THIS article presents the sciences that point at the intelligence of the funny people. It celebrates comedy as probably the earliest entertainment known to humanity. It explains the polarized society amid Jo Koy’s recent flop at the Golden Globes awards.
Jo Koy’s brand of success
When Filipino American Jo Koy performs, he brings the Filipino flag with him. And is it something to be proud of?
He has a huge audience and following, and he strikes conversations about being Filipino, as his comedy has capitalized on the intricacies of the Filipino lifestyle, living style, culture and tradition, and of course, a lot more.
He is a hit. He broke records for the most tickets sold by a single artist in Honolulu, at the Warfield in San Francisco and in Winnipeg, at the San Diego Civic Theater. He is reported to have the most consecutive sold-out shows for a comedian. He recently became the only comedian to sell 17,000-plus tickets, over 30 shows (in one year) at the Brea Improv.
He was given the prestigious “Stand-Up Comedian of the Year” award at the 2018 “Just For Laughs Comedy Festival” in Montreal. He has had four highly rated and successful comedy specials on Comedy Central and Netflix, currently streaming worldwide.
In 2019, the comedian reached No. 1 on the Billboard charts for his stand-up comedy album “Live From Seattle.” He can also be heard on his weekly podcast, has appeared on more than 140 episodes of “Chelsea Lately” and many other top-rated television shows.
His mother, in an interview, confirmed the truth behind his acts but argued that those are really funny and bring back memories.
Jo Koy’s huge global audience and following is proof of his success in comedy.
There is polarity on how he has contributed to the global perception and impression of the Filipino identity, especially now that the world is talking about his taking a lot of flak for his hosting of the 81st Golden Globe Awards held recently in California that was watched by some 9.4 million live viewers. This article digs deeper into comedy, rather than contributing to such polarity.
Defining comedy
Reportedly, Albert Einstein and Charlie Chaplain had exchanged an expression of mutual admiration that demonstrated the actor’s quick wit. “What I most admire about your art is your universality,” Einstein said to Chaplin. “You don’t say a word, yet the world understands you!”
Comedy has been part of humanity’s entertainment from cavemen to medieval characters. Then, there was minstrelsy, the form of entertainment associated with minstrel shows, featuring songs, dances and formulaic comic routines based on stereotyped depictions of African Americans and typically performed by white actors with blackened faces. Then vaudeville, a type of entertainment popular in the US in the early 20th century, featuring a mixture of specialty acts such as burlesque comedy โ of exaggerated imitation or parody โ and song and dance. In the Philippines, vaudeville became a hit and made Katy de la Cruz its queen.
The medium has morphed from one-liner artists to political satirists, social-taboo tweakers to observational humorists, from the club-comic bubble of the 1980s to the alt-comedy boom of the 1990s. But the idea of just a single person on a spotlight onstage in bar, club or theater, in front of strangers and talking until they crack up is the modern version.
Comedy is defined as a professional entertainment consisting of jokes and satirical sketches, intended to make an audience laugh.
We loved Dolphy and Panchito, the Reycards Duet, Elizabeth Ramsey, and more. We have seen the proliferation of comedy bars, which gave way to the celebrity careers of Vice Ganda, Ethel Booba, and other television and social media personalities like Tekla, Donita Nose and the Beks Battalion. Comedy finds patrons even in corporate events and live entertainment. And comedy sells.
But there is a fine line that separates comedy and mockery. The goal of comedy is to entertain the audience. Mockery is the practice of hurling insults at someone or something to earn a few laughs. Whether Jo Koy’s jokes are comedy or mockery is highly dependent on subjective judgment and personal biases.
Comedy is an art form. So here we’re not using comedy in the sense of types of classical plays, tragedy versus comedy. Here we’re talking about comedy as a sort of artistic performance.
Even Freud has a big book on jokes and the relation to the unconscious, and in that work, Freud draws an interesting distinction between two types of jokes: innocent jokes and tendentious jokes. Innocent jokes play on words, puns, clean jokes. Tendentious jokes, on the other hand, come in two flavors. He argues that there are dirty jokes, jokes about sexuality and ethnic jokes, jokes that make a particular group the butt of the joke, where one is using a stereotype.
Funny people are more intelligent
Albert Einstein attributed his brilliant mind to having a child-like sense of humor.
Neurobiology shows that laughter leads to brain changes, which may explain the link between humor and intelligence. Studies have found that experiencing positive emotional states โ joy, fun and happiness โ increases the production of dopamine in the brain. Dopamine not only makes us feel great, it also opens up the learning centers of the brain, which enables and sustains more neural connections. As a result, we become more flexible and creative in our thinking and better at solving problems. It also boosts our working memory.
A number of studies have found an association between humor and intelligence. Researchers recently discovered that funny people have higher IQs than their less funny peers. To produce (and process) humor, it takes both cognitive and emotional ability. Funny people have higher verbal and nonverbal intelligence, and they score lower in mood disturbance and aggressiveness.
The Broaden and Build theory also supports the idea that experiencing positive emotions through humor actually alters our thoughts, actions and physiological responses. It creates a virtuous emotion that enhances well-being.
Having a good sense of humor is linked to high emotional and social intelligence, and is a highly desirable quality in a person, making them nice to be around. Evolutionary psychologists describe humor as a heritable trait that signals mental fitness and intellectual agility to prospective mates. Both men and women rate funny people as more attractive and cite having a good sense of humor as being one of the most important traits in a partner.
Funny people are influential because humor actually boosts perceptions of confidence, competence and status. It is a powerful tool that many successful leaders use to enhance group cohesiveness and organizational culture because humor gets people to listen, helps communicate messages and aids learning. The more fun we have at work, the more productive we are and the less likely we are to suffer burnout.
The use of humor in education also supports the notion that humor is an effective aid to learning. Several studies have demonstrated that lessons that are delivered with humor are more enjoyable for students and also enhance students comprehension and recall of the topic.
Funny people also laugh more at themselves. In psychology, we use the term “positive humor style” to refer to people who use humor to enhance relationships and reduce conflict. This type of humor is associated with relationship satisfaction, extroversion and high self-esteem. It helps people better manage stress and adversity โ a source of coping. More negative humor styles such as sarcasm, ridicule and self-deprecating humor do not offer the same benefits. Instead, they tend to alienate people and are more often associated with depressed mood and aggression.
We judge comedians by weighing their artistic merit, technical proficiency and sense of timing, the quality of their written material, their delivery and degree of influence โ and often, their sense of what makes something, anything, funny. They are those who can wake us up to the weird, wonderful possibilities of the world around us, impel us to think differently about our own lives and realities โ and most of all, make us howl like “blithering idiots.”
We celebrate the brain and conscience of comedy โ its guts and heart. As Aristotle argues, ethical questions are really questions about the nature of one’s character, and when you look at the human soul, it’s divided into two parts. One part deals with the intellectual, one part deals with the ethical, the practical and the virtues of the practical are always the mean between two extremes. So in the case of humor, if you have too little, you are a bore; if you have too much, you are a buffoon. But if you are right in the middle, you are a wit. And that’s the virtuous way to be.
Laughter is the best medicine, right? Then, laugh.
Title:ย ย JO KOY AND WHY SCIENCE SAYS THAT FUNNY PEOPLE ARE MORE INTELLIGENT
Source: The Manila Times