If you don't get sarcasm or satire does that mean you're stupid?

[Whovian]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by SYFROYH (a host of the General Discussion forum).

Wait. don't answer that.

[Evergreen Emerald]

1. I don't get it.

[GreenStormCloud]

8. He posted the following thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2295220

Whovian (2,797 posts)

Shoot eveyone open carrying for implied threat.
Last edited Fri Feb 1, 2013, 11:14 AM USA/ET - Edit history (1)

Makes sense to me. They have a weapon and are pretty much bound to use it.

Except for police. Maybe,

When he was taken to task by many DUers he tried to claim that it was sarcasm and that we just didn't get it. Several DUers refered to his posting history and doubted that it was meant as sarcasm. If it was sarcasm, then it was very poorly done.

[appleannie1]

2. Huh?

[JohnnyRingo]

3. Oh Oh...

Looks like I awoke to another new DU controversy.

I'm guessing too many people were taken in by Limbaugh's faux adventure at the Mexican restaurant and are lashing out at satire itself to protect themselves in the future.

[appleannie1]

11. I figured that one out about halfway through the first paragraph but oh how I wish it were true.

One time my B-I-L asked if I had a radio so he could listen to Rush during a rare visit. I got him an old one and plugged it in on the porch while explaining that since I am a practicing Christian I don't allow hate inside my house. He is a man that reads the Bible for hours everyday, wears Jesus t-shirts and sermonizes constantly yet does not understand it is rude to eat in front of guests in his own home without offering them some.

[tularetom]

4. OK, which Onion post did you bite on?

[Baitball Blogger]

5. Generally, to do it right, the person who is deliverying the satire drops clues so people can

pick it up. The British have it down to a science. In the U.S., we rely on intonation, which undermines the whole experience because it usually comes across as nasty. In fact, I think that's why we fail miserably with sarcasm in this country. Too many people use it to be nasty, and not enough to be amusing. So the subtly is lost on everyone.

[TheCowsCameHome]

6. Washing your hands frequently reduces chances of getting it.

That's why they post those signs in restaurant bathrooms.

[RC]

7. Not necessarily.

It means the sarcasm was too subtle for the audience or the recipient is too conservative minded to get the nuances. i.e., it wasn't black/white enough for them.

Carry on.

[Earth_First]

9. Inflection, tone and the delivery are sometimes lost on the internet...

In most cases on the internet; it needs to be thick in order to be perceived.

So no, not always.

[ananda]

10. Well, I have noticed that...

... many people on the right are irony impaired.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

12. No. But there is a thing called confirmation bias

which is basically that you want to believe things that reinforce your existing opinion. So if, for example, you read an article about a Mexican restaurant refusing to serve Rush Limbaugh because he's a racist, or Ann Coulter refusing to fly on an airplane whose pilot was a black woman, you might miss the satire because you don't like these people, you know they have expressed racist views in the past, and you are inclined to believe the worst of them. So you read the articles and think "Ha! I knew something like this would happen to these assholes someday!" Doesn't mean you're stupid; it means you're susceptible - as everyone is - to confirmation bias. Just be aware of it - and remember that good satire will make you laugh as well as go "Ha! I knew it!" Bad satire will just confirm your bias. (The Daily Currant is usually bad satire because it's not very funny, just borderline libelous.)

[farminator3000]

13. i think you spelled sarcophagus and satyr wrong!

On April 1, 1977 the British newspaper The Guardian published a seven-page "special report" about San Serriffe, a small republic located in the Indian Ocean consisting of several semi-colon-shaped islands. A series of articles described the geography and culture of this obscure nation.
http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/archive/permalink/san_serriffe

(i guess the URL is a giveaway..?)



i think its more
'pretending they don't get it because they know they are wrong, maybe on an unconscious level.'

perhaps they have dreams where they aren't bigots?

edit: #12 has a good point, too.

(finish coffee before reading...)

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-12-30/lifestyle/36323648_1_anthony-weiner-train-wreck-gangnam-style
Dave Barry’s Year in Review 2012
It was a cruel, cruel year — a year that kept raising our hopes, only to squash them flatter than a dead possum on the interstate.

Example: This year the “reality” show “Jersey Shore,” which for six hideous seasons has been a compelling argument in favor of a major Earth-asteroid collision, finally got canceled, and we dared to wonder if maybe, just maybe, we, as a society, were becoming slightly less stupid.

But then, WHAP, we were slapped in our national face by the cold hard frozen mackerel of reality in the form of the hugely popular new “reality” show “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo,” which, in terms of intellectual content, makes “Jersey Shore” look like “Hamlet.”

[aikoaiko]

14. Locking.

The GD hosts voted to lock this thread and ask you post these types of threads in meta.