Clapter

[Keith&Co.]

Humor that is not humor.

It's not humor that fails to be funny, it' s not even constructed as humor.

The performer is not asking for laughter as much as validation.

Bill Mahr does a lot. He'll say that conservatives are stupid and the audience claps and hoots in agreement. There's no new insight, no ironic observation, no 'I guess when you put it that way...' It's just a lazy stretch for approval.

A lot of celebrities don't seem to understand the difference between laughter and clapter. They're used to saying things with a smile, getting approval, while thinking they're telling jokes. When they're held responsible for what they say, their defense is 'I was joking.'

It's not a joke if you're just saying things you would say anyway, except for that pause while you wait to be agreed with.

 

[James Brown]

Is this related to the fill-in-the-blank jokes?

"The problem with <insert-ethnic-group-of-choice-here> is that they're too stupid to know how to pour water out of a boot even if the instructions were written on the heel."

 

[Keith&Co.]

Is this related to the fill-in-the-blank jokes?

"The problem with <insert-ethnic-group-of-choice-here> is that they're too stupid to know how to pour water out of a boot even if the instructions were written on the heel."

No, I was thinking more of the sort like 'and so are feminists.' Not a joke, just an insult that certain groups will laugh at.

 

[James Brown]

Ah, when I was a kid, every joke was about Pollacks.

Then Poland started their Solidarity phase and suddenly no one joked about Pollacks.

I never understood why Pollacks were universally despised to begin with.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Ah, when I was a kid, every joke was about Pollacks.

Well, we had a Polish Pope, and Polish jokes became cardinal sins.

 

[thebeave]

Ah, when I was a kid, every joke was about Pollacks.

Then Poland started their Solidarity phase and suddenly no one joked about Pollacks.

I never understood why Pollacks were universally despised to begin with.

That's funny you said that, as I was thinking exactly the same thing the other day. Tons and tons of Pollack jokes when I was a kid, and now...never. I've known several Polish guys, and they were all smart, nice and normal. I should ask them why the Polish got such crap years ago.

 

[Eldarion Lathria]

Ah, when I was a kid, every joke was about Pollacks.

Well, we had a Polish Pope, and Polish jokes became cardinal sins.

No Cardinal Sin was a Chinese guy from the Philippines.

Eldarion Lathria

 

[bilby]

Ah, when I was a kid, every joke was about Pollacks.

Then Poland started their Solidarity phase and suddenly no one joked about Pollacks.

I never understood why Pollacks were universally despised to begin with.

According to the makers of the documentary film Polack (Tag-line "A small minded movie"), there are a number of possibilities (more than one of which may be correct, as they are not mutually exclusive):

As a category of folklore and sociology, joking is often the subconscious effort of an inside group within society to goad a fringe group into assimilating. Poles in America stayed within their communities and close to their families. Clean Protestant capitalist America feared groups that potentially owed their allegiance to a foreign power, the Pope, and didn’t strive toward the American dream, but instead were rather happy in their often dirty blue-collar jobs.


Additional theories for the source of the joke include: 1. rival ethnic groups importing old-world hostilities; 2. the Polish cavalry with swords and fancy costumes attacking Nazi tanks in WW2; 3. difficulty for Polish-Americans to learn English because their native tongue was slavic; 4. categorization of Poles as Communists; and 5. an early Polish legislative policy called the Liberum Veto, in which any member of congress could nullify the entire session, which lead to easy pay-offs and the inability of Poland to centralize its government against hostile neighbors.

Certainly the Polish joke never featured in English or (as far as I am aware) Australian comedy - it seems to be a uniquely American thing. Dumb people in English jokes are stereotyped as Irish, and Aussies tend to bag the Irish, the Poms and the Kiwis, amongst many others. Aussies are more equal opportunity insulters than either the Poms or the Yanks - indeed, the easiest way to tell that an Aussie doesn't like you much is that he doesn't insult you to your face; and an Australian's best mate can be easily determined, as he is the person who is always described in the most insulting possible fashion.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Parma, OH is the birthplace of Polish jokes.
-We wear white socks.
-Have plastic pink flamingos in our front yards.
-Eat kielbasa sandwiches.
-Will bend over to pick up a penny. I still have all those pennies I picked up as a kid at the end of mom's hand. Courtesy of the stada babbas that frequented the West Side Market.

We even had the late night Hoolihan & Big Chuck movies. Later to be Big Chuck & Lil' John. Awful movies. Awful "certain ethnic" skits in between. Some were funny. Most were clapter.
Skits

This one's good: