this post was submitted on 27 May 2026
385 points (94.7% liked)
People Twitter
9998 readers
895 users here now
People tweeting stuff. We allow tweets from anyone.
RULES:
- Mark NSFW content.
- No doxxing people.
- Must be a pic of the tweet or similar. No direct links to the tweet.
- No bullying or international politcs
- Be excellent to each other.
- Provide an archived link to the tweet (or similar) being shown if it's a major figure or a politician. Archive.is the best way.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I cannot think of a joke - except for puns - that do not have a victim.
Men in general / the husband is the victim of the punch line here. Or maybe pharmacists?
Much like dramatic narrative, from Shakespeare to Ted Lasso, all rising tension is resolved by a winner and loser.
I think you completely missed the point. "Nobody should be punching anybody" isn't about jokes, but discrimination. The answer to discrimination against women isn't to add discrimination against men. I'm pointing out that feminism is about liberation from discrimination rather than redirecting it to the "right group". The system should be the focus, not the people.
Also, it's not all victim this, winner that. It's not pie. Everyone can win, everyone can lose. Again, it's the system that's the problem, not the people.
I'm speaking dramaturgically. There's no literal Romeo and Juliet getting hurt, but in the story they both die.
That's what is meant by "punching."
Every rising action is met by a falling action. In a comedy format the tension rises to a punch line, where the punching happens, the fall is the release of laughter, and then resetting for the next joke.
You either don't hear enough jokes or you have a bad sense of humour. Either way this is just objectively wrong
it's not just jokes - all narrative forms adhere to this. The concept of all stories is essentially based on conflict, where a platform is established, corrupted and reset.
"Punching down" means making jokes at the expense of vulnerable people. But all jokes have a punch line of some description- so it is impossible to be both a joke and have no resolution.
Some surreal humor relies on subverting this form somewhat, but the tension is usually released in other ways (i.e. a "straightman" or "fish out of water", commenting on it or else a structural change like cutting to a different scene)
There's no punching done in this joke, no winner or loser. It's just observational humor. The pharmacist draws a mistaken conclusion from his observation.
it's "winner" and "loser" not winner and loser.
If Cinderella, Cinderella is the loser to the step sisters, the winner to the prince's affection, the loser to time constraints, the winner to the final slipper fit.
It's a method of discussing rising and falling action in Aristotlean poetics w/r/t narrative mores.