As we’re well into the crisis now, the jokes and memes are getting more twisted. Dark coronavirus humor is often funnier and somehow resonates better with people.
Interestingly, a taste for black humor could be an indicator of greater intelligence levels, according to this study published in Cognitive Processing. The psychologist Ulrike Willinger led an experiment which showed that participants who appreciated darker jokes expressed less aggression than those with a conventional sense of humor. Plus, the former group was found to have higher levels in verbal and nonverbal intelligence.
Meanwhile, comedian Ken Cheng believes that joking about any risqué topic within comedy elicits the same answer. “Which is, that it depends,” Ken wrote in an opinion piece for Metro. But he doesn’t see anything wrong with talking about the current crisis in a humorous way. “Of course there will be some camps who think no serious topic should be made fun of, that even mentioning coronavirus in a humorous context is making light of a tragic situation,” but he added, “I don’t subscribe to this.” If humor is used skillfully, it can bring shelter to whatever the situation would be while still understanding its severity.
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