Parents Just Don’t Understand

A “study”:http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6897023.stm by Washington University at St. Louis showed that old people find it difficult to “get” what’s funny. The study had undergrads and AARP-ers attempt to complete jokes and cartoon strips by picking the correct punchline from a group of options. From BBC News Online:

One such joke in the test was: “A businessman is riding the subway after a hard day at the office. A young man sits down next to him and says, ‘Call me a doctor, call me a doctor’. The businessman asks, ‘What’s the matter, are you sick?’.

The participants were expected to correctly identify the punch line as: “The young man says, ‘I just graduated from medical school’.”

Huh. Judging from the jokes my parents email me nonstop, I always thought this kind of humor was _only_ understood by old people.

What do you think?

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9 Responses

  1. bigshank2

    yeah, thats really not funny at all. calling it a joke is really a stretch.

    Reply
  2. kbookatz

    A whole new generation of old comedians (who can’t tell a joke to completion) now have Alheimzer’s to thank for their late-blooming comedy careers! Thank you degenerative brain diseases!

    Reply
  3. Sara.Pamela

    They can’t find the punchline, because there isn’t one! This joke sucks. When my Grandfather (a retired doctor) told my non-Jewish boyfriend that he’ll circumsize him for free–I realized that even though he’s 86, his humor game is STILL ON.

    Reply
  4. Puck

    I’m surprised people haven’t taken umbrage at this article as well.
    Umbrage…that’s not a word you hear often these days.
    Umbbbbrrraaaggeee.

    Reply
  5. epcloy

    Too divine! How I’d like to serve my late mother a slice. A shikse, she drove a stake through the heart of our relationship with these immortal words: “The Jews made too much of a fuss over the Holocaust.”

    Ellen
    (full of Jewy goodness in the other Vil

    Reply
  6. Morty_Schmutzheimer

    Not fucking cool. My grandparents were forced to eat a cake just like this in the old country and choked on the glass.

    It was a cheesecake but still!

    Reply
  7. tzivje

    It’s an awesome concept! Even though German chocolate cake has nothing to do with Germany to begin with….it was invented by a guy from Texas with the last name “German.”
    Let’s make him eat a slice of this one!

    Reply
  8. snuffweedbooze

    German Chocolate cake is not actually German. It was originally made with Baker’s German Chocolate, an American product, hence the name.
    It used to be my favourite, but these days, “Oy the heartburn!”

    Reply
  9. markman

    Is it safe for me after eat those glasses? Please take it away from my sweet cake………
    Reply

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  15. stacyfariot12

    It’s an awesome concept! Even though German chocolate cake has nothing to do with Germany to begin with….it was invented by a guy from Texas with the last name “German.” Let’s make him eat a slice of this one! Reply

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