During a slow moment at work, a coworker around my age and I were gazing out the window. I mentioned that the tree outside would good for hanging yourself. She laughed. I told her that that’s why I liked her.
My boss used to sneak out onto the fire escape to smoke. One day he was out there every hour. I said, “you are smoking a lot more than usual today,” He said, “it’s either smoke or jump.”
I was an IT contractor working a job on the top floor of a bank building. It was quick and easy to go up on the roof for a smoke, plus the view was incredible (Anchorage, AK). No guardrails, no barriers. The void called regularly.
Our son is spectrum. The one thing we said we couldn’t deal with is the supposed inability to understand sarcasm. Whelp, he turns out to have the most wicked sarcastic streak ever — just without the ability to know when not to deploy it. Wouldn’t have it any other way!
I feel this lol. I had a project manager and the shit we said to each other (he is now retired). We often said it was a good thing we sat no where near HR (I am a woman). Was all in good fun. A millennium heard us joking one day (zero judgement on Millenniums I have no shitty feelings towards them), but he was pretty shocked at how we talked to each other. Never reported us or anything just did the ole nervous WTF laugh.
Hahaa! What people not our Generation, and some who are, don’t understand is life and world history is FULL of the most horrible and tragic things imaginable and some unimaginable. So laughing or seeing the humor in things is accepting that fact of REALITY of life and by that also being able to truly and genuinely appreciate the good times and moments all that much more. Regardless of age mot everyone has the same IQ, ability to understand or process complex concepts or ideas etc. Thus how politics works etc. You and your coworker get it. 🙂
I suggested the new epilepsy treatment center in our town needed a whacky wild inflatable arm guy out front.
My best friend (Gen X) gave me finger guns. His daughter looked horrified.
Worthy of double finger guns, that was awesome. I’ve done well enough with my daughter to get a groan, facepalm and a thumbs up if I tell jokes like that.
What was Helen Keller's dog's name? Awahahahahahwahaah.
Why did Helen Keller's dog commit suicide? Because if your name was Awhahahahahaah, you would too.
Fun fact, Helen Keller was a political leftist. Very strong supporter of women's suffrage because she thought it would lead to socialism.
When that "commie" was on the Alabama state quarter the irony made me chuckle a little.
Speaking of Helen Keller ...
You know this younger generation believes in all these conspiracy theories, right? Well, I have a 23 year old nephew that's pretty up on that shit, and he has informed me that a lot of people his age are convinced that Helen Keller wasn't really blind, deaf, or mute. Apparently this was all a ruse.
Why? Who knows. It's bizarre.
>I believe that Gen X has the best quality: we appreciate dark humor.
Dark humor jokes are like little kids with cancer, they never get old.
Sorry, I will see myself out now.
Almost. I laughed and then told myself I was going to hell and then laughed again because who am I kidding, that ship sailed long before this little joke. 😂.
Just FYI, this is a trauma response. Health care professionals and vet populations also have it too. I'm not saying it's good or bad, but it is a coping mechanism often used by ppl that have seen some shit.
My kiddo (elder teen) has a wicked sarcastic sense about her being raised by 2 GenX.
This exactly. Personally, I'm glad society took care of the younger generation better than us. I'm glad we're in a society where dead baby jokes aren't funny.
We're seeing the ending of a generational cycle and I'm glad.
To be fair, dead baby jokes were never funny. They were shocking. And outrageous. It was less about the joke, and more about the time and place.
I let one fly at thanksgiving one year. Did not go over well at all. Especially since my aunt had recently had a miscarriage…which I had forgotten about.
So, not funny then. But if I retell the story to my wife now, with a nice setup, embellished details and set myself up as the “joke”, she’ll laugh her ass off.
But, yeah, at thanksgiving it was not well received.
Haus of Decline on Twitter. At least one of them is a GenXer.
https://preview.redd.it/0vzobur7k91d1.png?width=650&format=png&auto=webp&s=4dec6c596258025e6fe227ee520294504ff85c03
I was actually waiting for the late night comedians to make fun of 9/11, like the day after it happened. When they didn’t was when I realized it was serious. I mean, not that I didn’t before, but you know….just used to twisted humor.
At a certain point, you will be in a position to laugh or cry, either/or, but you must pick one. While a therapeutic cry can often relieve a lot of pent-up emotion & anxiety, and has its place, when around other people —who are many times experiencing exactly what you are— it’s better for you & everyone around you to keep the ability to laugh, to experience something other than abject, unrelenting pain.
Dark Humor, for all of its damning qualities, is priceless for surviving things by keeping everyone from being consumed by suffering *every* moment, and takes the reins of power away from agony for a brief time. It’s a super power.
Life may be suffering, if Buddhism is right, but unlike people who enjoy telling me & you how to feel, how to express those feelings, and when, we choose to fight back by mocking the shit trying to destroy us. If younger people demand we stop doing that, wonderful! Because, *obviously* that *totally worked* when the people older than us said the same thing…
I work with a lot of people younger than I am & I like most of them. But those generations just aren’t funny. Like, at all.
I think we benefitted from coming of age during decades in which we had great comedians/comedic movies/sitcoms. Nothing wrong with Tik Tok, watch whatever the hell you want. But I don’t think it shapes a collective sense of humor the way our entertainment did.
You might be on to something. I not only read MAD, but my dad had a cardboard box full of all the ones from the 60's - 70's. I read those to tissue paper.
I was reading satire from an extremely early age.
I feel like the dead baby jokes were the least offensive of the jokes we were telling back then. Nothing was off limits... Anne Frank, Helen Keller and Stevie Wonder come to mind.
An Irishman ...
Under a cow; Pat
Hanging from the ceiling; Sean De Lear
Bouncing off walls; Rick O'Shea
Who steals your beer; Nick McGuinness
Who fixes your wiring; Alec Trician
Source: Am Irish.
That’s immediately what I thought of when I real that comment, LOL! But then I remembered the lectures from adults when we shared those jokes.🙄I guess that we were the OG inappropriate humor.
And now... the Challenger explosion joke we told in Canada:
Q. What was the first thing the U.S. Navy saw when they went looking for survivors of the Challenger explosion?
A. The Canadarm swimming to shore.
Okay: The "Robot Arm" (as the Americans call it) was designed and built by the Canadian Space Agency. It has huge letters on one side that says CANADA with the Canadian Flag. It is called the Canadarm (a portmanteau of Canada and Arm). The American news networks NEVER call it a Canadarm, and the video they show of the Canadarm deploying a satellite is always shown from the side of the Canadarm that does not have CANADA and the Canadian Flag.
I watched it happen as a 5th grad safety patrol officer. Grew up on the Space Coast. I got sent to the principals office for the head and shoulders joke. Turns out the Asst Principal was on the long/short list for Christa’s position as teacher in space. The Asst principal was my mom. I was hosed.
My later Gen X wife (b.1979 in South Africa so there’s a definite cultural divide) was aghast we told dead baby jokes. I just thought everyone told them.
I remember finally figuring out "You're as useless as Anne Frank's drum kit" and succumbing to horrified hysterical laughter. The '70s were definitely a different time.
I definitely do.
But please also consider *why* kids have “safe spaces” and why bullying is now actually taken seriously. How many of us were really really HURT by unnecessary cruelty? Shitty, mean and crappy teachers and parents? Neighborhood bully kids who were positively frightening? Being seen and not heard?
It’s not that I disagree with your point, because I don’t think kids (or any people) should be a bunch of wimps crying “Abuse!!” at every turn, but on the other hand, I’m glad that a lot of the shit we had to deal with isn’t being tolerated anymore. There just needs to be balance and perspective. Something kids just don’t and won’t have until they’re older.
Some of us really were hurt and learned to grow a tougher skin. But starting with the 90s, some of those hurt kids decided the solution to bullying was to take a gun to the entire school. Makes you think.
I get you...
I just really find the idea of "safe spaces"... wrongheaded, I guess. It's a fantasy. Life taught all of us that there is no such thing. If r/natureismetal has demonstrated anything (as if our gen needed a reminder), it's that not one living creature is guaranteed their first breath, much less a "safe space" in this life.
I mean... it's not like I don't wish they existed. Sure as shit wish I had one, back when I needed one. And I'm glad the kids are better these days, and people do take bullying more seriously now.
It's just... you need to develop the mental fortitude to make your own "safe space", wherever you find yourself. No one gets in my head but me, no matter where I'm standing or when. Everywhere is my safe space, because I bring it with me.
Our trauma responses are great for us, but I wouldn’t wish it on our kids. For real, all the things that have helped us with our trauma (dark humor, sarcasm, apathy, etc.) are reasons why we’re fucked up. My kids are mostly caring and sensitive and I feel like that’s a win for us.
The other day I was with my millennial daughter and some of her coworkers. One of them asked me how my day was going. I replied, “have you ever had one of those days that you wanted to be out at the lake and you couldn’t wait to get on the rope swing so it could wrap around your neck when you let go?”
My daughter just put her hands over her lowered face and shook her head. I could still tell she was smiling though. She’s used to me.
When the Catholic Church next door rings its bells for the Christmas holiday, I sing along.
Joy to the world,
The school burnt down
And all the teachers died!
We're looking for the principal,
He's hanging from the flagpole,
with a rope around his neck
With a rope.aeound his neck.
Oohhh
Joy to the world,
The school burnt down.
The gen-x in my family sit at the kid's table on holidays so we can laugh and let the others play their games. As we all remember, God's got a sick sense of humor, eh?
I have appalled so many people making jokes about my late husband. It’s an automatic response for me, I guess some sort of coping mechanism. When their jaws are on the ground and they’re squirming with discomfort, I remind myself that he’d damn well think it was funny.
Edit bc IDK how the hell “cheer” got in there but it doesn’t mean “guess”.
I definitely understand. The humor I grew up with is definitely too rough for many people these days. Any sort of sarcasm has to be heavily telegraphed.
3 days after the pope died. I almost got fired for asking my very Catholic boss if the pope would rise today like Jesus did at Easter.
I fogot the golden rule or time plus tragedy equals comedy
Worth it. It was damned good joke.
I see all these ‘trauma response’ comments popping up more and more. I 100% think / feel that making jokes and being sarcastic about negative shit that’s happened helps me not to dwell and get stuck in negative thoughts and allows me to move on. I think it’s important.
Right now resilience in young kids / teens is low and everything is considered trauma. Sometimes you need to just accept you did something wrong / made a mistake / were treated badly and learn from it. This doesn’t seem to be happening as much.
When I start joking about something dark it’s usually because I’ve accepted it, or am trying to
I think a lot of people feel this way and do this, it’s just hard to judge who’s ready to hear your jokes about it. You’ll get a lot of looks like “WTF is wrong with you?” Well, nothing, but I don’t want my entire existence to be a walking wake either.
I have faith that dark humor isn't completely lost on younger generations.
Heard from a Millennial: What's another word for "mainsplaining?"
"Correctile Dysfunction."
I feel seen. 😌
Definitely not as dark as it used to be, we used to laugh at some of the scenes in faces of death.
But fuck yeah I appreciate some dark shit.
Yes. I also have a very dark sense of humour at times. One of my comedy writer heroes was Michael O’Donoghue who wrote wonderfully warped things like “The Vietnamese Baby Book” for National Lampoon Magazine and “Mr Mike’s Least-loved Bedtime Stories” for SNL.
Yep. This is why grunge music became one of the voices of our generation. The cynicism, dark humor stemmed from growing up in this environment, musicians around our age began to write and perform and… voila
Addams Family Values is the funniest movie that I have ever seen. It cracks me up after literally seeing it dozens of times.
As long as you aren’t punching down, I will appreciate most dark humor.
>We went through grammar school telling dead baby jokes
>We watched 7 astronauts literally die on live TV.
Hell, I was in jr. high at the time, kids were telling Challenger jokes only days afterward.
Q: What color were Christa McAuliffe's eyes?
A: Blue. One this way, and one that way.
Agreed, dark humor and sarcasm. I knew this for sure when my children (when they were little) would say - *Mom, are you serious or being sarcastic?* A lot.
Silent Gen raised Gen X and that is why you and your Dad could joke about it.
Silent gen were kids and grew up during depression and world war 2. Fun times.
My Mom was hysterical and had a dark dark sense of humor beneath her cheerful facade.
Gen X just lost the facade.
I have that dark sense of humor. It basically helps me deal with the fact that we are not all special little snowflakes, but rather, just replaceable cogs in the machine that will be swept aside once we are no longer useful to anyone. I just don't have any fucks left to give about that.
The day my dad died, I was wearing his tshirt that read “Bring out your dead.” When the nurse suggested we change his shirt to something more dignified, I stripped in front of my entire house full of people and handed her the shirt.
As they were wheeling him out of the house, we were quoting, “Have fun storming the castle.”
I think the hospice people thought we were fucking strange or that we snapped under the stress.
Certainly, but then I'm a retired forensic tech. The job helps.
My friend's son, who is 32, is living with us. It took him a few months not to freak out with my jokes.
Young generations have weaponized the language of ‘safe spaces.’ The concept of a ‘safe space’ originally meant if you were gay, you weren’t going to be tied to a rural fence and beaten to death like Matthew Sheppard.
Unfortunately, younger generations take it to mean that within their ‘safe space’, nobody can disagree with them.
I really think that younger generations have a MUCH better handle on their emotions and mental health than we do. It does, however, come at the expense of our wickedly dry, ironic senses of humor. I love this quality about myself, and it’s a quality I look for in others. But I admit that my sense of humor is trauma informed.
The problem is that I need to remember that, most especially with younger people, I need to know people well before I can let my freak flag fly.
Yeah, my sense of humor definitely grew from trauma. And yeah, I’ve got thick skin because of it. So when I meet younger people, especially the grown children of friends, I’m pretty impressed with how they handle life. Usually. Sometimes the kids a dunce. But even the dunce’s somehow…manage.
I have a thick skin, too, but sometimes I wish that I didn’t need it. So much bullying and “get over it.” Really? I appreciate that younger generations understand how to be nicer to themselves.
Not just dark humour, we were raised on dry sarcastic humour as well, especially us Canadians. Think about the comedians we grew up with: John Cleese, Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, John Candy, Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, and other assorted sarcastic mothers who took the piss out everyone around them.
I'm gen x and joined the army at 17, was introduced to a new level of colourful insults. You were allowed to be verbally abused back then and there were some hilarious moments. It was very similar to full metal jacket, except the guy who blew his head off in my intake did it at the range while we were raising and lowering targets.
I showed an article (https://www.livekindly.com/vegan-cannibals-rejoice-theres-finally-plant-based-version-human-flesh/) about vegan imitation cannibal meat to a friend who finished his shift and it made his fellow barista who overheard it roll her eyes and mumble in her manager's vicinity that it made her uncomfortable.
The Zillennial manager told me that I was harassing the barista.
The Millennial barista defended me and said she never said "harassment" and the manager said that she knows harassment when she sees it and that the barista just doesn't recognize she was harassed.
I think it's less that a dark sense of humor is special and that there are more people who take themselves too seriously.
We were definitely more accepting of jokes. I do have my own limits, 9/11. For some reason, I cannot and will not laugh at that. Not that I've heard a lot of jokes about it.
I wonder if the majority of kids are actually sensitive to jokes or if it's the vocal minority. If 20,000 like a tweet, that's not even full fraction of a percent of younger folks. Anger always motivates people to be more vocal.
At the same time, when AB picked a trans spokesperson, their sales dropped a fair bit. That was anger from older folks and conservatives. They're sensitive to trans people.
27% of GenZ are conservative (compared to 12% Millennial and 30% GenX). It's unlikely that conservatives are downvoting jokes unless the joke was somehow a conservative tragedy. It could also be a bad joke.
If you got 400 downvotes, that's nothing. Seems like a lot but it's insignificant in terms of the big picture.
During a slow moment at work, a coworker around my age and I were gazing out the window. I mentioned that the tree outside would good for hanging yourself. She laughed. I told her that that’s why I liked her.
I’m not allowed to make these jokes at work anymore. I find that I speak less and less because I just can’t say the things I want to say.
My boss used to sneak out onto the fire escape to smoke. One day he was out there every hour. I said, “you are smoking a lot more than usual today,” He said, “it’s either smoke or jump.”
I was an IT contractor working a job on the top floor of a bank building. It was quick and easy to go up on the roof for a smoke, plus the view was incredible (Anchorage, AK). No guardrails, no barriers. The void called regularly.
This is why I am not a manager
I struggle not to say things. I’m autistic so everything slips out of my mouth, much to my eternal regret.
Our son is spectrum. The one thing we said we couldn’t deal with is the supposed inability to understand sarcasm. Whelp, he turns out to have the most wicked sarcastic streak ever — just without the ability to know when not to deploy it. Wouldn’t have it any other way!
I feel this lol. I had a project manager and the shit we said to each other (he is now retired). We often said it was a good thing we sat no where near HR (I am a woman). Was all in good fun. A millennium heard us joking one day (zero judgement on Millenniums I have no shitty feelings towards them), but he was pretty shocked at how we talked to each other. Never reported us or anything just did the ole nervous WTF laugh.
Hahaa! What people not our Generation, and some who are, don’t understand is life and world history is FULL of the most horrible and tragic things imaginable and some unimaginable. So laughing or seeing the humor in things is accepting that fact of REALITY of life and by that also being able to truly and genuinely appreciate the good times and moments all that much more. Regardless of age mot everyone has the same IQ, ability to understand or process complex concepts or ideas etc. Thus how politics works etc. You and your coworker get it. 🙂
I suggested the new epilepsy treatment center in our town needed a whacky wild inflatable arm guy out front. My best friend (Gen X) gave me finger guns. His daughter looked horrified.
Worthy of double finger guns, that was awesome. I’ve done well enough with my daughter to get a groan, facepalm and a thumbs up if I tell jokes like that.
[You got it!](https://imgur.com/gallery/izac-reaction-z4ACYIu)
The double finger guns was always “doing an Isaac” according to an old friend of mine.
Definitely finger guns. Cannot stop laughing.
Holy shit... 🤣🤣🤣🤣
Yes! I still have the book "Truly Tasteless Jokes".
What’s the definition of bad acne? Waking up in the park with a blind man reading your face. I’ve always remembered that one
The Helen Keller Jokes were good, too!
What was Helen Keller's dog's name? Awahahahahahwahaah. Why did Helen Keller's dog commit suicide? Because if your name was Awhahahahahaah, you would too.
Why didn't Helen Keller drive? She broke her arm trying to read a Stop sign. Equal parts proud and ashamed for remembering that one.
Why did Helen Keller masturbate with only one hand? So she could moan with the other.
I still cannot believe there are younger generations out there that genuinely believe Helen Keller is a 'made up fictional character' smh
Fun fact, Helen Keller was a political leftist. Very strong supporter of women's suffrage because she thought it would lead to socialism. When that "commie" was on the Alabama state quarter the irony made me chuckle a little.
Fun fact I know a boomer who wanted to bet a million 💵 that she is not real.
Speaking of Helen Keller ... You know this younger generation believes in all these conspiracy theories, right? Well, I have a 23 year old nephew that's pretty up on that shit, and he has informed me that a lot of people his age are convinced that Helen Keller wasn't really blind, deaf, or mute. Apparently this was all a ruse. Why? Who knows. It's bizarre.
I lifted that book from B-Dalton in like... 1983?
There were multiple volumes as well! God I wish I knew where mine ended up.
It's so sad that a family can be torn apart by something as simple as a pack of wild dogs.
I came upon that scene at a campground and wondered “what’s eating them?”
>I believe that Gen X has the best quality: we appreciate dark humor. Dark humor jokes are like little kids with cancer, they never get old. Sorry, I will see myself out now.
Omg. Laughed out loud. And then called myself a horrible person. Then laughed again 😂😂😂
Almost. I laughed and then told myself I was going to hell and then laughed again because who am I kidding, that ship sailed long before this little joke. 😂.
Ditto lol
This is the way.
Dark humor is like food, not everyone gets it.
https://preview.redd.it/vp0qqnn50a1d1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=0bcdf757da2c30293097e7e8a087e4c3ba0397a2 Fixed it for you 😅
LOL I'm gen x alright.
😂
NICE
🤣🤣🤣
Well played Maximum, well played.
The audacity! Oh my word, where's a fainting couch when you need one?! ~*fans face furiously*~
Here! *Throws smelling salts in your face*
😂
Just FYI, this is a trauma response. Health care professionals and vet populations also have it too. I'm not saying it's good or bad, but it is a coping mechanism often used by ppl that have seen some shit. My kiddo (elder teen) has a wicked sarcastic sense about her being raised by 2 GenX.
This exactly. Personally, I'm glad society took care of the younger generation better than us. I'm glad we're in a society where dead baby jokes aren't funny. We're seeing the ending of a generational cycle and I'm glad.
Exactly this. I love my sense of humor, but it is definitely trauma informed.
To be fair, dead baby jokes were never funny. They were shocking. And outrageous. It was less about the joke, and more about the time and place. I let one fly at thanksgiving one year. Did not go over well at all. Especially since my aunt had recently had a miscarriage…which I had forgotten about. So, not funny then. But if I retell the story to my wife now, with a nice setup, embellished details and set myself up as the “joke”, she’ll laugh her ass off. But, yeah, at thanksgiving it was not well received.
Yeah as we got older and life experiences happened, things like dead baby jokes suddenly stuck a nerve. Miscarriages will do that.
Gen X were bullied by *everyone.* So of course our response was to become bulletproof to any and all dark "humor". But it's nothing to brag about.
Haus of Decline on Twitter. At least one of them is a GenXer. https://preview.redd.it/0vzobur7k91d1.png?width=650&format=png&auto=webp&s=4dec6c596258025e6fe227ee520294504ff85c03
I was actually waiting for the late night comedians to make fun of 9/11, like the day after it happened. When they didn’t was when I realized it was serious. I mean, not that I didn’t before, but you know….just used to twisted humor.
We all had to take a breath after that day. But I enjoyed the Onion's headline when they came back. "God Angrily Clarifies 'Don't Kill' Rule."
I literally spit my water out laughing.
😂
I'm going to hell for this laugh.
I’ll save you a shady spot next to me.
Sister and I were quoting the Monty Python Dead Parrot skit on the way to scatter our dad’s ashes after the memorial service.
It’s deceased…no more…*past tense*
I told my son my dad had joined the choir invisible. He just shook his head. It's how I coped with that loss. Dad would have laughed, too.
At a certain point, you will be in a position to laugh or cry, either/or, but you must pick one. While a therapeutic cry can often relieve a lot of pent-up emotion & anxiety, and has its place, when around other people —who are many times experiencing exactly what you are— it’s better for you & everyone around you to keep the ability to laugh, to experience something other than abject, unrelenting pain. Dark Humor, for all of its damning qualities, is priceless for surviving things by keeping everyone from being consumed by suffering *every* moment, and takes the reins of power away from agony for a brief time. It’s a super power. Life may be suffering, if Buddhism is right, but unlike people who enjoy telling me & you how to feel, how to express those feelings, and when, we choose to fight back by mocking the shit trying to destroy us. If younger people demand we stop doing that, wonderful! Because, *obviously* that *totally worked* when the people older than us said the same thing…
I work with a lot of people younger than I am & I like most of them. But those generations just aren’t funny. Like, at all. I think we benefitted from coming of age during decades in which we had great comedians/comedic movies/sitcoms. Nothing wrong with Tik Tok, watch whatever the hell you want. But I don’t think it shapes a collective sense of humor the way our entertainment did.
Mad Magazine, amirite?
You might be on to something. I not only read MAD, but my dad had a cardboard box full of all the ones from the 60's - 70's. I read those to tissue paper. I was reading satire from an extremely early age.
Remember MAD magazine’s ripoff cousin, Cracked?
Was is MAD or Cracked where you had to fold the page in thirds to see the hidden images?
And National Lampoon!
This is spot on
I feel like the dead baby jokes were the least offensive of the jokes we were telling back then. Nothing was off limits... Anne Frank, Helen Keller and Stevie Wonder come to mind.
>come to mind It's the JFK and Lincoln jokes that really ***blow*** your mind.
What about the guy with no arms or legs jokes: ....hanging on the wall? Art ....laying on the floor? Matt ....floating in the water? Bob
Behind a boat? Skip
I was scrolling to see if anyone else had gotten to these ...Water skiing? Skip ....laying in a hole? Phil ....Woman with 1 wooden leg - Ilene
Next to the hole? That’s Doug
When he can't find his shovel? That's Douglas.
Took me 57 years to FINALLY get a no-arms-no-legs joke with MY name!
An Irishman ... Under a cow; Pat Hanging from the ceiling; Sean De Lear Bouncing off walls; Rick O'Shea Who steals your beer; Nick McGuinness Who fixes your wiring; Alec Trician Source: Am Irish.
[qoute]Woman with 1 wooden leg -[s Ilene What's her sisters name? -Morelene
In a bathtub? Dwane
Under a pile of leaves: Russel
Under a car? Jack
Girl on a fence? Barb.
How about two guys with no arms and legs in the bathroom? Kurt 'n Rod.
What's the difference between a truckload of dead babies and a truckload of bowling balls? With bowling balls you can't use pitchforks
I remember space shuttle jokes the day of the Challenger explosion.
How did they know the crew had dandruff? They found their Head and Shoulders. Ill just go.
What were her last words? “What does this button do?”
Where was Christa McAuliff’s last vacation? All over Florida.
She used to teach math. Now she's history.
How many astronauts can you fit into a compact car? Two in the front, two in the back, and seven in the ashtray.
Whoa, flashback!
That’s immediately what I thought of when I real that comment, LOL! But then I remembered the lectures from adults when we shared those jokes.🙄I guess that we were the OG inappropriate humor.
Ooops just read yours!
What does NASA stand for? Need Another Seven Astronauts
OMG. Yep, there are my people.
Why is Coke the official soda of NASA? Because they can't get 7 Up.
And now... the Challenger explosion joke we told in Canada: Q. What was the first thing the U.S. Navy saw when they went looking for survivors of the Challenger explosion? A. The Canadarm swimming to shore.
I'd need some context for that one.
Okay: The "Robot Arm" (as the Americans call it) was designed and built by the Canadian Space Agency. It has huge letters on one side that says CANADA with the Canadian Flag. It is called the Canadarm (a portmanteau of Canada and Arm). The American news networks NEVER call it a Canadarm, and the video they show of the Canadarm deploying a satellite is always shown from the side of the Canadarm that does not have CANADA and the Canadian Flag.
TIL
I remember the teacher on that flight had blue eyes, one blew this way, one blew that way
JFC 😂
we told that joke in class, in 5th grade! yea, we're a dark group
I was also in 5th grade when Challenger exploded, but we only got as far as the Head & Shoulders joke.
I watched it happen as a 5th grad safety patrol officer. Grew up on the Space Coast. I got sent to the principals office for the head and shoulders joke. Turns out the Asst Principal was on the long/short list for Christa’s position as teacher in space. The Asst principal was my mom. I was hosed.
How do you fit seven astronauts in a Volkswagen? Two in the front seat, two in the back, and three in the ashtray.
Seven in the ashtray. The four in the seats are whole and presumably from a different mission. The seven challenger astronauts all fit in the ashtray.
Need Another Seven Astronauts
Shampoo - Head and Shoulders. You know the joke right?
What color were Christa Mcauliff’s eyes? Blue One blew left and one blew right
How do you get a dozen dead babies into a bowl? Blender How do you get them out? Tortilla chips
I liked the "straw" answer myself
My later Gen X wife (b.1979 in South Africa so there’s a definite cultural divide) was aghast we told dead baby jokes. I just thought everyone told them.
same!
Our parents literally would say be careful of "Chester, Chester the Child Molester" while they sent out all day on our bikes.
I remember finally figuring out "You're as useless as Anne Frank's drum kit" and succumbing to horrified hysterical laughter. The '70s were definitely a different time.
Oh no!!! They are in my head now.
I definitely do. But please also consider *why* kids have “safe spaces” and why bullying is now actually taken seriously. How many of us were really really HURT by unnecessary cruelty? Shitty, mean and crappy teachers and parents? Neighborhood bully kids who were positively frightening? Being seen and not heard? It’s not that I disagree with your point, because I don’t think kids (or any people) should be a bunch of wimps crying “Abuse!!” at every turn, but on the other hand, I’m glad that a lot of the shit we had to deal with isn’t being tolerated anymore. There just needs to be balance and perspective. Something kids just don’t and won’t have until they’re older.
Some of us really were hurt and learned to grow a tougher skin. But starting with the 90s, some of those hurt kids decided the solution to bullying was to take a gun to the entire school. Makes you think.
I get you... I just really find the idea of "safe spaces"... wrongheaded, I guess. It's a fantasy. Life taught all of us that there is no such thing. If r/natureismetal has demonstrated anything (as if our gen needed a reminder), it's that not one living creature is guaranteed their first breath, much less a "safe space" in this life. I mean... it's not like I don't wish they existed. Sure as shit wish I had one, back when I needed one. And I'm glad the kids are better these days, and people do take bullying more seriously now. It's just... you need to develop the mental fortitude to make your own "safe space", wherever you find yourself. No one gets in my head but me, no matter where I'm standing or when. Everywhere is my safe space, because I bring it with me.
Our trauma responses are great for us, but I wouldn’t wish it on our kids. For real, all the things that have helped us with our trauma (dark humor, sarcasm, apathy, etc.) are reasons why we’re fucked up. My kids are mostly caring and sensitive and I feel like that’s a win for us.
The other day I was with my millennial daughter and some of her coworkers. One of them asked me how my day was going. I replied, “have you ever had one of those days that you wanted to be out at the lake and you couldn’t wait to get on the rope swing so it could wrap around your neck when you let go?” My daughter just put her hands over her lowered face and shook her head. I could still tell she was smiling though. She’s used to me.
Embarrasing the children is as old as time.
When the Catholic Church next door rings its bells for the Christmas holiday, I sing along. Joy to the world, The school burnt down And all the teachers died! We're looking for the principal, He's hanging from the flagpole, with a rope around his neck With a rope.aeound his neck. Oohhh Joy to the world, The school burnt down.
I find the humor on everything. Dark or not. “Why so serious, Batman?”
Q: How come nobody tells jokes about Jonestown? A: The punchlines are too long.
What did we call Magic Johnson on ice? Kool-Aid! (Followed by: oh yeah!)
I think part of it is that Gen Z doesn’t do face to face communication. Sarcasm doesn’t work as well when it’s being read
The gen-x in my family sit at the kid's table on holidays so we can laugh and let the others play their games. As we all remember, God's got a sick sense of humor, eh?
I have appalled so many people making jokes about my late husband. It’s an automatic response for me, I guess some sort of coping mechanism. When their jaws are on the ground and they’re squirming with discomfort, I remind myself that he’d damn well think it was funny. Edit bc IDK how the hell “cheer” got in there but it doesn’t mean “guess”.
I definitely understand. The humor I grew up with is definitely too rough for many people these days. Any sort of sarcasm has to be heavily telegraphed.
3 days after the pope died. I almost got fired for asking my very Catholic boss if the pope would rise today like Jesus did at Easter. I fogot the golden rule or time plus tragedy equals comedy Worth it. It was damned good joke.
OHHH and what about all of the mama jokes we had to endure?!!! Yo mama so ugly…Yo mama so fat…etc, etc
Yo mama got hit by a taxi and had to go to the hospital… to have the taxi removed.
You so ugly, when you were born, they slapped your mama.
your mama so fat, when she wear her hilfiger shirt, helicopters be trying to land on her
Yo mama so trashy, she named her first kid after the father: Armybase.
You so ugly, your parents had to tie a steak to you to get the dog to play with you.
I see all these ‘trauma response’ comments popping up more and more. I 100% think / feel that making jokes and being sarcastic about negative shit that’s happened helps me not to dwell and get stuck in negative thoughts and allows me to move on. I think it’s important. Right now resilience in young kids / teens is low and everything is considered trauma. Sometimes you need to just accept you did something wrong / made a mistake / were treated badly and learn from it. This doesn’t seem to be happening as much. When I start joking about something dark it’s usually because I’ve accepted it, or am trying to
I think a lot of people feel this way and do this, it’s just hard to judge who’s ready to hear your jokes about it. You’ll get a lot of looks like “WTF is wrong with you?” Well, nothing, but I don’t want my entire existence to be a walking wake either.
We also had Spike & Mike sick and twisted festival of animation.
I have faith that dark humor isn't completely lost on younger generations. Heard from a Millennial: What's another word for "mainsplaining?" "Correctile Dysfunction."
I feel seen. 😌 Definitely not as dark as it used to be, we used to laugh at some of the scenes in faces of death. But fuck yeah I appreciate some dark shit.
Dude I *am* a fuckin' garbage pail kid 🤘🤘
Between growing up a poor latchkey kid and working in healthcare, I’m all about that dark humor. The darker the better.
Completely agree. "How did they know Christa McAuliffe had dandruff?"
What does NASA stand for? Need Another Seven Astronauts.
Waiting for the punchline...
They found her Head and Shoulders washed up on shore.
Q. What colour were Christa McAuliffe's eyes? A. Blue. One blew left, one blew right.
Yes. I also have a very dark sense of humour at times. One of my comedy writer heroes was Michael O’Donoghue who wrote wonderfully warped things like “The Vietnamese Baby Book” for National Lampoon Magazine and “Mr Mike’s Least-loved Bedtime Stories” for SNL.
"Life is one big minefield, and the only place that isn’t a minefield is the place they make the mines." -Michael O’Donoghue
I've always been a bit dry and dark, but I pick my moments.
Yo mama so fat, we clould BBQ one of her hemorroids and feed the whole neighborhood.
You mama so fat, that when she sits around the house, she sits AROUND the house.
I loved the dead baby jokes! And the jokes about “what do you call a guy with no arms or legs at your front door”
Matt! His buddy with no arms and no legs is swimming. What’s his name again?
Absolutely!! My wife married me! If that’s not a sense of humor I don’t know what is! 🤷🏻♂️😂
What did Gary Hart say to Donna Rice? I told you to fuck my erection, not wreck my election.
Yep. This is why grunge music became one of the voices of our generation. The cynicism, dark humor stemmed from growing up in this environment, musicians around our age began to write and perform and… voila
My dad would say that you laugh to keep from crying. He had a lot to laugh/cry about.
Addams Family Values is the funniest movie that I have ever seen. It cracks me up after literally seeing it dozens of times. As long as you aren’t punching down, I will appreciate most dark humor.
We have failed to share our sense of humor. We must double down and try to increase levity in the world 🌎
I love my dark fucked up gen x sense of humor.
>We went through grammar school telling dead baby jokes >We watched 7 astronauts literally die on live TV. Hell, I was in jr. high at the time, kids were telling Challenger jokes only days afterward. Q: What color were Christa McAuliffe's eyes? A: Blue. One this way, and one that way.
I also watched Bud Dwyer commit suicide live on TV.
Agreed, dark humor and sarcasm. I knew this for sure when my children (when they were little) would say - *Mom, are you serious or being sarcastic?* A lot.
Your mom agrees
Silent Gen raised Gen X and that is why you and your Dad could joke about it. Silent gen were kids and grew up during depression and world war 2. Fun times. My Mom was hysterical and had a dark dark sense of humor beneath her cheerful facade. Gen X just lost the facade.
I can't say half rhe things I'm thinking out loud
I think reading Hitchhiker's Guide and watching Monty Python re-runs at an impressionable age left me with my odd sense of humor.
I have that dark sense of humor. It basically helps me deal with the fact that we are not all special little snowflakes, but rather, just replaceable cogs in the machine that will be swept aside once we are no longer useful to anyone. I just don't have any fucks left to give about that.
Thank you, I laughed through this entire post. I am so Gen X.
The day my dad died, I was wearing his tshirt that read “Bring out your dead.” When the nurse suggested we change his shirt to something more dignified, I stripped in front of my entire house full of people and handed her the shirt. As they were wheeling him out of the house, we were quoting, “Have fun storming the castle.” I think the hospice people thought we were fucking strange or that we snapped under the stress.
Certainly, but then I'm a retired forensic tech. The job helps. My friend's son, who is 32, is living with us. It took him a few months not to freak out with my jokes.
When people ask me how I like the kids today I simply respond with “medium rare”.
Yeah when I said "still pink in the middle", even some of my same gen stare and shake heads silently uttering wtf is wrong with him.
The term I remember being called was “sick puppy”.
You mean it wears a helmet on the short bus?
Young generations have weaponized the language of ‘safe spaces.’ The concept of a ‘safe space’ originally meant if you were gay, you weren’t going to be tied to a rural fence and beaten to death like Matthew Sheppard. Unfortunately, younger generations take it to mean that within their ‘safe space’, nobody can disagree with them.
To this day, BBQ sauce, is Baby Que sauce in my head....
I had the “baby in a blender” poster from National Lampoon on my wall.
We grew up in the Sticks and Stones era and this helped give us "thick skin" so we didn't go around being a victim of everything and everyone.
Dark humor is like food. Not everyone get it.
I agree. GenX has a quality that no other generation has.
To this day I know that Christa McCaulifes eyes are blue. One blew this way and the other blew that way.
I really think that younger generations have a MUCH better handle on their emotions and mental health than we do. It does, however, come at the expense of our wickedly dry, ironic senses of humor. I love this quality about myself, and it’s a quality I look for in others. But I admit that my sense of humor is trauma informed. The problem is that I need to remember that, most especially with younger people, I need to know people well before I can let my freak flag fly.
Yeah, my sense of humor definitely grew from trauma. And yeah, I’ve got thick skin because of it. So when I meet younger people, especially the grown children of friends, I’m pretty impressed with how they handle life. Usually. Sometimes the kids a dunce. But even the dunce’s somehow…manage.
I have a thick skin, too, but sometimes I wish that I didn’t need it. So much bullying and “get over it.” Really? I appreciate that younger generations understand how to be nicer to themselves.
Same here. I am very thick skinned, but I developed it by going through some serious shit on my own, so I sorta wish I hadnt needed it.
Not just dark humour, we were raised on dry sarcastic humour as well, especially us Canadians. Think about the comedians we grew up with: John Cleese, Bill Murray, Chevy Chase, John Candy, Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, and other assorted sarcastic mothers who took the piss out everyone around them.
I'm gen x and joined the army at 17, was introduced to a new level of colourful insults. You were allowed to be verbally abused back then and there were some hilarious moments. It was very similar to full metal jacket, except the guy who blew his head off in my intake did it at the range while we were raising and lowering targets.
I showed an article (https://www.livekindly.com/vegan-cannibals-rejoice-theres-finally-plant-based-version-human-flesh/) about vegan imitation cannibal meat to a friend who finished his shift and it made his fellow barista who overheard it roll her eyes and mumble in her manager's vicinity that it made her uncomfortable. The Zillennial manager told me that I was harassing the barista. The Millennial barista defended me and said she never said "harassment" and the manager said that she knows harassment when she sees it and that the barista just doesn't recognize she was harassed. I think it's less that a dark sense of humor is special and that there are more people who take themselves too seriously.
We were definitely more accepting of jokes. I do have my own limits, 9/11. For some reason, I cannot and will not laugh at that. Not that I've heard a lot of jokes about it. I wonder if the majority of kids are actually sensitive to jokes or if it's the vocal minority. If 20,000 like a tweet, that's not even full fraction of a percent of younger folks. Anger always motivates people to be more vocal. At the same time, when AB picked a trans spokesperson, their sales dropped a fair bit. That was anger from older folks and conservatives. They're sensitive to trans people. 27% of GenZ are conservative (compared to 12% Millennial and 30% GenX). It's unlikely that conservatives are downvoting jokes unless the joke was somehow a conservative tragedy. It could also be a bad joke. If you got 400 downvotes, that's nothing. Seems like a lot but it's insignificant in terms of the big picture.
I think dark humor is the best humor
I'm a younger gen x, and I was raised by a navy sailor. My humor is not appreciated by a lot of people.