The tyrannical are notorious for being unable to take a joke. From Igor Chudov at igor-chudov.com:
Humor, Ridicule, and the Far Right: Mainstreaming Exclusion Through Online Animation
Dear Readers: I am sorry for sprinkling humor and sarcasm throughout my Substack posts. My apologies!
Had I known that social scientists Jordan McSwiney and Kurt Sengul found the use of humor and ridicule to be an insidious attack on our democracy, I would certainly avoid even a trace of sarcasm or humor in my articles!
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/epub/10.1177/15274764231213816
According to the authors, the evil far-right forces invented a novel, innovative, and subversive discursive technique called humor.
It is broadly accepted that contemporary far-right actors, be they parties, movements, or activists, are savvy media performers (Wodak 2021) who employ a range of innovative communication strategies to exploit the highly mediatized and hybridized political landscape. A particular focus in recent times has been the effective use of humor and irony as part of the far-right’s social media strategy (Greene 2019).
Humor is used insidiously:
Humor and laughter have powerful social functions. Through sharing a joke, humor can positively impact social cohesion, by generating feelings of enjoyment through shared laughter. [very dangerous for democracy – I.C.] It engenders group cohesion and solidarity in a manner that is fun and playful. As a form of affective rhetoric, humor can persuade or align, facilitating social cooperation by uniting interlocutors.
We are beginning to see how dangerous humor is because laughter can keep social groups together, which is totally unacceptable. The authors go on, being utterly serious and bordering on the pompous:
