Learning to Laugh

Sometimes we need to learn to laugh at ourselves in life, adopting a serious nature when somebody playfully shoots an inappropriate joke our way can often be the easier option. Embracing a joke however can often leave to better relationships and better well being for yourself. I could get all high and mighty about every gay joke I see, for instance, but I don’t.



That doesn’t mean if somebody made a completely offensive out of line joke that I wouldn’t defend myself – I would.

All of us seem to fit into some type of stereotype, whether it’s your nationality, your skin colour, the colour of your hair, your intellect or your sexual preference, nobody is immune to mockery. I come across gay jokes on a day to day basis and for the most part I find them genuinely funny. Programmes like South Park and Family Guy continue to ridicule gay men: I don’t see it as an attack though, I see it as satire. I personally believe that these jokes are actually mocking homophobes and not gay people at all.

A lot of people cast off programmes like these, considering them low art, unintelligent and offensive but I believe if we look underneath the surface they have a level of intellectual depth. I entirely sympathise with those people who are genuinely offended, I just feel that perhaps sometimes we may act offended because we feel we should be, not because we actually are.

Laughing at ourselves is important, falling over in the street can be tremendously embarrassing, you only make things worse if you act angry about it though; just relax and embrace the joke. You’ll feel better for it. It’s inevitable.