Hitler and the Boston Bombers

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Biophysics Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California (originally New Jersey)
Performance Date: 3/29/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Korean

Item (direct transcription):

What did the Boston bombers do that Hitler didn’t?

End the race.

Background Information:

The informant read the joke on 9GAG, an online social media site.

Contextual Information:

The informant made it very clear that he would only tell the joke to someone he knew very well and was confident wouldn’t be offended.

Analysis:

This joke fits the common pattern of jokes forming in response to tragic events. In this case, the effect is double, because the joke makes fun of tragedy of both the Boston Bombing and the Holocaust.

Poop Problems

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Accounting Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 3/26/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandarin

Item (direct transcription):

So, what happens is… a guy… he’s having some… poop problems. Okay? He goes to the doctor and he says, “Doctor, there’s something wrong. What happens is, when I eat an apple I literally poop out the apple I just ate. Like, whole, you know. Like, it’s a frickin’ apple, you know what I mean? I eat a doughnut, it’s still a doughnut. Okay? I eat a—You get what I mean, Doc?!”

The doctor’s like, “So, yeah, uhh, what’s the problem?”

He’s like, “I can’t poop! Think about it: I eat food and it just goes straight out, whole!”

So the doctor’s like, “Have you considered just eating poo?”

Background Information:

The informant first heard this joke from a friend in 6th grade.

Contextual Information:

Interestingly, the informant doesn’t believe that the joke would only be appropriate to tell between children. On the contrary, he believes that this joke is an example of cross-generational “toilet humor.” When he was younger, he enjoyed sharing this type of joke with his father.

Analysis:

The joke has the qualities of a typical children’s joke focusing on obscenity play and absurdity. Human excrement is often a good topic for children’s humor, since it lends itself to these categories.

Also, the joke is genuinely rather witty.

The One Soul

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Engineering Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 3/26/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Bengali

Item (direct transcription):

There is a man. He has a family. He has a wife, a child, a newborn child. He’s going to work. He’s driving down the highway. Unfortunately a drunk driver hits him and kills him. He dies. On the spot. Instantly. So…um, he leaves behind a widow and his child. The widow is obviously very sad. But the man goes up into…um [motioning upward with his hands]…whereever.

He meets God. And God, so he wakes up, he sees this being around him. He assumes it’s God. He says, “Are you God?” And he says, “Yes, I am God.” Um, and then he says, “Am I dead.” He says, “Yeah, you’re dead.” And he says, “So am I going to heaven or hell?” He says, “Well, uh, not yet.” And then, um, the man asks, “What’s going to happen to my wife and my child?” And God says, “Your wife, um, she’s going to act very sad for a while, but… deep down she’s actually happy, because she’s actually been having an affair with somebody else, and this actually works out very well for her. [Laughs.] And your child will grow up having a very idyllic view of you. Um, he’ll think you were the perfect father, because you were never around. [Laughs again.] So that’s going to work out very well for him, too. But you on the other hand, you’re not going to heaven or hell.”

So then the man asks, “So what going to happen to me? Where am I gonna go?” And then God says, “You are going to be reborn as, uh… a village girl in China in the sixth century.” And this man says, “But wait! Isn’t it the twenty-first century? I died in 2018. What’s happening? Am I going back in time?” “Yes, exactly, you’re going back in time.” So the man says, “Wait, wait, wait. If I’m being reborn back in time, so how many, like, distinct souls are actually living on Earth right now?” And God says, “There’s only one soul on Earth, and it’s been you this whole time.” And the man says, “Wait, so you’re telling me that I was Adolf Hitler?” And God says, “Yes, you were Adolf Hitler. And all the Jews that he killed.” [Laughs.]

And, um, so yeah. He was basically everybody on Earth. So this obviously a very giant, big revelation to him. The man is just mind-blown and he asks, um, “So what’s the meaning of all this? Why did you create a planet? Why do I even exist?” And God says, “Um, well, I can tell you this because when you wake up as a newborn, you’re not gonna remember anything, so it doesn’t matter what I tell you. So, um, I created this world because, um, this, uh, this world is basically an egg. And you are one of me. You are basically just growing inside this egg. And one day, when you’re mature enough, you will become one of me. And when you do, you will break out of the shell of the egg and you will take your place among us.”

And then he wakes up as the village girl in China in the eighth century.

Background Information:

The informant read this tale on Quora, an online question-and-answer site. He liked the story because it “made [him] think.”

He says that the story is “as believable as any religion,” and he believes that the person who posted on Quora probably made it up himself or herself.

Contextual Information:

The informant performs the tale in order to provoke a philosophical debate. Since he claims the story is not true, yet the metaphysics presented in the story cannot be disproved, he uses it as a way of presenting agnostic beliefs.

Analysis:

This tale interesting in how it combines elements of various, usually unconnected mythologies. This eclecticism is probably by design, considering the tale’s purpose of revealing the folly of religion. At first, the story seems to be using a Abrahamic, monotheistic context, then the story later reveals a polytheistic context. The story also incorporates the concept of a “world egg,” which appears in Egyptian, Hindu, Zoroastrian, Finnish, and Chinese mythologies, among others.

See “Easter Eggs” (1967) by Venetia Newall, for more information on the place of eggs in mythology.

The Ironic Suicide

Nationality: American
Age: 21
Occupation: Accounting Student
Residence: Los Angeles, California
Performance Date: 3/26/2018
Primary Language: English
Language: Mandarin

Item (direct transcription):

There was a legend, a tale, about a man who tried to commit suicide. And he tried to use three methods. Ironically, the three methods ended up canceling each other, and he ended up living. Here goes the tale. The tale goes like this:

He’s standing right at the edge of a bridge. [The informant uses a water bottle as a prop. He pushes it to the edge of a counter.] So already, you already know his first method of committing suicide: he’s going to hang himself. So he tries to hang himself. That’s method one. Method two is he wants to blow his brains out, so he has a pistol right by his side. And then in his other hand, he has a poison capsule. So, he has to do it very carefully.

First he puts the poison capsule inside his mouth, swallows it, waits a while, then he gets out the gun, then he jumps! And then, he tries to pull the trigger, but then, the rope yanks his head, and he ended up pulling the gun out of his mouth, but he still pulled the trigger. [He acts out all of these events.] The gun, the bullet breaks the rope, so he ends up not hanging himself and he ends up not shooting himself in the head. And because the water is so not-too-distant away from him, he doesn’t die from hitting the water. Now, the water is salty—it’s sea water, and he ends up—Ugh! [vomit noise]—swallowing a great gallon, half a gallon of salt water. And then he ends up throwing up the poison capsule that was in his stomach. So he ends up canceling out all his suicide methods, by using his suicide methods!

Background Information:

The informant first heard this tale in high school. He has remembered it and enjoys telling it because his audiences tend to respond well to it. In his opinion, the story has a captivating hook and a hilarious conclusion.

He does not believe that the story was true, because he finds it “outlandish.” Interestingly, the gender of the story’s character seems to influence that belief. The informant claims that men tend to kill themselves using simple and direct methods (e.g. jumping from a height or using a gun), whereas women are more likely to use complex and unreliable methods of suicide (e.g. inhaling carbon monoxide or overdosing on sleeping pills). Since the story’s character is a man, the informant finds it unlikely that he would use three methods of suicide, rather than just one.

Contextual Information:

The informant performs the tale in order to entertain an audience. He enhances the performance by acting out the story as he tells it.

Analysis:

The story uses the common Western storytelling motif of threes (i.e. three suicide methods).

Lobster Joke

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Sacramento, CA
Performance Date: April 23, 2018
Primary Language: English

Main Piece:

The following is transcribed from a conversation between the performer (EC) and I (ZM).

EC: My favorite joke of all time…I think I told this on the Weekender. I tell it every year on the Weekender, but…What’s the difference between a dirty bus stop and a um lobster with implants? …One’s a crusty bus station and the other’s a busty crustacean.

ZM: (laughs) That took me a while. Did you come up with that one yourself?

EC: No, I saw it on Tumblr in like 2000 something (laughs)

 

Context: This was recorded after I asked EC if she knew any good jokes.

 

Background: EC is a sophomore studying at the University of Southern California.

 

Analysis:I liked the interplay between the Internet and oral tradition. A lot of the time I think of how oral tradition is transferred to the Internet but not really about how it could go the other way. In this case, EC read a joke on the Internet and continued to spread it orally for years.