The comedy thread

[justdrew]

FYI, Charlie Brooker's 2014 Wipe is officially Out There now.

[semper occultus]

UK students' union passes policy to stop white gay men acting like black women

Cross-dressing and drag is banned as delegates use jazz hands instead of applause

25 MARCH 2015 | BY JOE MORGAN

http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/uk-s ... omen250315


UK's National Union of Students has passed a policy to stop gay men appropriating black female culture.

Delegates at the Women's Conference today, many of them self-identified feminists, have passed plenty of motions.

Just one of them was ensuring everyone at the conference understood that some behaviors were damaging.

On Twitter, they announced: 'Some delegates are requesting that we move to jazz hands rather than clapping as it's triggering anxiety. Please be mindful!'

A later motion passed was 503: 'Dear White Gay Men: Stop Approprirating [sic] Black Women'.

Put forward by the NUS LGBT Committee, they believe the appropriation of black women by white gay men is prevalent within the LGBTI scene and community.

'This may be manifested in the emulation of the mannerisms, language (particularly AAVE- African American Vernacular English) and phrases that can be attributed to black women. White gay men may often assert that they are “strong black women” or have an “inner black woman”,' they said.

'White gay men are the dominant demographic within the LGBT community, and they benefit from both white privilege and male privilege.'

They claimed the appropriation is 'unacceptable and must be addressed'. Passing the motion, they agreed to eradicate the appropriation of black women by white gay men and to raise awareness of the issue.

A second motion passed was the banning of cross-dressing or drag as it could be offensive to trans women.

'To issue a statement condemning the use of crossdressing as a mode of fancy dress,' they pledged.

'To encourage unions to ban clubs and societies from holding events which permit or encourage (cisgender) members to use cross-dressing as a mode of fancy dress'.

This ruling was given an exclusion to queer students who want to use cross-dressing in their everyday lives as a mode of expression and to those who want to cross-play by flipping the gender of a fictional character in fancy dress.

A NUS spokeswoman told Gay Star News: 'We're a democratic society, and if members voted for it, these are our policies'.

Several have mocked the policies online, with the New Statesman calling into question the second motion for being 'remarkably conservative' for a group 'otherwise so much at pains to stress the variety and fluidity of gender'.

Others on social media also questioned the first, saying inspiration for the slang like 'shade' and 'spill the T' was taken from the underground drag culture in the 70s and 80s, Paris is Burning and modern shows like RuPaul's Drag Race.

And some were less subtle:

[conniption]

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Patents (HBO)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bxcc3SM_KA
Published on Apr 19, 2015

For inventors, patents are an essential protection against theft. But when patent trolls abuse the system by stockpiling patents and threatening lawsuits, businesses are forced to shell out tons of money.

[conniption]

David Cameron Rap

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YBumQHPAeU
cassetteboy

Published on Oct 1, 2014

Contains swearing. Seriously though Dave, thanks for legalising parody videos.

[stefano]

[conniption]

Jonathan Pie: Reporter gets angry about Matt Damon, David Cameron, Alan Sugar...etc'!

Jonathan Pie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P979HaI5qlk

Published on Oct 5, 2015
UK News reporter Jonathan Pie has a go at David Cameron, Alan Sugar, Nuclear Weapons, Matt Damon's treatment in the press, Jeremy Corbyn's treatment by the press...you name it, he has a go about it!

[justdrew]

[stefano]

Almost posted this in GD, but let's keep it in the Lounge.

I'm Douglas Reynholm and I'm not a scientist, but I do have a better understanding of what space is than any scientist living today...

[KUAN]

Developing a sudden liking for slapstick comedy such as Mr Bean or The Benny Hill Show, could herald the onset of dementia up to nine years before the illness is diagnosed.

According to University College London (UCL), a change in sense of humour can provide a "red flag" to family members and doctors, giving an early warning sign that neurodegenerative disease has begun.

Many family members notice behavioural and personality changes in their loved ones in the years before dementia is diagnosed, and researchers speculated that humour may be one of the most obvious alterations.

Friends or relations of 48 people with different forms of frontotemporal dementia and Alzheimer's Disease were asked to rate their preference for different kinds of comedy and how it had changed over 15 years. The researchers found that people with both types of dementia preferred slapstick humour to more cerebral satirical comedy, such as Yes Minister, or absurdist comedy, such as that of Monty Python and The Goon Show, even if they had previously been fans of more complex comedy.


People with frontotemporal dementia also appeared to develop a darker sense of humour, taking delight in other people's misfortunes. And when they made jokes they tended to be graphic, smutty or childish in their subject, according to the study. Many stopped laughing altogether. The same was not true of Alzheimer's sufferers.

While Alzheimer's disease is the leading cause of dementia, frontotemporal dementia is the most common cause of dementia in the under-55s.

Friends and relations reported seeing the changes in sense of humour for both forms of dementia an average of at least nine years before the start of more typical dementia symptoms such as memory loss.

Dr Camilla Clark who led the research at the Dementia Research Centre, UCL, said: "As sense of humour defines us and is used to build relationships with those around us, changes in what we find funny has impacts far beyond picking a new favourite television show.

"These findings have implications for diagnosis - personality and behaviour changes should be prompts for further investigation, and clinicians themselves need to be more aware of these symptoms as a potential early sign of dementia.

"As well as providing clues to underlying brain changes, subtle differences in what we find funny could help differentiate between the different diseases that cause dementia.

"Humour could be a particularly sensitive way of detecting dementia because it puts demands on so many different aspects of brain function, such as puzzle solving, emotion and social awareness."

The study was published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease.

- Daily Telegraph UK

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[seemslikeadream]

what does it say about me that I really like Drunk History?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpCWs7H3NeE



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75cWpzc8Uv8

[MacCruiskeen]

Mike Rosenthal ‏@VectorBelly 5. Jan.

Got banned from Wikipedia for making all the verbs on the Ray Romano page hypothetical



Retweets 8,436 Likes 15,174

12:43 - 5 Jan. 2016

https://twitter.com/VectorBelly/status/ ... 80?lang=de

pi ‏@TheRealpi 6. Jan.

@VectorBelly @HalakItLikeThat They take down already. They so quick:

Mike Rosenthal ‏@VectorBelly 6. Jan.

@TheRealpi Don't make the same mistakes I've made. Don't live this life of crime

[Belligerent Savant]

.

[stefano]

David Brent: Life on the road is getting poor reviews and I'm sure they're spot on. I was ambivalent about it because The Office is such a perfect piece of television and it seems wrong to resurrect even just the Brent part of it...

Still going to watch it, though, I expect some good laughs.



She was a traveller... but clean

[MacCruiskeen]

Mick Jagger's voice...

This had me laughing so hard.

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[Iamwhomiam]

conniption, thank you for introducing me to the very funny Jonathan Pie. He makes one laugh about such tragic things!