I was going to rail against a quote in the Natalie Imbruglia song Wishing I Was There. But the two lines “I wish you made sense, Like a joke that no one gets” are fine sentences and don’t need to be railed against. I thought about this incorrectly at first; it does not follow that all jokes that make sense, no one gets.
Indeed I care so much because half my humour is “things that make sense”. What I keep doing is following the logic until a piece is humourous. This is a common strategy in political cartoons, and something I picked up on. And indeed, I’m going to pick on my political cartoons that I previously posted to this site to show my humour is half “things that make sense”.
In Blast From the Past II, I have 5 political cartoons. In the first one are three secondary jokes that make sense: “I sense voter dissatisfaction” said by counselor Troy makes sense and “Please Captain, let me meet with the Lesbian splinter group – I can show them the light” said by Ryker makes sense if you’ve seen the planet of lesbians show that he visited and made at least one “lesbian” see the light and the 3rd comment by Jacques O’ Christmas Tree saying that “Is there any doubt retro 70’s is in?” when fashions of the time were retro 70’s and Jean Chretien himself became famous in the 70’s.
In the 2nd cartoon the “Well blow my top” comment by the whale is of course true. “Sure am glad about the moratorium on cod fishing” said by the Harp Seal also makes sense.
In the 3rd cartoon the harp seal saying “’arp” when being whipped also makes sense for why harp seals are called harp seals.
In the 4th cartoon the chicken says “I balk at the sight.” The pun as well as straight forward explanation make sense.
As well, some of the cartoons listed at this site’s menu also make sense. In Jacques 2003 Arnie a couple statements make sense : Arnie saying “But we don’t mind Canadians helping with the wildfires” and Jacques saying: “Wildfires? I’ll go up like a Christmas tree on January 15th”.
In Jacques 2003 Paperless Society, a magnate says “Last time someone said paperless society someone else said computer printer and it was hard to keep up with demand” which makes sense.
Jacques 2003 Paul Martin, is a literal visualization of what Paul Martin was most famous for and thus made sense.
In Jacques 2003 Smith/NDP War the Smith presenter makes sense. He says “It’s a sad day when NDP becomes a surname. Imagine what would happen if all NDP supporters were to change their name in this way. With 17% of the popular vote in Ontario, it would become the most popular surname!”
So I know that at least half of my political humour has been “things that make sense”. I suspect that with many political cartoonists, the same can be said. Indeed, I wouldn’t be surprised if that much of my blog humour is “things that make sense”.
Logic remains a big proportion of my humour. And I foresee it being so for some time. Indeed, I wonder if “observational humour” (which describes Seinfeld for instance), is another big category of “things that make sense” but are also deeply funny.
