For untold centuries humanity has partaken in the art of comedy. From the humor of Shakespearean theatre to Monty Python’s flying circus, people have laughed at many good jokes, sketches, skits, and the like. Indeed, humor is almost as old as humanity itself and plays a central role in every single culture across the globe. Many have heard such classics as “Why did Sally fall off the swing? Because she has no arms!”. It’s not very funny is it? Where is the humor in this “joke”? It can’t be in the punchline. Indeed, it isn’t present at all. Nonetheless, one may find it funny anyways. What was expected was a punchline to make this “joke” funny, but instead all that has been delivered is an unfunny and awful image of poor Sally who couldn’t play on the swing because some unfortunate circumstances prevented her from retaining her arms. This “joke” is but one of many specimens of Anti-Humor. It’s not really funny, but the anticipation of some humorous punchline and the strangeness of the “punchline” are what triggers the response of laughter. Laughter can be many things. It can be a response to something genuinely amusing or a polite gesture to avoid offending some guests. But what many forget is that laughter, and even amusement, can be natural reactions to something genuinely disturbing or otherwise terrible. It is part of the human condition to laugh as a reaction to these horrible things, as it is a way of easing discomfort or pain which is entirely necessary for most people as they live their lives. It is within this human necessity that Anti-Humor has carved its niche.

One might tell a “joke” of the Anti-Humor variety first by setting up some sort of genuine joke which could plausibly hold some sort of reasonably funny punchline. Anything that is ordinarily a joke can just as easily be converted into an “Anti-Humor joke”. For example “Why did the Chicken Cross the road?” with the anti-joke punchline being “to get to the other side” or “Because Colonel Sanders already killed his family behind him”. The purpose of Anti-Humor is to have fun toying with the expectations of unwitting friends. Anti-Humor “jokes” will almost always be built up in some way either with some sort of exposition or section of pre-punchline joke (the question which is posed as the first part of most verbal jokes). One prime example of this is with the classic Shaggy Dog Story which is “a funny story, traditionally about a talking dog, that, after an often long and involved narration of unimportant incidents, has an absurd or irrelevant punch line.” (Dictionary.com) Each Shaggy Dog Story will start off in some benign way which will gradually build up interest on the part of listeners or readers who will want to know where the story goes. Such stories will typically ramble on and can often take upwards of five minutes to tell for the necessary buildup to serve its function. A Shaggy Dog Story may look something like this:

“‘I don’t reckon them times will ever come again. There never was a more bullier old ram than what he was. Grandfather fetched him from Illinois–got him of a man by the name of Yates–Bill Yates–maybe you might have heard of him; his father was a deacon–Baptist–and he was a rustler, too; a man had to get up ruther early to get the start of old Thankful Yates; it was him that put the Greens up to jining teams with my grandfather when he moved west. Seth Green was prob’ly the pick of the flock; he married a Wilkerson–Sarah Wilkerson–good cretur, she was–one of the likeliest heifers that was ever raised in old Stoddard, everybody said that knowed her…
…his widder bought the piece of carpet that had his remains wove in, and people come a hundred mile to ‘tend the funeral. There was fourteen yards in the piece. She wouldn’t let them roll him up, but planted him just so–full length. The church was middling small where they preached the funeral, and they had to let one end of the coffin stick out of the window. They didn’t bury him–they planted one end, and let him stand up, same as a monument. And they nailed a sign on it and put–put on–put on it–sacred to–the m-e-m-o-r-y–of fourteen y-a-r-d-s–of three-ply–car–-pet–containing all that was–m-o-r-t-a-l–of–of–W-i-l-l-i-a-m–W-h-e–……’

He always maundered off, interminably, from one thing to another, till his whisky got the best of him and he fell asleep. What the thing was that happened to him and his grandfather’s old ram is a dark mystery to this day, for nobody has ever yet found out.” (Twain, Chapter 53).

This chapter from Mark Twain’s Roughing it is the epitome of what it is to tell a Shaggy Dog Story with a quintessential Anti-humorous end. After all of that exposition, all that has happened is that the man telling the rambling and incoherent story(ies) has fallen asleep, leaving the anti-joke complete with no punchline whatsoever, which results in raucous laughter in its absence.
One would almost certainly be unable to predict where something like a shaggy dog story may lead. If one were to tell one of these, they would either have to have the whole thing be completely scripted, or they would have to make it up as they go. This is because it is a staple of Anti-Humor that its “punchlines” must be completely unpredictable. For Example: “Why was six afraid of seven?” with the “punchline” being “It wasn’t. Numbers are not sentient and thus incapable of feeling fear.” (anti-joke.com). The only reason that Anti-Humor works is because the mundane/horrible “punchlines” are unexpected which is the only way that any sort of laughing response could be cajoled from one who expects a joke. What’s more, on top of being unexpected, the punchline must completely defy the expectations of those people. It is only in this way that the Anti-Humor “joke” will be complete. The reason that Anti-Humor is meant to be unpredictable is simply because there is meant to be no true punchline. It will never be expected because all that someone has to do to end an Anti-Humor “joke” is to spout some sort of nonsense which will fill the void where a punchline should have been.
This nonsense however must not be funny nonsense that, in some way, has intrinsic humor within its content. In order for Anti-Humor to truly be Anti-Humor, it must avoid being intrinsically funny at all costs. The only thing that is supposed to be funny is the absence of anything funny at exactly the right moment, which is what will cause laughter. Comedy will deliver a genuinely funny punchline if it is performed well, while Anti-Humor will not. It is a case of Tony Clifton, a character played by comedian Andy Kaufman who is precisely the antithesis of a Lounge Lizard entertainer who would berate his audience as part of his “comedy” and who is funny only because he is painfully untalented (Tony Clifton Attacks Jim Carrey at Press Conference), versus, Major Kong’s ride on a nuclear bomb to his demise with haughty laughter. (Dr. Strangelove: Major Kong Rides the Bomb 1080p) The difference is in the fact that Dr. Strangelove is genuinely funny with its satirical themes of dark comedy consisting of cold war and nuclear warfare humor (even though the satire may seem ludicrous) while Tony Clifton’s act is the antithesis of humor and lacks any sort of comedic skill or even accidental comedic happenings whatsoever.
Most importantly, however, all Anti-Humor will be, in one form or another, utter nonsense. Nowhere within Anti-humor will there be any point at which there is some kind of general sense to the “joke”. Conceivably, one could make an Anti-Humor “joke” by going up to a stranger and shouting gibberish. The Stranger may be compelled to laugh, even though nothing is inherently funny. He might even laugh despite it appearing to be something very sad, an insane man with no direction who resorts to shouting gibberish to make human contact. Or it could be completely visual nonsense such as with Goldeneye 64 cartridge tilting glitches which cause all characters in the game to spin wildly out of control. (Japanese Goldeneye Cartridge Tilting (original)). It is nothing more than a bunch of digital characters spazzing out with no explanation, and yet videos of this game phenomenon are deemed hilarious by millions of viewers and videos of it are up voted by the tens of thousands. At some level, both previous examples of plain Anti-Jokes and Shaggy Dog Stories are the same at their core; they are utter nonsense too in that they are just as pointless.
It is precisely because of its main distinctive conventions that one cannot call Anti-Humor “comedy”. Anti-Humor lacks the main element of comedy which is something funny or hilarious about the content. Indeed, it lacks any kind of intrinsic quality which would make it truly good. In this fact, Anti-humor stands as the antithesis of humor (hence the name) and, therefore, stands as its own genre because it is nothing by itself. On its own, an anti-joke is worthless and therefore worlds apart from bona fide comedy. Anti-Humor ultimately stands to fill a need that ordinary comedy sometimes cannot, the need to resolve or understand the nervous feeling of uncertainty when seeing the unexplainable or the morbidly surprising. It is what keeps us sane when we encounter a situation that we would otherwise have no way of responding to. It is often said that laughter is the best medicine and what better way is there to immediately self-medicate than to laugh off those strange, awkward, and nonsensical moments that come out of the blue? Only Anti-Humor can truly provide a good basis to understand the reaction of nervous laughter and, in and of itself, it can be a good hour’s entertainment.

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