A couple people have been asking me to define this, so I’m going to give a lengthy response that hopefully covers the “basics” of humor. (Side note: I wrote for a very famous humor website before I got into PUA but never thought “humor” was explainable…until I saw something as abstract as “attraction” was explainable. So, in homage to the pioneers of PUA, I’ll offer what I can on “being funny”.
First, humor is the most effective, fastest, and simplest way to offer value and establish prizability. Ironically, it’s also (in my opinion) the most Machiavellian social device ever (in fact, it’s SO Machiavellian people DON’T even consider it manipulative). If someone is genuinely laughing at your jokes, there’s no way you’ll get blown out – ever.
So, the structure of this response will follow an inverted pyramid, beginning with the “humorous” inner game-type-stuff and then drilling down into the specifics of humorous banter.
Frame – In my opinion, the funniest person alive is Howard Stern. But it’s not his content or jokes that make him funny (in fact, reading transcripts from the Howard Stern show are very NOT funny), but, instead, it’s his delivery and attitude. The thing about Howard is he just says whatever the fuck he feels like and never waits for a response. Sometimes you DON’T even know if he’s joking or not. Even if his jokes bomb, he doesn’t react. He simply says the next thing on his mind.
Conversely, look at people who are NOT funny. They’re the ones who are constantly waiting for reactions or saying shit like, “I guess you had to be there…” Probably the worst thing you can ever say to someone is, “I have the BEST joke for you.” Chances are, no matter how funny the joke, it won’t get any big laughs. Why? Because the joke teller made it obvious HE thought the joke was hysterical, thus telegraphing his need for a reaction.
Try this exercise: Tell the same joke to two people. But to the first person, say, “I have the FUNNIEST joke for you!” and to the second person, say, “I heard this offensive joke the other day. I really don’t find it funny. I’ll tell you, but don’t laugh because it’s really not a funny topic.” I guarantee the second person will stifle a genuine laugh (because he doesn’t think you’re looking for a reaction) whereas the first person will only give you a courtesy laugh. (Unless of course the joke you’re telling really sucks.)
How this relates to the field: When telling a joke, DON’T wait for a reaction. Simply say the funny line and stack or do a takeaway, For example, over the weekend, my wing was getting blown out off the opener. As I walked by the hostile set, I said over my shoulder, “You could’ve been a little nicer to him. He just got molested by a FAT girl.” The girls started cracking up and the set was back on. Is that line really so hysterical? NO! But I said it in a way that implied I wasn’t looking for a reaction. I know this is basic stuff and relates to frame control (living in your own reality), but it’s why so many guys fail at being funny. If I simply wrote up a transcript of “funny lines” I KNOW I’d have tons of guys who would go into the field, use the lines, then complain to me that the lines “aren’t funny” because they telegraphed they were looking for reactions so the lines would bomb. THIS IS WHY KNOCK KNOCK JOKES ARE RETARDED AND DEAD BABY JOKES ARE HILARIOUS!* With “knock knock” jokes, you’re telegraphing “Hey! This is a joke!” whereas with a “dead baby” joke, it’s so fucked up you’re NOT supposed to laugh (so you do).
*Disclaimer: In some instances “Knock Knock” jokes can be funny as in the case of: “Knock knock. Who’s there? Fat chicks. Fat chicks who? Who cares?! They’re fat!” (because jokes about fat chicks are ALWAYS funny...it's a Universal Law of the Universe) and dead baby jokes ARE NOT funny anymore because they’re so played out, they lost their taboo and now ARE reaction-seeking.
Attitude(s) – Once you adapt a non-reaction-seeking frame, you’re ready to try on “funny attitudes”. Unlike the underlining frame, which will ALWAYS be non-reaction seeking, your attitude can change in different situations. As a basic rule, the best attitude to accept is one diametrically opposed to the one expected. So, again, to cite an example from this weekend, some drunk hooligan/thug (complete tool) started screaming at 2 of my girl friends (for pretty much no reason) and then started screaming at me that I’m only hanging out with them to “get my D wet” and that I’m “a gay ass pussy”. Because the guy was so irate and barking such uneducated babble, the “humorous” attitude to take was for me to speak like an erudite college professor. So I looked the guy in the eye, smiled, and said, “Wow. You’re like a Greek philosopher! You totally broke down my secret game plan with that artfully constructed syllogism! That’s like Aristotelian logic, bro. To cite you, since I am, in fact, one ‘gay ass pussy’ therefore I am logically trying to get ‘my D wet’ with these – what was your term again? – ‘skank-ass bitches’. Bravo, Plato! You, my friend, are a scholar AND a gentleman.”
While this could fall under 'sarcasm', I think “attitude” is more than simply being ironic or flippant. To offer some examples, if a girl keeps calling you a “playa”, it’s funny to accept a “Don Juan lover” attitude where you tell her you write love sonnets and chisel ice sculptors of women you fall in love with. If you and your wings are obviously established, clean-cut guys, it’s funny to say you “met in prison” when HBs ask how you know each other. If an AMOG is screaming how much he hates your peacocking, saying “Glad you like it” in the most disinterested way will ALWAYS get a laugh because it’s so unexpected. (I could keep posting examples, but think it’s better if you consider attitudes you could assume in different situations you find yourself in so it’s more congruent.)
Content – Even with a solid frame and the right attitude, you still need “funny” content. I could devote an entire post to content (and maybe I will) because it’s probably the most difficult aspect of humor to master. However, sticking to a few guidelines will ensure you get big laughs.
1.) Pop culture references – This is probably the most important one to internalize and will instantly transform your humor. Whenever you’re telling a story, figure out how to make a funny pop culture reference or metaphor and you’ll ALWAYS get a laugh. I’ve posted on this before and am currently FTing a whole theory on this (it’s goes beyond just humor), so I don’t want to spend too much time talking about it here. But just to give a stupid example: I was just talking to my friend on the phone and explaining to him how I got black out drunk a few days ago and woke up covered in my own vomit and somehow climbed into my loft bed without setting up the ladder. (I know…this is funny/embarrassing as is…) So here’s how I described it for maximum effect: (Taking the attitude waking up like this when you’re 25 years old is a great life accomplishment and I’m totally proud of myself): “Dude, this black out trumps all previous career drunken black outs. Specifically, I guess drinking an absurd amount of vodka now turns me into Spiderman because I somehow used my Spidey senses to climb into my loft bed without using the ladder…but it gets even better…so my last conscious memory was getting into a cab and then I completely blacked out…but, when I woke up, it was so freaky because I was covered in my own vomit with no ladder to get down from my bed…dude, this shit felt like a scene from SAW…I swear, I thought I was gonna fucking die…I was waiting for that scary little clown to pop out of my kitchen riding that freaky little tricycle and say, “HELLO JUDGE, WANT TO PLAY A GAME??? (In scary voice) Figuring out how to get down from that bed made me realize how much I value life…the Eggo waffles I ate after I got down tasted different somehow. I feel like I have a new lease on life…”
2.) Be specific – More detail ALWAYS means more humor. Whatever detail you can add – whether it be the color of something, the way something looked, the brand name of something, WHATEVER – the harder people will laugh. (This sort of ties into the pop culture references since making a pop culture reference DOES specify and detail your story/joke). I could cite endless examples here, but leave it up to you to figure this out. However, just to use my “black out disaster” example, look at how much less funny this would’ve been had I just told the story without the specifics: “Dude, this black out trumps all previous career drunken black outs. Specifically, I somehow climbed into my loft bed without using the ladder…but it gets even better…so my last conscious memory was getting into a cab and then I completely blacked out…but, when I woke up, it was so freaky because I was covered in my own vomit with no ladder to get down from my bed… I swear, I thought I was gonna fucking die…Figuring out how to get down from that bed made me realize how much I value life…the breakfast I ate after I got down tasted different somehow. I feel like I have a new lease on life…”
3.) Blowing things out proportion – Taking something that’s frivolous and making a big deal out of it with a story and/or a huge extended metaphor is funny. Again, my aforementioned example of waking up from a black out and getting a new lease on life demonstrates this (oh, just in case you couldn’t figure out the sarcasm, my bed is only like 9 feet off the floor so it’s not like there was any real danger). But you can apply this concept at ANY point in the pickup and it’ll amplify whatever you’re doing. For example, if I call a girl a “flaya” (a female playa) because she said something I ‘misinterpreted’ as a flaya comment, that might get a chuckle or a quick, “Nooooooo”. But I’ll get a huge BT spike if I go, “Shit, this chick is such a flaya. I’ll bet you’re like Lil Kim, you have a bunch of manslaves that dance around you in your rap videos and shit. Oh man, I’ll bet you make guys cry all the time. I know your type – You’re one of those honeys getting money playing fellas like dummies…”
(For those of you who caught that, my next point…)
4.) Quoting song lyrics in serious conversation – Always awesome. (Again, relates to the “pop culture” reference.) If you do this with the right delivery, you can get away with ANYTHING. Like, if a girl is getting mad at you, say, “Here’s the thing. We started out friends. Yeah, I mean, it was cool but it was ALL pretend.” Also, another great one (to quote again from my last example) is, if a girl calls you out on using a pickup line, say, “Pick up line!? No way, if I was trying to pick you up I’d ask what your interests are, who you be with? Let’s see…what else…Things to make you smile, what numbers to dial…”
(And her response beings me to my next point…)
5.) Making absurdly wrong assumptions – Never give a straight/honest answer (at least not in the A phases). So, if you use one of my examples mentioned in the last example, and the girls goes, “OMG!!! Are you quoting Kelly Clarkson?!?!?!” You say, “What? No. That’s Shakespeare. God, didn’t you read Much Ado About Nothing?! Do you have any culture?” This also works great for girls with accents. If a girl has a strong Eastern European accent (which I love “btw”), I always say, “Oh wow. Love your accent. Lemme guess, you’re from China.”
Wording – Finally, the way you word things will enhance your humor and eek out all the potential from your frame/attitude/content. Incorporating funny words/phrases is simple. Aside from listening for funny words in every day situations (i.e. floozy, abomination, atrocity), I also write down any phrase I think is humorous. This is why reading books like "Sex, Drugs, and Cocopuffs" is great. Finding people who understand humor will seriously up your game and no one will ever know you're stealing phrases from them. Using over-the-top wording is always funny. So, if a girl says something stupid, rather than telling her, "What?!" say something like, "That was profoundly retarded" or "That was a complete atrocity." Again, I could list off plenty of "funny" words or phrases, but I'm confident you guys can build up your own "funny vernacular."
Conclusion - This is tip-of-the-iceberg stuff but it's enough to get you started and get you laughs. If you don't know how to vibe and be funny, you'll never get laid (sorry!). But, don't worry: humor and "funniness" can be learned so GOOD LUCK!
First, humor is the most effective, fastest, and simplest way to offer value and establish prizability. Ironically, it’s also (in my opinion) the most Machiavellian social device ever (in fact, it’s SO Machiavellian people DON’T even consider it manipulative). If someone is genuinely laughing at your jokes, there’s no way you’ll get blown out – ever.
So, the structure of this response will follow an inverted pyramid, beginning with the “humorous” inner game-type-stuff and then drilling down into the specifics of humorous banter.
Frame – In my opinion, the funniest person alive is Howard Stern. But it’s not his content or jokes that make him funny (in fact, reading transcripts from the Howard Stern show are very NOT funny), but, instead, it’s his delivery and attitude. The thing about Howard is he just says whatever the fuck he feels like and never waits for a response. Sometimes you DON’T even know if he’s joking or not. Even if his jokes bomb, he doesn’t react. He simply says the next thing on his mind.
Conversely, look at people who are NOT funny. They’re the ones who are constantly waiting for reactions or saying shit like, “I guess you had to be there…” Probably the worst thing you can ever say to someone is, “I have the BEST joke for you.” Chances are, no matter how funny the joke, it won’t get any big laughs. Why? Because the joke teller made it obvious HE thought the joke was hysterical, thus telegraphing his need for a reaction.
Try this exercise: Tell the same joke to two people. But to the first person, say, “I have the FUNNIEST joke for you!” and to the second person, say, “I heard this offensive joke the other day. I really don’t find it funny. I’ll tell you, but don’t laugh because it’s really not a funny topic.” I guarantee the second person will stifle a genuine laugh (because he doesn’t think you’re looking for a reaction) whereas the first person will only give you a courtesy laugh. (Unless of course the joke you’re telling really sucks.)
How this relates to the field: When telling a joke, DON’T wait for a reaction. Simply say the funny line and stack or do a takeaway, For example, over the weekend, my wing was getting blown out off the opener. As I walked by the hostile set, I said over my shoulder, “You could’ve been a little nicer to him. He just got molested by a FAT girl.” The girls started cracking up and the set was back on. Is that line really so hysterical? NO! But I said it in a way that implied I wasn’t looking for a reaction. I know this is basic stuff and relates to frame control (living in your own reality), but it’s why so many guys fail at being funny. If I simply wrote up a transcript of “funny lines” I KNOW I’d have tons of guys who would go into the field, use the lines, then complain to me that the lines “aren’t funny” because they telegraphed they were looking for reactions so the lines would bomb. THIS IS WHY KNOCK KNOCK JOKES ARE RETARDED AND DEAD BABY JOKES ARE HILARIOUS!* With “knock knock” jokes, you’re telegraphing “Hey! This is a joke!” whereas with a “dead baby” joke, it’s so fucked up you’re NOT supposed to laugh (so you do).
*Disclaimer: In some instances “Knock Knock” jokes can be funny as in the case of: “Knock knock. Who’s there? Fat chicks. Fat chicks who? Who cares?! They’re fat!” (because jokes about fat chicks are ALWAYS funny...it's a Universal Law of the Universe) and dead baby jokes ARE NOT funny anymore because they’re so played out, they lost their taboo and now ARE reaction-seeking.
Attitude(s) – Once you adapt a non-reaction-seeking frame, you’re ready to try on “funny attitudes”. Unlike the underlining frame, which will ALWAYS be non-reaction seeking, your attitude can change in different situations. As a basic rule, the best attitude to accept is one diametrically opposed to the one expected. So, again, to cite an example from this weekend, some drunk hooligan/thug (complete tool) started screaming at 2 of my girl friends (for pretty much no reason) and then started screaming at me that I’m only hanging out with them to “get my D wet” and that I’m “a gay ass pussy”. Because the guy was so irate and barking such uneducated babble, the “humorous” attitude to take was for me to speak like an erudite college professor. So I looked the guy in the eye, smiled, and said, “Wow. You’re like a Greek philosopher! You totally broke down my secret game plan with that artfully constructed syllogism! That’s like Aristotelian logic, bro. To cite you, since I am, in fact, one ‘gay ass pussy’ therefore I am logically trying to get ‘my D wet’ with these – what was your term again? – ‘skank-ass bitches’. Bravo, Plato! You, my friend, are a scholar AND a gentleman.”
While this could fall under 'sarcasm', I think “attitude” is more than simply being ironic or flippant. To offer some examples, if a girl keeps calling you a “playa”, it’s funny to accept a “Don Juan lover” attitude where you tell her you write love sonnets and chisel ice sculptors of women you fall in love with. If you and your wings are obviously established, clean-cut guys, it’s funny to say you “met in prison” when HBs ask how you know each other. If an AMOG is screaming how much he hates your peacocking, saying “Glad you like it” in the most disinterested way will ALWAYS get a laugh because it’s so unexpected. (I could keep posting examples, but think it’s better if you consider attitudes you could assume in different situations you find yourself in so it’s more congruent.)
Content – Even with a solid frame and the right attitude, you still need “funny” content. I could devote an entire post to content (and maybe I will) because it’s probably the most difficult aspect of humor to master. However, sticking to a few guidelines will ensure you get big laughs.
1.) Pop culture references – This is probably the most important one to internalize and will instantly transform your humor. Whenever you’re telling a story, figure out how to make a funny pop culture reference or metaphor and you’ll ALWAYS get a laugh. I’ve posted on this before and am currently FTing a whole theory on this (it’s goes beyond just humor), so I don’t want to spend too much time talking about it here. But just to give a stupid example: I was just talking to my friend on the phone and explaining to him how I got black out drunk a few days ago and woke up covered in my own vomit and somehow climbed into my loft bed without setting up the ladder. (I know…this is funny/embarrassing as is…) So here’s how I described it for maximum effect: (Taking the attitude waking up like this when you’re 25 years old is a great life accomplishment and I’m totally proud of myself): “Dude, this black out trumps all previous career drunken black outs. Specifically, I guess drinking an absurd amount of vodka now turns me into Spiderman because I somehow used my Spidey senses to climb into my loft bed without using the ladder…but it gets even better…so my last conscious memory was getting into a cab and then I completely blacked out…but, when I woke up, it was so freaky because I was covered in my own vomit with no ladder to get down from my bed…dude, this shit felt like a scene from SAW…I swear, I thought I was gonna fucking die…I was waiting for that scary little clown to pop out of my kitchen riding that freaky little tricycle and say, “HELLO JUDGE, WANT TO PLAY A GAME??? (In scary voice) Figuring out how to get down from that bed made me realize how much I value life…the Eggo waffles I ate after I got down tasted different somehow. I feel like I have a new lease on life…”
2.) Be specific – More detail ALWAYS means more humor. Whatever detail you can add – whether it be the color of something, the way something looked, the brand name of something, WHATEVER – the harder people will laugh. (This sort of ties into the pop culture references since making a pop culture reference DOES specify and detail your story/joke). I could cite endless examples here, but leave it up to you to figure this out. However, just to use my “black out disaster” example, look at how much less funny this would’ve been had I just told the story without the specifics: “Dude, this black out trumps all previous career drunken black outs. Specifically, I somehow climbed into my loft bed without using the ladder…but it gets even better…so my last conscious memory was getting into a cab and then I completely blacked out…but, when I woke up, it was so freaky because I was covered in my own vomit with no ladder to get down from my bed… I swear, I thought I was gonna fucking die…Figuring out how to get down from that bed made me realize how much I value life…the breakfast I ate after I got down tasted different somehow. I feel like I have a new lease on life…”
3.) Blowing things out proportion – Taking something that’s frivolous and making a big deal out of it with a story and/or a huge extended metaphor is funny. Again, my aforementioned example of waking up from a black out and getting a new lease on life demonstrates this (oh, just in case you couldn’t figure out the sarcasm, my bed is only like 9 feet off the floor so it’s not like there was any real danger). But you can apply this concept at ANY point in the pickup and it’ll amplify whatever you’re doing. For example, if I call a girl a “flaya” (a female playa) because she said something I ‘misinterpreted’ as a flaya comment, that might get a chuckle or a quick, “Nooooooo”. But I’ll get a huge BT spike if I go, “Shit, this chick is such a flaya. I’ll bet you’re like Lil Kim, you have a bunch of manslaves that dance around you in your rap videos and shit. Oh man, I’ll bet you make guys cry all the time. I know your type – You’re one of those honeys getting money playing fellas like dummies…”
(For those of you who caught that, my next point…)
4.) Quoting song lyrics in serious conversation – Always awesome. (Again, relates to the “pop culture” reference.) If you do this with the right delivery, you can get away with ANYTHING. Like, if a girl is getting mad at you, say, “Here’s the thing. We started out friends. Yeah, I mean, it was cool but it was ALL pretend.” Also, another great one (to quote again from my last example) is, if a girl calls you out on using a pickup line, say, “Pick up line!? No way, if I was trying to pick you up I’d ask what your interests are, who you be with? Let’s see…what else…Things to make you smile, what numbers to dial…”
(And her response beings me to my next point…)
5.) Making absurdly wrong assumptions – Never give a straight/honest answer (at least not in the A phases). So, if you use one of my examples mentioned in the last example, and the girls goes, “OMG!!! Are you quoting Kelly Clarkson?!?!?!” You say, “What? No. That’s Shakespeare. God, didn’t you read Much Ado About Nothing?! Do you have any culture?” This also works great for girls with accents. If a girl has a strong Eastern European accent (which I love “btw”), I always say, “Oh wow. Love your accent. Lemme guess, you’re from China.”
Wording – Finally, the way you word things will enhance your humor and eek out all the potential from your frame/attitude/content. Incorporating funny words/phrases is simple. Aside from listening for funny words in every day situations (i.e. floozy, abomination, atrocity), I also write down any phrase I think is humorous. This is why reading books like "Sex, Drugs, and Cocopuffs" is great. Finding people who understand humor will seriously up your game and no one will ever know you're stealing phrases from them. Using over-the-top wording is always funny. So, if a girl says something stupid, rather than telling her, "What?!" say something like, "That was profoundly retarded" or "That was a complete atrocity." Again, I could list off plenty of "funny" words or phrases, but I'm confident you guys can build up your own "funny vernacular."
Conclusion - This is tip-of-the-iceberg stuff but it's enough to get you started and get you laughs. If you don't know how to vibe and be funny, you'll never get laid (sorry!). But, don't worry: humor and "funniness" can be learned so GOOD LUCK!
3 comments:
This is an excellent summary of being funny. Comedy is probably the best emotion to evoke, however i like to take girls for a roller coaster ride of emotions. Don't get stuck playing the clown 24/7.
The best comedy book i ever read was "Comedy Writing Secrets" by Helitzer. To be honest, the book was an extreme advanced look on comedy, specifically for writers like TJ. It did an excellent job explaining why people laugh and why jokes are funny. Once you understand this, improvising jokes is easy in any setting. It also goes on to classify all the different types of jokes there are. I definitely recommend this one. Don't worry, its torrent friendly :)
Good post Judge. And don't think we forgot about your upcoming routines post that you mentioned in your last FR!
P.S. Don't bother buying/dling David D's Cocky Funny series as TJ just summed it up perfectly.
I must say that this is a great explanation of "being funny." I do have to agree that I have learned pop culture references, if delivered correctly can dramatically increase BT. The more outlandish the better it would seem. One thing I would like to add is make sure that it is something almost everyone has heard of. This increases the chances of getting good laughs. One neg/funny pop culture reference I really like is, comparing the target to Punky Brewster. If delivered correctly this can be great! I would be really interested in hearing other pop refs that you guys might have.
Excellent post, dude.
To give an example:
A couple weeks ago, my friends and I were cleaning up our stuff after fencing practice. Someone asked where a really specific piece of fencing equipment was, and I replied "I think I saw OTHER GUY gnawing on it earlier" without looking up or acknowledging whoever asked. Now, I thought I had—to use a phrase that's now stuck in my head—said something profoundly retarded.
But EVERYONE who heard me cracked up. Why? Well, when I think about it in hindsight, here's why I think it was so funny:
— My delivery was completely deadpan and non-reaction-seeking.
— The word "gnaw" is inherently funny, especially if a human is doing the gnawing.
— Saying random stuff that pops into your head can be hilarious even if you don't think it will be.
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