HUMOUR, SENSE OF - Today a good sense of humour is considered a cardinal virtue, perhaps the cardinal virtue. People who seek company through the sort of free magazine normally found trampled on the soggy floors of streetcars eschew genuine humour for what they refer to as g.s.o.h. All the world's lonely hearts, it seems, really desire is someone with whom to laugh in the face of whatever adversity has isolated them to the extent that they have to advertise their personalities in columns also used to sell sex, used cars and unwanted Christmas presents. The most unprepossessing dullard will stubbornly proclaim his g.s.o.h. even as the object of his repartee prepares to fling herself from the nearest window rather than endure another of his witless anecdotes. The absence of humour is as serious a failing as the absence of compassion or mercy. Nobody likes to be told he lacks a sense of humour. The asset is claimed by bullies as justification for what, viewed objectively, amounts to anti-social behaviour. What they claim as humour is, in reality, a total absence of self-restraint, the abandonment of reason to the darkest human urges. Every day, people endure the grossest indignities rather than leave themselves vulnerable to the accusation that they can't take a joke. They tolerate having their chairs whipped from under them as they sit down, insects introduced to their lunchboxes, their personal details plastered over the walls of communal toilets. It's only a matter of time before ‘it was only a joke' becomes a legitimate criminal defence. We must see things for what they are. A man whose handshake transmits electric shocks harbours a pathological yearning to inflict more serious pain. In appropriate circumstances, the whoopee cushion is a harmless source of fun (I've owned several myself), the packet of gum that conceals a steel snapper, however, is a weapon of attrition. Spencer owned various such devices. This is indicative of what he refers to as ‘humour'. It is actually belligerence.

 

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