How Sarcasm Works

like when you're French. No, this is Couston, like Houston exactly, but with the sea instead of an h. Couston means that I'm one day closer to you. What. That's a song, right, Houston means that I'm one one step. That's a country jam. Okay, I was gonna guess Dion Warwick. She always like singing about about Susan, Yeah, about San Jose at cetera. Okay, that was a Backer act Burt Backer act song. Um, and she popularized it because she did it so well. Do you know the way to San Jose? Okay, I

didn't know she's saying that. Oh yeah, I guess she popularized it with everyone but you. Okay, that was sarcastic. No, that was that was pretty straightforward direct sarcastic would have been like, um, oh, I'm sure you didn't know that. Yeah, I guess that would be sarcastic. It wouldn't have made much sense, but yes, you know what's funny, chuck in. In researching this, I kept trying to come up with um examples of sarcasm, and it's one of the hardest

things in the world to do with with thought. Sarcasm is like almost always off the cuff or not very well thought out. It's which which um, I think is one reason why you know, most people will agree that somebody who is an employing sarcasm, even when they're not very good at it, is the funniest person in the world. Right then, see that's sarcasm. I I can't help myself. Yeah, this researching sarcasm really makes you take a long, hard look in the mirror, doesn't it. It really does, and

at people who are big fans of Deadpool. Oh I do like Deadpool. Uh, here's my ideal with sarcasm. It is laying ones. I mean I definitely can be sarcastic. I think all of us can be, and I think it can be used for funzies but I definitely see where I can be a real a hole sometimes by being sarcastic, like to Emily. And that's like the sort

of that goes back to my end. Boy, I'm sort of revealing some stuff here, but that it falls under the umbrella of of my communication issues instead of being like straightforward with something may be being sarcastic but passive aggressive and me and and sarcasm all kind of go hand in hand. I think, Yeah, so you've hit upon something that I think is not really necessarily obvious to just anybody when they are confront of a sarcasm. Is that No, sarcasm is a way to hide. It's a

way to hide from emotions. It's a way to hide from direct conflict if you're not um big into conflict. It's a way to hide from criticizing somebody when you're not big into that but you really need to or you want to. And you said it it's passive aggressive.

But I think we should make the distinction. And I I um came across this very late in research, but it makes a lot of sense to me that there's a distinction between sarcasm and verbal irony, and that sarcasm is at its core, insulting, mocking, harmful, and hurtful, whereas verbal verbal irony is just basically like a joke where no one gets insulted, where where maybe a situation is being made fun of, Like if it's exactly if it's raining cats and dogs, yes, that would be verbal irony,

not sarcasm. Um. I saw a really great example about the distinction on I can't remember. It was like a TV and film writing website, but they basically said, in that sense, that would be verbal irony. But if you were the spouse of a meteorologist who for forecast a sunny day when they came home and it was raining cats and dogs, and you said, great weather today, that would be sarcasm because you're insulting or mocking them for getting it wrong. Right, Like, let's say you and I

are neighbors. Great weather today, Josh, Oh you said it their neighbor. Hey, I can speak for myself, Oh you said it there, neighbor. Different than Hey, nice job with your front lawn, Josh, and I sank swimming under you. You're the six year old that takes everything literally exactly because I have, uh, I have noticed that. What made

me think of sarcasm. You picked this article, but I was like, that's kind of perfect because having a kid will make you realize how often you're sarcastic because they don't get it, at least not yet. She's uh, just during six same days you happy birthday, Yeah, happy birthday, Ruby too, and very sweet gifts that you sent, and you guys exchange the video messages, which was adorable. But um,

she's six and she still doesn't get sarcasm. And I've had to say like that was sarcasm and she's like what And I'm like, man, why just keep that purity alive of them taking things literally? Yeah, yeah, don't don't introduce sarcasm to your kid, but you can't help it. No, And that's the thing, Like, there's there's a whole school of thought that it's like to heck with sarcasm, Like we don't need it. People who use sarcasm are annoying,

insecure people. Um there, it's it's not a nice thing to do or say, like there's better ways of getting your point across, and it's not even particularly funny. But the thing is is I've found that when you follow that thread, there's like something inherently problematic with it, and that there is some value to sarcasm in some some instances. It's just one of those things that should be wielded

very delicately and infrequently in the right context. But if you do it like that, sure, and if you do it like that though, it can be um very useful and actually some studies have found um that it's actually beneficial brain wise too. Although researching all of the sarcasm stuff has just reiterated my um my belief that social psychology as a field should be completely dissolved and they should just start from scratch again because it is almost

exclusively useless. It is so bad. We should have a every time you go off on social psychology, we should have a sound effect. We would just start employing again, just get that part. We should hire a barbershop quartet, just full time to stand behind us. Made up was exclusively as social psychologists exactly who can also sing the sweet sweet tunes? So Webster's defines, Um, that's a great start,

chuck Uh. It's actually the Oxford English Dictionary if you want to go back to the original definition, which I think it is useful. We don't love to read definitions, but its first definition was a sharp, bitter or cutting expression or remark, a bitter jibe or taunt. And the word itself even derives from ancient Greek from to tear flesh, gnash the teeth, and speak bitterly. So it seems like from the beginning sarcasm was not like a nice and

and super funny thing for people. Know, And apparently the ancient Greeks um had their own famous sarcast and Socrates who was um known for what's now known as sark Socratic irony, which is terrible where basically you play dumb uh when you're talking to somebody in order to kind of get their true opinion out about something, and then you destroy their opinion and you suddenly become intelligent and destroy their opinion. It's a terrible, terrible thing to do.

But apparently Socrates was well known for that kind of thing, so much so that they named it after him. That's right. He it's called the how how about them? Apple's approach? Right? Um Interpreting sarcasm, That's that's where it gets tricky because and that's why a six year old and we'll get two kids more because and some people say that by that age they can detect sarcasm. But we'll get to that. Um. I'm glad that that my daughter can't yet because that

means that she's not a jerk yet. But as far as picking up on these clues, you, the words themselves you can't rely on. So what you're looking for? Other kinds of clues uh that are myriad um. One of which is obviously the tone of voice. Uh. Let's say you can't even see the person. If you see someone say great weather today, like you, you know without even looking out the window, that that probably means it's it's raining or something. Yeah, I don't even need to look.

They just saved you the effort, right. And some people say that that's a nasal tone. Uh. This kind of seemed a little hinky to me, But some researchers have said that there's a connection between that, um, sarcasm and extreme disgust, and that's why it comes out nasally, like you're trying to expel something through like your mouth and your nose. Great weather, like your nose wrinkles. I guess

a little bit I can see maybe. Uh. And then of course their physical cues like a a good eye roll or at least like looking up when you say something is a big, big clue. Yeah, that one in particulars because your brain is going haywire because you're saying the opposite of what you mean. And researchers have concluded that that looking up, which kind of looks like an

eye roll, is actually processing difficulty. Your brain was like, I don't know what, dude, You just make the eyes look up while I try to figure out what I'm doing here. That that's that. Yeah, there's social psychology is big contribution. Um. As far as the intonation, uh, there's some researchers that have called that inverse pitch obtrusion, which, uh, great weather is if it was really great weather, you would say great weather today. Huh. And if not, you'd

say great weather. So your your tone and your intonation goes down as a clear signal of sarcasm. Yeah, which supposedly intonation or pitch um inverse pitch obtrusion is um

pretty universal as far as languages go. Are different cultures because other cultures are sarcastic just American, No, And there's a big there's a big debate online about whether it's a universal whether sarcasm is universal, and some people are saying like, yes, it's everywhere, like even if a culture has a taboo against it, which some could, although I couldn't find which ones. Um, although I think China has

widely pointed to is a not a very high sarcasm culture. Um. But that if you have if your culture has a taboo against sarcasm, you have to be aware of sarcasm to have a taboo against it. So it's still in that sense universal, even if it's not universally used or accepted by each culture. Yeah, for sure, I could see Japan is not being super sarcastic. So I read an

article about Japan. It was like a business writer's um experience, like a British expat working in Japan, and he said he used sarcasm and like he didn't really get much laugh much of a laugh, And later on he said he was explaining it to his Japanese call colleague was like, oh, I know it was sarcasm. We we know all about sarcasm. Grossly inappropriate to use it. Right then I think I was like, oh god, I love it. Oh we know what sarcasm is. That just that was just not good. Sorry.

Another thing you can do is elongate your words. Um, it's much difference to say oh sorry than to say sorry, Yes, that's a great, great one. That's intonation and elongating a word. I guess combined with that eye roll, you can also go the opposite way and take a word that should be said kind of um with oomph and deflating it. Yeah right, I'm big. I'm big on that one, like, um, like wow, yeah great. I say that a lot. Yeah, yeah, yeah, we we We are very sarcastic people. I've come to realize.

I use for some reason. I know you didn't see Fletch and you hate Chevy Chase, but I well you no, no, I'm sorry. I love Yeah, He's my favorite. He's so funny. Um. I will would use a line from his flag occasionally. Um. I don't know why I would use it. I guess whenever there was a cop or something, I would say, thank God the police. And he says that line like that in the movie. Yeah, I can. I can totally see it wearing a baseball cap too, I'll wager m hmmm,

probably maybe. Uh. You mentioned other cultures. Um, if you're a teacher of Esaul, English is a second language that is one of the trickier parts of teaching English to UH people as a second language, as adulter as kids even is is trying to teach them things like sarcasm if they're not super familiar with it. And sometimes apparently they will say, here, watch watch this TV show because

you know, there's quite a bit of sarcasm on TV sitcoms. Yeah, supposedly that's a really good way to pick up on on sarcasm is watching sitcoms. Probably Friends in particular, I would guess. I'm guessing they assigned Friends a lot to be any more sarcastic. So, Chuck, this is kind of a willy nilly episode, and I kind of like them that way. I'm just gonna go ahead and confess. So there's no clear place where we should put an AD break in, So I suggest that we put an AD

break in right about here. That's a great idea. Stuck, Stuck, Stuck. I don't know that you know it. Stuck in this. It's a great name. That's the name of it. It's a great name, alright, stuck with a with an X. You know. I have to say, when I was researching this, Chuck, I was wondering if we were gonna just do the weird thing in not be sarcastic. I just think that

that was there was never gonna happen, was it. No, I think it's it was clear from the beginning to me that we were gonna throw our own little brand of sarcasm in. I can't help it, chunk, I can't tell if you're being straight. I can't either. So we're talking about kids, um and whether or not they understand sarcasm. And there's been um some research on this kind of thing, um, and of course it's come up with contradictory findings. One thing I saw was that kids you kept mentioning six

year old's not really getting sarcasm. That's about when they start to pick it up somewhere around age six. That's when they start grade school. Okay, do with it, maybe so, But but from what I saw, they might recognize it as sarcasm. They just don't understand it as a way to employ humor. And that that comes at about age ten,

which happens to coincide when kids become obnoxious. Uh yeah, and then it's all then you reap what you sow as a parent because you're like I taught you this method and UH, it's being used used against me like a weapon. There was a study in France French speaking kids in two thousand five that showed UH kids the age of five understood sarcasm when they when the sarcastic

speaker was using intonation um. Where it took to be over seven to be able to tell by context, and context is when like I think the example they used in the article was if you're like having a longer conversation about UH family member being a bad gift giver, and then at the very end you say, but I love my sweater that they got me, and maybe see, like I said it even sort of regular, but contextually it would still be sarcastic. I don't know, Like even

in that example, I just found it confusing to tell you. Well, I guess it could be I was a little too I sold it too well. It sounded yeah, it sounded really genuinely earnest. Right, that's the slip. That's the slippery SLOPO sarcasm, so um one of the other uh. In addition to kids not necessarily getting sarcasm, people with dementia or Alzheimer's um or brain lesions have been found to

not necessarily, um, get sarcasm. And if you stop picking up on sorry sarcasm all of a sudden, Uh, that's a really good indicator that you might need to go get an m R. I too sweet, Yeah for sure. Uh. And not just that, they are all kinds of neurodiversities that people can have that make them not able to pick up on sarcasm. I know that sometimes people with autism have difficulty understanding sarcasm. Um. They might take things

a little more literally then uh, neurotypical people might. So it's you know, you gotta know who you're dealing with, um, when you're throwing sarcasm around and being sensitive that kind of thing, right for sure. So um, So people with autism are famously kind of associated with an inability to detect sarcasm. And from what I've seen, that's not really

the best way to put it. That they that many people with autism can detect a detect sarcasm, use sarcasm um, some find it funny, Others can recognize it but don't necessarily find it funny. Um. But there's different I don't know if they're competing or not. There's different theories as to why that's the case. It supposedly UM. People with

autism tend to use more literal thinking than UM. The kind of UM, well, let me just say, sarcasm is known as a form of unplaine speaking, along with some other kinds like UM forced politeness, where you like, are nice as somebody who who's got you hate UM are using aphorisms UM or ritual language like when you say I'm fine when somebody asks you how you're doing, even though you're not fine. UM. Sarcasm falls under that. It's

it's not saying what you mean directly. And so if people with autism tend to use direct thinking and literal thinking, if you use indirect or unplane speaking, it's gonna be hard for them to pick up on. They're gonna take it at its literal meaning, they might not pick up

on the sarcasm um. And so that that kind of tend that UM tendency to think literally combined with UH an undeveloped theory of mind, which is where you can put yourself in the other person's shoes and imagine what they're thinking easily, which is what sarcasm requires you to do, because they're saying something different, but you know that's not what they mean, and that requires that you go into

their mind and tool around. Those two things combined tend to explain why people with autism are kind of thought of as not detecting sarcasm. You got a job, Okay, thanks? Thanks. If I had rainbow suspenders on right now, I would have just snapped him after them. I actually had those when I was a kid. I wanted those for a long time. Yeah, I mean it was the whole Mork and mindy thing. I even had the buttons on them, and I wore the khaki pants. I did my best

to beat work from work. Yeah, so Morks suspenders are obviously primo. But there's an overlooked vest, a puffy vest that he wears in the credits when they're on the football field that I would say even top the rainbow suspenders. I would love to get my hands on that. Yeah, looking back, I was just trying to be in work from work, but I was dork from dork. I don't have any pictures of that, unfortunately. Can you mention wearing

those with like a spinning bow time like now? No, especially as a kid like I don't know about this guy, but this kid wearing that you'd be all right, Uh, if you're talking about the brain. That was a study in two thousand five that, um, and this kind of stuff is always I feel like we just have to say it, even though people are like, Okay, those are the three parts of the brain. Thinks nothing to me.

But the three parts the language cortex and the left hemisphere, the frontal lobes and the right hemisphere and the right the right ventro medial prefrontal cortex. You're gonna hear the comment, and your language cortex kicks in and understands the literal meaning great weather. Right. Then the frontal lobe and the right hemisphere have the context it's raining. And then that right ventro medial prefrontal cortex puts the two together and it goes sarcasm dummy, right, and the laugh region goes

bananas down the laugh region. It's sometimes it can be funny, but it's you've got to really be good at it. So um, Chuck, I was talking about how sarcasm qualifies as unplane speaking. That's like the general umbrella that it falls under, right, Um, and that the fact that it is unplaine speaking where you can get a message across just as easily directly saying the weather sucks today. What is the point then, of using sarcasm, of saying great

weather today rather than this weather sucks today. Um. There, and so linguists, researchers, um, you know, speech scientists, talkie doctors, all these people together have have come up with this idea that there must be some additional thing that's going on there. Clearly that there is something gained by using sarcasm over using the direct message that gets the same point across, because sarcasm has got a little extra mustard on it, and they've tried to get to the bottom

of exactly what that mustard is. And I'm sorry to use mustard. I know you don't like it very much. Yeah. And by the way, my dog might actually be barking some in this episode and there's just nothing I can do, and I think that makes it folcasy. We usually trying to edit that out. But well, to see, um, there are a couple of ideas on why people do it. Um, Like when it's a purposeful thing and not just like

I'm trying to be funny or whatever. Um. Sometimes well, sometimes it could just be as easy as like you have a very hard time being straightforward with someone, and you, like you said, you use it to high, to use it as a defense or something like that, Um, cloaking something in a positive term. Oh, you did a really great job with that episode, Josh. Um. That's sarcastic criticism, whereas you can do the exact opposite. Uh, if you

and I were out. Um. I mean the example that use in the article is fishing and I'm not catching any fish and you're just like catching tons of fish. I'm like, oh boy, you're really you really suck at that fishing thing. That is a sarcastic compliment. And this is all wrapped up under what's called the Tinge theory of sarcasm, which is you're you're trying to mute either your criticism or your praise of somebody by throwing like slapping that mustard on it. Yeah, by tinging it with iron.

Hence the name. Right. There's also like a related one that really just kind of looks at them the criticism part um. It's called politeness theory, and it basically just says that we use sarcasm to criticize because it makes the criticism more palatable. And so you put that together, and that is one interpretation of what sarcasm is. Therefore, it's meant to boost, it's meant to mute either the

compliment or the praise or the criticism. But then there's another one that's that basically says the exact opposite, that sarcasm is meant to be like more biting, that it's meant to really make the mustard spicy and put it right near your eye. Yeah. I mean, here's the thing. I think, I mean, get the value somewhat of using sarcasm rather than God, if you're just straightforward about everything,

it's like it's sort of borish. Like if let's say you're you were with the friend who you're hanging out and your friend is always talking over you and you don't get a chance to get a word in edgewise, and you made a little sarcastic dig in front of people like like, oh no, I'm sure they're gonna let me speak any minute now. That person would go, all right, I see what you're saying, Like it may be a

little bit of an a whole sarcastic comment. But what if someone was always just like pulling you aside and being like you just never let me speak, and it would just really like, I think there are times to be straightforward, but like that, but if you're like that all the time, it's like, God, no one's gonna be around you either yeah, or or even if you didn't pull him aside at the table, if you were like, shuck, I'm sorry, but it's my turn to speak. You you're

not letting me speak, so I'm going to speak now. Really, just like straightforward happened to say, Yeah, that's gonna just like just gonna be a record scratching. Like you said, no one wants to hang out with you. And that's what I was talking about the outside of this that it's like the idea of just getting rid of sarcasm altogether, there's something inherently wrong with that, because if use correctly, sarcasm is a it's a social lubricant that just keeps

the party going. Yeah, totally, because at least everyone gets a laugh. It might be at their expense a little. They get the message, and you don't like stop the fund of the party by make having a real serious talk about interrupting people and then starting your point that's right, yeah, and then everyone wants to hear what you gotta say, right. So, so the other idea is that sarcasm is used to make criticism more biting. That it's basically like this this.

If I did just say, you know, um, uh, you know you didn't screw that up. Or no, if I said, you know, Josh, you really screwed this episode up, I can't even criticize you hypothetically. I'm sorry. If you said to me, Josh, you really screwed this episode up, um, I would be like, oh, well, go sit on it, Chuck. But if you said, boy, you didn't screw that episode up at all, Josh, I would be leveled for months, basically.

And I think that's what that interms. That's what that theory is, the rival theory to Tinge theory, that that it actually gives an even more emotional impact to criticism than otherwise would have directly. Yeah, and I think not to get too personal, but I think you and I as partners have learned to deal with each other a little more straightforwardly over the years that I think that's how we both prefer to be handled by each other

as and that's with us, like it's different. For it's not like I can be super sarcastic with other people, but I know that that wouldn't be a very nice thing to do to you. Does that make sense? Sure, it makes sense. I think that you can be sarcastic with me. Well I can't give it a try. Come on, you got uh? I could be. I can be. Just held their breath there, like is he about to level Josh?

I don't know. I can be, And I am sarcastic with you, but only in like fun ways, like I would know never a no now to not make try and make a real point with you. I see, I see what you mean. Yeah, And and they have like a real conversation if it's really yeah, yeah, okay, I got you, I got you? Sure yeah, oh so chuck. The other thing about this, too, is there's a there's another theory. It's like, no, this is everybody you're just overthinking.

This is just humor. Like people are dressing up and otherwise boring or pedestrian point that they want to get across with with just a little bit of humor. And it's like sarcasm is an easy way to use humor. Oscar Wilde said it was the lowest form of wit, but the highest form of intelligence, and that second part, I think he was referring to the fact that it it takes some something and to make a sarcastic comment, and it also takes them thinking to decode it too.

But it's not necessarily funny. Right, But that is supposedly the humor, and it is another theory for why we use sarcasm, that it's just it's just humor. And I think from researching all this, all of those makes sense. And social psychology, in typical fashion, has found um findings that support all of them and none of them at the same time. Should we take a break? Sure, all right,

let's take a break. We'll talk a little bit about that and a little bit of the use of it throughout history and culture and arts and stuff like that. Right after this. Stuck Stuck. I don't know that you know it's stuck Stuck. It's a great name, that's the name of it. It's a great name. Alight with with an X. All right. If you want to talk uh literature, you can't get any more sarcastic at times than Mark twain Um. Shakespeare was pretty sarcastic at times, Chaucer was

fairly sarcastic at times. They used an example in this article of the Bible that I didn't read as sarcasm. I thought it was a bit of a stretch myself, and we'll go ahead and read it. This is from Ecclesiasts eleven nine. Rejoice, young man, during your childhood, and let your heart be pleasant during the days of young manhood. And follow the impulses of your heart and the desires of your eyes. Yet know that God will bring you to judgment for all these things. That feels more just

sort of like a one to joke than sarcasm, I guess. So, yeah, yeah, I think they were like, there's got to be something in here, and that's the best they could come up with. Maybe, like we gotta find some sark them in the Bible, guys. Get um. The thing is with that, like that kind of reveals like the one of the problems with sarcasm is that when it's just written, especially it's written a couple of thousand years ago, it's really difficult to discern sarcasm.

You have to use whatever cues you can get because you've had a lot of the normal cue stripped, like all those facial expressions, the intonation um, all of that stuff. Is gone, and now it's just the printed words, so basically what you have as context. Um. And for that reason and because we are entering I guess we've already entered this digital age where like the written word is

basically how we convey thoughts. Now, sarcasm has really taken a beating lately because um, study after study keeps finding that people grossly over overestimate how clearly their sarcasm is coming through in like texts and tweets and emails and stuff like that, and that it actually isn't being understood as sarcasm on the other end, even though the person who's sending the email or text thinks they're sarcasm is clear as a bell. Yeah, just don't try to be

sarcastic in emails, especially for work. I think it's just a good rule. It's like, don't even try because it's not going to come through. And like you said, you probably think it does. It's not obvious to other people. If you're texting with friends and stuff, you can you can do things like overspell things like say great or you know, say insert the I roll emoji or even say sarcasm in parentheses or something like that. The one I've seen. It's the backslash s yeah. I mean that's

definitely no backslash. Which one is it? It's one of the slashes. It's a backslash followed by an say so backslash s um. Because you know, for the first I don't I remember. For for the first few years of like social media and texting and stuff like that, there was a lot of talk about like how do we indicate sarcasm and uh, and the emojis kind of help solve that problem, but you can't do that in emails, like professional emails. You're not gonna send an emoji I

roll emoji. No, don't do it. Okay, you might as well put three exclamation points at the end of that's great. Are we not doing that either? This is why I don't email anybody. I don't know what I'm doing. But when I do email them, it's at like ten o'clock on a Saturday night. One of the cons of sarcasm um.

You know, it's, like you said, you can use it and employ it in certain certain circumstances, but there are people who just think it is a hostile act and it is a way to say something and also let yourself off the hook for saying that thing at the same time, and that it is hostility veiled as humor, is what uh how they put it in this article, and you know, at times it very much can be that. Yeah.

So the UM like marriage counselors, um uh therapists, like basically anybody who's who's dedicated to improving you as a person in exchange for money, UM has kind of zeroed

in on the worst version of sarcasm. The the very strict definition of sarcasm is not verbal irony, but as an insult, as mocking somebody, as it being veiled hostility, Like you're saying passive aggressiveness, that kind of thing, and that that is no way to communicate, especially with somebody that you care about or love, that you should be forthright, direct, honest with them. They're not saying, like, you know, make

sure you cut out humor. They're basically saying, sarcasm isn't humor, and if you if you think it's humor, like seriously, like like, just go find better humor because there's plenty of better stuff out there. He's right, and they so they're they're basically saying, like kind of just cut that out of your interpersonal relationships, at least again with people you care about, because it probably does mask passive aggressiveness and it's not doing anything but harming your your relationship.

And in fact, John Gottman UM, who is a very renowned couples therapist and his wife are together, UM says that UM sarcasm is one of the indicators of contempt, along with eye rolling, along with like raising a lip like kind of in disgust while you're talking. That that if you pickiece together, that you you are signaling that you have contempt for your significant other, and that contempt is one of the He calls them the four horsemen

of UM of a marriage. That it's a it's a really good predictor of divorce when couples speak to each other with contempt, and one of those ways that they'll speak to each other with contempt is through sarcasm. Yeah, and it's just not a pleasant Like it's one thing to be sarcastic here and there, But I have a friend whose father, stepfather whether is the most sarcastic I roy person I've ever met in my life to an alarming degree. And it's just so like it's such a

turn off to be around this dude. You're like, I don't want to have sex at all when I'm around, certainly not with him. Uh yeah, he just and you can tell like his marriage is suffered and there's he can't be straight, and it's just a it's just a chore to be around this guy. I hope he listens to this and it's like talking about he's talking about me and he changes his life. No, he would never listen to this. He wouldn't give me dissatisfaction. So wow,

that guy. Huh yeah, he's that guy. So there there. This is not to say that there's like, no, nothing

good about sarcasm. There. There's this one group of social psychologists who made names for themselves by basically saying no, no. We figured out that if you take a test of creativity immediately after engaging in a sarcastic exchange, you're going to score higher on that test of creativity than you would had you not been involved in a sarcastic exchange immediately beforehand, and that has been turned into in the

popular precess Sarcasm Boost Creativity across the Board. Yeah, I guess the idea that it it challenge you challenges you to think in a different way because it's not straightforward. May have a little something to it, but I don't know, it's a bit of a reach. There's other things. It provides social bonding, like you and your friends, um, being sarcastic about stuff, especially if you're being sarcastic about like a shared target, yeah, like your teacher. Sure, it's a

great example. Um. It maintains social egalitarianism, like taking that fisherman down a peg before he gets a big ego for catching some fish. Um. And it can make you seem apparently, as far as Harvard Business Review says, more competent and intelligent at work. Um, which makes sense in that you know, you do kind of have to be sharp at the very least, you're paying a little more attention probably if you deliver a sarcastic remark successfully. Right.

It's also risk by that you can also really come off looking like like your friend's dad basically. Yeah, and just professionally like that stuff back. That's my advice. Yeah. So the one thing I saw was I came across a k State I think it's Kansas State newspaper from like two thousand eleven maybe where they were talking about how sarcasm just totally pervades our society, and um, they gave an example of how primed we are for sarcasm, that when we encounter earnestness, like we we might be

confused set first in some situations. And the writer gave this great example of Michael Richard's apology after he went on that racial tirade at the laugh Factory and then like a couple of days later went on Letterman and the audience did not get Some of the audience who hadn't heard about this, I guess, did not get that this was like a real apology, and part of it was his presentation that it seemed like he was doing a bit kind of and the audience remember tittering, and

Jerry Seinfeld, who was like in the studio with Letterman, had to turn to the audience and be like, stop laughing, it's not funny, and like tell them like he wasn't, that this wasn't sarcasm, that this was for real, and like, if you go back and watch it, if you're a fan of laughing at things that make you deeply uncomfortable, like you will love that bit. It was. I remember it at the time. I think it had a lot to do with the fact that it was Kramer and

it was hard to just take him seriously. That's exactly what it was. Yeah, man, what a mess. Yeah, it was a massive made it even worse. Yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna go watch that again today. Actually I could use some cringe humor. Yeah, um, have you got anything else? Oh? No, Josh, I had nothing else. Yeah, I check. This went real well. We did a great job. Man, I'm annoying myself even now, So let's just send this to Since I said I'm annoying myself, let's go to listen to ma'am. I'm gonna

call this Elton John song because why not? Hey guys, love Love, Love your podcast and making making my way through the whole catalog. I've been tempted to write, but it didn't think I hadn't even interesting to say before. You may not think it's interesting now. I do, though, But what finally prompted me is when you were talking about Elton John and the Soul Train episode so long ago, Josh said he'd never heard the song burned Down the mission.

That made me think of the powerful song ticking from Elmon John seventy four Caribou album. Song was way ahead of its time in the way that it foretold many future her events. I can't ever remember it being a popular, well known song, but you've not heard it. Go listen to it gives me chills every time I hear it. Keep up the good work, guys. And this is from

Dinah Clay Melvin in Fort Worth, Texas. And I went back and looked at the lyrics and dude Ticking is a song about a uh an aggressive ticking time bomb, white male shooter from ninety four, and it's all right there. I I'm assuming Bernie Taupin wrote it. I'm not. I didn't look it up, but I think he was kind of writing all of his stuff back then. Who Bernie Taupin? Oh you do? That's a referential joke to another episode

from the conversation we had. I guess probably in the episode that this guy is talking about oh boy um. But yeah, it's it's interesting to go back and listen to that song from early nineteen seventies. Of and of course it wasn't a big hit like she said, but it's a I don't know, it's just interesting to hear that and be like, man, you can't. You couldn't write a song that on the nose today. So there, he wasn't the only one who was predicting that at the time.

Like Stephen King had a short story about a kid who comes in and like just shoots up his school, and it's basically it's like this teenage revenge fantasy, but it was exactly what ended up happening. Like twenty years later, he wrote that I can't remember what that one was called, um, and then there's like, um, remember falling Down that movie with Michael Douglas from The Ladies that was basically about that as well. Yeah, um, so yeah, I could see.

I just want to make sure we don't give Elton John undue credit here is kind of what I'm going after. Oh man, okay, you're classic beef with Elton John. Alright, so I think we're at the end of this episode, aren't we. I hope we are, all right. While it was a little bit of short stuff crossover right there, So let's let's end this as we normally do. If you want to get in touch with us, like Diana did, h you can send us an email to Stuff Podcast at iHeart Radio dot com Stuff you Should Know is

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