too. :-)
I read that the National Park Service's feed is funny as well so I decided to follow them too, because I can always use a good laugh.
Research tells us that humor can be a very effective form of communication - particularly irony.
Do you look for humor in your life? Have you encountered the use of humor in boring/difficult situations? Has it helped? Did you become more engaged in the message? And did you respond as intended?
What about controversial topics? "All in The Family" was a ground breaking 70's sitcom, which tackled serious subjects like racism and misogyny. Its impact and influence were significant. And, I am sure that anyone who watched it still remembers when Sammy Davis Jr. kissed Archie Bunker. It was that shocking.
Given the decisiveness we see in the world today - would a little humor help?
Brooklyn, C. (2022, March 25) The Funniest Travel Account on Instagram Is Run by the T.S.A. Seriously. nytims.com. Retrieved March 29, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/25/travel/tsa-social-media.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage§ion=Travel
9 comments:
Humor helps out a lot in busy places. I feel like a little too much humor about bringing someone down can be annoying and not cool. For example, family guy or South Park humor is something I just don't get anymore. I do try to look for humor in my life and I don't like to look at things in serious situations. By doing that, it has helped out a lot. For example, I was on a road trip with my friends and our car tire became flat. We were scared that we might spend the night in the middle of nowhere. We called for help, but it was taking them forever to come. Our makeup was melting off our faces, and for some reason, we just thought it was so funny. We couldn't stop laughing until the help arrived, and from that trip, that was the most memorable moment. At that time, we didn't even care that we were stuck in the middle of nowhere. Given the decisiveness we see in the world today, humor can help. I was seeing memes about Putin and I just thought they were funny. Humor is a great way of getting your message out to the world. When Ukraine tweeted that meme, it quickly got everyone's attention.
https://twitter.com/ukraine/status/1468206078940823554
I do think that humor can be an incredibly helpful tool when dealing with challenging times. I do not think humor is a bad coping mechanism because it is simply how some people best keep themselves calm when things are not going well in their lives. Something that immediately comes to mind for me is SNL. At Saturday Night Live, they utilize humor to address challenging political, cultural, or world issues. It makes people laugh for a few minutes and remember what is truly important in life. It is important to remember that we cannot control everything in the world around us and the humor seems to help ground people and put context to that. This type of humor also seems to bring people together from different backgrounds who are all effected by a certain issue in some way. I think that at a more personal level, rather than a large SNL style level, learning to laugh at frustrating or unexpected situations helps to build a sense of resilience to stress.
Shohei Ishikawa
I believe that I look for humor in my life because it makes our life better. Although people have different humor, people always look for humor; otherwise, our lives are less enjoyable. Also, I had encountered humor when I was in a boring/difficult situation. A good example would be that my professor made a joke before the midterm. As we can imagine, we were nervous and stressed out; the professor's humor made us relaxed, and we were able to focus on the midterm better. In addition, begging of the semester and having the very first class can be difficult. Once again, a professor demonstrating humor in the class made us more engaged and relaxed. Therefore, I believe that humor works well in these situations. For controversial topics, I think humor also could work. I do not really like reading or hearing about serious or sad topics; I rather hear something funny. At the same time, I know the importance of listening to these controversial topics. Therefore, I believe that it is important to bring humor to get more attention.
Regarding safety announcements on planes, I strongly believe that the reason why most passengers don’t pay attention to this information (myself included) despite it being important to know is that the information is presented in a way that sounds unappealing- with no humor or personality added to it and individuals who fly often have heard the same information before (frequent flyers). Even with that, each time people board a plane there is a different air host/hostess and if they added humor/a personal anecdote to the information, more people would pay attention to the information being said.
Humor is definitely something that should be incorporated into everyone’s mindset towards situations, tasks, or conversations. It removes the seriousness of things and eases the tension that may come with being in a difficult situation.
I believe I particularly seek out humor when I am in need of comfort, a sense of companionship, and simply just moments of joy and happiness. Often times I will notice that when having to read or study material for a class, when the content is expressed in a lighthearted, amusing, and humorous way, that is when the material resonates with me the most and I become more engaged. I find it easier to remember content and moments in general more when they provide humor and amusement, which is often how they translate as most impressionable.
Nowadays, brands utilize humor as part of their social media management and marketing in order to garner greater brand appeal and customer loyalty. People like to feel connected to brands, organizations, pages, people, and so on, that bring light to their lives and smiles to their faces. Just as of recently, the Will Smith and Chris Rock moment on television became the most widely talked about piece of pop culture, and while this was controversial in some form, people online took the moment and spun it in all kinds of humorous ways, making memes and so much more.
I truly believe humor has become such a huge part of our daily culture, more so than it has been in the past, as a way to better cope with the realities of our lives and the state of today's world in general. Individually, humor has always been and will be used as a tool of comfort and assurance. I think as long as humor does not get offensive, it is a great way to feel connected, a sense of happiness, and "safe" given the decisiveness of today's world.
- Nomi Q.
Having historically been a more serious person, my years of life have taught me that a good laugh holds a stronger power to alleviate an ache than dozens of pitiful comforting words. As such, over the passed couple of years I have in fact intentionally looked for humor in my life and bring it to others; specially during situations in which I know I would be incapable of making a profound impact otherwise. However, the humor I seek for my life and bring to others is generally balanced out with some of my more serious thoughts. In such balance between humor and difficult/boring situations is where I personally believe we might be able to find the most help to get through these situations. I too have encountered the funny flight attendants, I very clearly remember the first time they used humor on the plane and indeed! they had my attention. I've heard it a couple of times by now but it still gets me a lot more engaged compared to when there is no humor. Perhaps yes, I can agree that humor touches a part of ourselves that helps us become more engaged. The problem is when that irony goes unnoticed and a wrongful message is unintentionally delivered to those who fail to see the irony in the joke. After all, a Putin meme might bring a wider audience to bring aware of the topic but perhaps among some it might lessen the feeling of distress currently being lived by the Ukrainians.
I would say I look for humor in my everyday life. I feel like it is common to see people using humor in boring situations because it causes people to be more engaged with the subject matter. It does help because people get distracted by the humor and don't realize how boring the subject is. For example, I once was on a flight, and the flight crew was being funny during the announcements. I usually just put on a book and don't pay any attention to the flight crew, but this time I waited till they were done with their announcements. It did keep me engaged. So I would say I responded as intended.
I am a big fan of humor surrounding controversial topics. Many of my favorite shows use humor surrounding controversial issues. A great example of this is an It's Always Sunny in Philidelphia episode where they create their own Lethal Weapon movie, and the topic of blackface comes up. I think they handled it well and even discussed what's wrong with it and the history of blackface. But unfortunately, this episode has been banned due to its use of blackface.
Maybe because I am a fire safety warden in my company - I always listen the the flight attendants and watch the routine. I take life safety issues seriously and always look for exit signs and ways out of building.
In life though, I always look for humor, in fact as I am typing this my entire team is right outside my office cackling as we were just just making fun of the crazy schedule we have lined up for the next 2 weeks. If we attack it with gloom and doom it will not be good experience.
I also think of late night political shows, Late night with Trevor Noah and Bill Maher all attack serious political issues with humor, almost a sarcastic style that makes it more palatable and relatable. Sometimes highlighting the ridiculousness that's going on in Washington.
More Humor would help the world, but its tough to find humor in war especially when so many innocent lives are being lost. I did see the Ukrainian soldiers were successful as they kept their morale up - In an interview on The Rachel Maddow show hosted by Ali Belshi this Friday night they spoke to the soldiers who were rifling through things the Russians left behind as they fled, making jokes of some of the items they were coming across.
Natasha
Tonya Ongko
I strongly concur with the idea that humor can be a very effective form of communication – particularly irony. I consider myself to be a very laidback person who favors and incorporates satire into my daily conversations. I believe that humor adds happiness to an interaction. Hence, this can lead to smooth and engaging communication. Though not only this, humor does also spice up or ease boring/difficult situations. It captures people's attention – just like the safety announcement on the airplane. People become uninterested when they hear the same, repetitive, mundane information. With humor, it adds appeal and originality to the presentation. As for controversial topics, political cartoons that use satire to teach people about the news can be very effective. The satire entices people to learn more about the current news which people may not find appealing as it is more relatable, and "entertaining". When it comes to informing or educating an audience, I think the best communication is combined with entertainment – which in this case could be humor.
Post a Comment