Comedy

[Kevin]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sShMA85pv8M <---comedy not tragedy

Granted the guy bops himself on the head or other minor goofs but the true joke of the skit is not at anyone's expense.

Edit: I think "comedy" is better defined as our amusement over our own and other's mistakes and misunderstandings. Maybe it keeps us from going insane after a lifetime of goof ups.

It may not be tragedy, but you can argue the joke is at the expense of of the character who is unable to grasp that Who, What, I Don't Know, etc are sir names and not pronouns. You can also argue that it's just making fun of the language, but that again is humor based on a flaw, if the language were structured better / differently the joke doesn't work.

This understanding is part of why clowns cry and many people don't find them funny, they rarely try to hide the fact that comedy is often about suffering, ignorance, etc.

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"The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese." -- Steven Wright

That's at the expense of the tragedy of the first mouse dying.


His "I bought some powdered water but didn't know what to add" or "I bought some batteries but they weren't included" are closer to funny without being based on some form of tragedy.

"Why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways?" is a pure language thing. Which like I mentioned earlier you might be able to argue is funny because the language isn't better than it is. But that I think is still a better example than your mouse one which clearly has tragedy worked into it.