Jew No-No

As Tolstoy noted, "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." A similar observation may be made about humor. Funny is funny, but unfunny, well, there are lots of ways to go wrong. Here are three examples:<!–break–>

1) Normal unfunny: "Why did the Chicken cross the road? To get to the other side."

2) Trashmouth unfunny: "Why did the fuckin’ chicken cross the road, bitch? To get to the other fuckin’ side"

3) Jewish unfunny: "Why did that meshugge chicken cross the road? He was so farklempt that he had to get his tuchis to the other side before he turned into gribness."

Recently, the 92nd Street Y unleashed a particularly pungent piece of drek named _Jewno_ (to promote the Purim party on Saturday, March 22 at their brand new building at 200 Hudson Street in Manhattan), which essentially incorporated all that’s wrong with Jewish humor today.

Jews have written masterpieces of satire and parody; we are famously funny from Beverly Hills to the Black Sea. And still there are those among us who cannot seem to allow to pass un-punned any word that in any way evokes Jews or things Jewish. _Heroes_ can be _Schmearos_, _Family Guy_ can be _Family Goy_, _One Tree Hill_ can be _One Tree Hillel_… okay, maybe that last one has potential, but still, you see our point.

Even that may be forgiven, if the content itself paid off. But _Jewno_ offers perhaps the worst usage of Jewish words and images for the purpose of sounding funny that we’ve ever encountered. It seemed like it was written by someone using Yiddish-English madlibs, with the Yiddish serving no function other than to announce to the world "Look, see how Jewish we are!" The same effect could have been more easily and less annoyingly achieved had they simply shot the whole thing focussing on the male protagonists’ penises.

Let’s be clear. We are not at all opposed to the use of Yiddish. Nor are we like some Yiddishists who are enraged by what they see as the degrading of their language for purposes of schtick. Yiddish has a lot of funny sounding words, which can make things funnier or more authentic. The operative phrase here, though, is "funnier or more authentic." When a joke is already funny, when it’s already chock full of Jewy goodness, then it can be enhanced by a well-chosen Yiddishishm. But when the Yiddish itself is supposed to be the source of hilarity, then it really isn’t funny at all.

Now, some people may think this is a curious cri de coeur coming from _Heeb_, and particularly from a guy who writes under the name Jewdar. And to be sure, _Heeb_ doesn’t always rise above the bar that we’ve set here (Jewdar does, but then, we’re like the Fonz of Jewish humor), but _Heeb_ at least tries to do something new and different, and frequently, gets it right. Desperate minstrel shows like Jewno aren’t new, interesting, or original; they are barely coherent. All they are is a collection of tics and affectations that play to the lowest common denominator. Have a freylichn Purim.

What do you think?