A man walks to the top of his hotel and finds a bar with several tables. He chooses one and sits down. After a couple of drinks, he says hello to the man seated at the next table.
The man next to him then says that he needs a break, walks over to the edge of the roof, jumps off, and soars through the air before landing back on the top floor and sitting down, with a triumphant smile.
The hotel guest then gets up, and says to the flyer, “Amazing. Lemme try that.” The man leaps off the roof and falls 15 stories to the ground. With that the bartender shakes his head and says, “You know, you’re a real jerk when you’re drunk, Superman.”
In these times, we need some humor. Did you laugh? Well, I have learned that jokes such as these are known as dark humor and, according to some studies, your reaction to dark humor could indicate your intelligence. Apparently, people who enjoy dark humor have a higher IQ, show lower aggression and resist negative feelings more effectively than people who turn their noses up at jokes like that.
It is said that dark humor requires more mental processing, sort of a mental gymnastics, than a simpler joke such as a knock-knock. With these humorous stories, there is the use of informational processing with multiple levels of thought. The processing takes one away from the consequence of the humor, such as, did the man die when he jumped? That more mundane thought does not arise for those with a love of dark humor.
Compare this type of humor to the pun. A pun literally pits your brain’s right and left hemispheres against each other as you process a single word’s multiple meanings. This occurs without forcing you out of a comfortable emotional place.
Sure, all jokes of any value rely on wordplay that works the brain. As I have read, dark humor jokes require a bit more emotional control to let you laugh and enjoy the quality of the short presentation without questioning the consequences.
In the material I was reading, there were many examples of this dark humor. Here are some of them. See if you are amused or offended by them. Give your brain a spin with these jokes. The comedy writers suggest that if you laugh, you will appear to sound smart.
“I’m sorry’ and “I apologize” mean the same thing. Except at a funeral!”
Q. What has four legs and one arm?
A. A happy pit bull.
Q. Why don’t cannibals eat clowns?
A. Because they taste funny.
Cats have nine lives. Makes them ideal for experimentation.
Offended? Think they are pathetic? OK, that doesn’t make you less smart than another, but perhaps you have a lesser humorous side.
I have had a favorite clean joke for years that offends women and cracks up men. Clearly there are substantial differences between the humor enjoyed by women and men. Tina Fey has pointed out those differences many times in her life as a comedienne. She truly gets the two levels of audience enjoyment.
George Burns was the epitome of male humor and perhaps Lucille Ball, the opposite. They often played more to their own sex. Here goes my dark joke.
A young man decided on that cold January day to do some ice fishing. He had read about cutting the hole in the ice and baiting his hook. After doing so, he stood by his newly cut hole waiting for a bite. None came.
He looked next to him as an older man cut his own hole in the ice and immediately started catching fish. The young man could not help himself and walked over to the old man.
“What is your secret old man?” he asked.
The man turned to him and seemed to mumble some words. The boy just shook his head.
With that the man opened his mouth and pulled out some wriggly items and clearly said. “You got to keep your worms warm!”
OK, some of my readers will laugh and some turn away with their mouths pouched. And there is one of the differences. That’s dark humor with a further condition. Ickiness.
Happy ice fishing.
https://daily-journal.com/opinion/marek-dark-humor-and-intelligence/article_18c284dc-d381-11ef-90a2-63f9be3b5b4b.html