I hope you all enjoyed the alliteration of that title.
Swapping drunken stories is a cornerstone activity of uni students. Witnessing drunken happenings before they become stories is an activity even more celebrated.
And they are usually met with raucous laughter, even though you know and understand that both Jenny vomming in a bush and vomit itself are disgusting.
But you laugh anyway.
Because it’s hilarious. But why?
It isn’t only drunken tales that are ironically funny. Today I was told a story about a particularly unusual breakup, in which the girl called the guy into her workplace to ‘talk,’ (i.e. to dump him, I assumed,) which then somehow turned into him ‘having his way with her’ ( at her place of work,) which then somehow allowed him to create the ‘opportune moment’ whilst ‘having his way with her,’ to say the words required to terminate their relationship.
That story is really not funny. They did the dirty at work, which is just plain feral, (I think in a change room or something, this detail was brushed over,) then the girl was rejected whilst busy experiencing (well, presumably,) an emotion far on the other end of the spectrum. Horrible.
But when I heard it I laughed like a banshee. And I’m giggling reliving the moment when I first heard it right now.
Think about it- it’s awkward for the person who did the stupid thing because that’s embarrassing, awkward for the people laughing because they are laughing at another’s pain, and even more awkward that these lolz are being generated from the subject matter themselves- airing out their awkward laundry for the sake of our lollage.
(Yes, I just used the word’ lollage’. And yes, I recieve tertiary education.)
I think it’s the raw absurdity of these awkward tales that makes people laugh. But they are absurd because humor, ( the ultimate social lubricant,) well, this brand of humor specifically is rooted ironically in awkwardness- the cryptonite of social cohesion. Hows that for a paradox? (If you want to go further with this chicken-or-the-egg game, that fact this paradox exists is also pretty awkward…)
Well, I’d rather tell myself that at night then ‘we are all horrible people that laugh at the misery of others out of pure evil.’
Eh Eh Ehhh
Let's get awkward... 