TO HEHE OR NOT TO HEHE

Let me tell you a story. A real-life story. Many of you might have already heard it from me. My school was in West Bengal. Naturally, most of our teachers were Bengali bhadrolok (gentlemen). Obviously their Hindi sucked. Nothing wrong with it though. Please note that “DADA” in Hindi means grandfather but in Bangla it means elder brother. One not-so-fine Saturday a student was surprised to find one of his relatives in school. His grandfather had passed away. So he was given leave for some days. On his way home he happened to come across a teacher ( a Bengali bhadrolok). Naturally the teacher enquired about reason for his sudden return to home. The student answered “ Sir mere dadaji ki death ho gayi.”  The teacher was not prepared for this. The bhadrolok felt a bit of shock and bad for his student. After about thirty seconds of sombre silence the teacher again asked, “Toh tumhara dadaji kis class me podhta tha?”  That was the story. Now that we see in hindsight it sounds funny. But imagine the silence and hopefully some literal correction and explanation  that followed. 

                 Humour has always been tricky to say the least. The trickiest part is that it is subjective. What might be funny to one person might be offensive to another. In today’s time there is no dearth of examples. I mean every now and then comedians get in serious trouble. I am not taking any sides (of offender or offendee ). Such situations spring one question again and again. What should be the boundary while making jokes ? Alopecia is certainly way beyond the boundary for now😬(Will Smith definitely agrees!). I have seen a comedian (on YouTube) making jokes about children with cancer! More interestingly, the joke was received with huge laughter!! In another incident a particular Indian comedian made jokes about deities of a particular religion and was later jailed. It seems that the  art of making jokes doesn’t come with a manual. 

                     I guess what matters while deciding the “boundary” is the context and temperament of the audience. Context is set by culture of the place where a joke is being told. Some cultures tend to be more “liberal” (for the want of better word in my vocabulary). Here jokes are taken more sportingly. Artists, here, can make joke on and about subjects which are considered taboo in other different cultures. In a Netflix special, Kevin Hart talks about how his children caught him and and his wife engaging in the baby-making process itself. And while doing so he describes the horribly awkward situation with very graphic gestures and actions. The crowd laughed madly. At the end of the performance Kevin got standing ovation. Now imagine same set of jokes being performed in India. Even I myself found some of the jokes outright vulgar and inappropriate. And I am sure many of my compatriots will agree with me. But does that make me any less of a fan of Kevin Hart? No.

                Now, the other limiting condition upon a joke which is temperament of the audience. Is the audience sporting enough to take a joke at their own cost? Many are, many aren’t.  The “roast” culture is mention-worthy here. To laugh at one’s own cost is a virtue. It shows humility. But at the same time one must respect boundaries set by the audience. According to me, a perfect comedy show needs some prerequisites. One of them being conducting a test of sense of humour (only if that is possible by any means) of each person in the audience. And only those with score above a particular threshold should be allowed into the show. What I want to say is that a comedy show is no less than  a conversation whereby each party should have at least some idea about other’s sensibilities. 

                             Even if such a show is somehow organised, probability of sentiments being hurt is still there. This reminds of the infamous “AIB-roast”. All those present at the show thoroughly enjoyed and had a laugh riot. But in following days, FIRs were registered (the complainants didn’t even attend the event). The show was accused to be vulgar and obscene. Very soon two camps emerged, one condemning the event and other defending it. All of this wouldn’t have happened if the complainants had a sort of trust in participants of the event. I mean the former should have trusted maturity of the latter and treated the event as a private affair among the participants, all done in good  non-conventional humour.   

                               All of this boils down to this: each joke has its own appropriate space, time and audience. A joke should reach only the intended audience. But in this  era of internet  and globalisation, how much of that is even possible, who knows! 

P.S. :- God, I hope I made some sense!🙏