The Journal of Aesthetic Education

Introduction

Comparatively speaking, philosophy has not been especially long-winded in attempting to answer questions about what is funny and why we should think so. There is the standard debate of many centuries’ standing between superiority and incongruity accounts of humor, which for the most part attempt to identify the intentional objects of our amusement.¹ There is the more recent debate about humor and morality, about whether jokes themselves may be regarded as immoral or about whether it can in certain circumstances be wrong to laugh.² There is even apparently some disagreement about whether amusement is an emotion proper or a different kind of psychological attitude altogether. While I have almost despite myself taken sides in some of the arguments listed above and can unabashedly voice a preference for incongruity accounts of humor, claim that it is at least on occasion possible for jokes to be immoral, and state that I regard amusement as an emotion, I do not believe that there is much that I can contribute to these discussions beyond what has already been said in print. I do believe, however, that philosophy has more to say about humor and amusement than the aforesaid discussions have ventured to suggest, and one of the subjects that should strike us as most promising is that which attempts to draw some connection between humor and moral criticism. In this paper I will focus on a variety of such examples but will finish by concentrating in particular on sarcasm, irony, and satire—the dictionary definitions of which seem inextricably entangled—in order to delineate in detail a particular kind of revelation of truth, one that is often but not inevitably tied to moral questions.

In fact, superiority and incongruity theories of humor alike point to instances of humor in which amusement depends on the unexpected disclosure of some (often unflattering or morally problematic) truth as cases [End Page 1] that demonstrate the applicability and accuracy of their respective accounts. Of course, both theories can explain forms of humor such as irony, sarcasm, and satire with equal effectiveness. Superiority theories ally humor principally with ridicule and the enjoyment of one’s own superiority in pinpointing the foibles or weaknesses of another. Incongruity theories link humor to the defeat of expectations, to a clash or dissonance that is enjoyable rather than distressing or confusing. Irony and sarcasm, of course, always present us with a dissonance between literal and intended meanings, fitting the story put forward by incongruity theorists. And irony and sarcasm frequently figure in ridicule, moral criticism, and other expressions of contempt, much as superiority theorists from Plato to Hobbes might suggest. Both theories, therefore, take irony, sarcasm, and satire to demonstrate the efficacy of the explanations of humor that they offer. However, it can prove equally interesting to investigate the frequency with which the humor to be found in these forms depends on the revelation of something that has been hitherto obscured, a revelation that often focuses on matters of ethical salience. In other words, whichever theoretical position on the objects of humor is ultimately adopted, it remains significant that amusement can (though it will not always) depend on the exposure of some previously unconsidered or neglected truth or (even more directly) on the exposure of a moral flaw.

Let us continue for the moment by considering, first, the kinds of ethical questions raised about humor that will not prove relevant to the present enterprise. These are questions about whether jokes and other forms of humor can be regarded as immoral in themselves, questions about whether it can be wrong to laugh. My investigations do not involve some peculiar inversion of those concerning the potential immorality of racist or sexist jokes. I am thankful not to be arguing that amusement is sometimes mandatory or ethically called for. I will simply be making a case for the kinds of factors on which amusement can depend, especially but not exclusively in satire, sarcasm, and irony, and suggesting that there is some connection to be found here to distinctively ethical valuations and insights. I will next explore how such matters...