I've noticed quite a bit of mistaken humor lately, and it has been the start of some ill feelings between posters (when the initial intent was totally harmless). I'm certainly as guilty as anyone of dipping in the humor well. I just want to give a heads up to all of us would be humorists that many jokes are taken the wrong way.
There are many reasons a joke can be taken the wrong way.
- language barrier
- differences in senses of humor
- sensitive issues
- inside jokes
- cultural differences
- or just a plain old "not funny" jokes
- lack of the ability to use inflection or physical attributes with your joke in a written format
Those are the ones I've come up with. Fortunately we are armed with a full arsenal of emoticons to use (the smiley things
) Some may not like to use things because they think they are goofy, but a little
or
would go a long way towards assuring your attempt at humor is received as just that.
Just some food for thought. Mmmmmmmmm...food (see the humor there is a Homer Simpson based mmmmmmmmmmm joke.) I guess there's always the train of thought that a jokeis less funny if you have to explain it, but you see what I'm getting at.
Peace, love and smiley faces
Redz