It’s not that clear cut anymore. I just had a brief talk in with my fellow brainiac housemate in which we agreed that “gross humor” was a thing to be desired in any TV series we would consider following. Beyond the Freudian goodness there is to explore when you mention “gross humor,” I think it’s maybe less stigmatized now.

Or it could be that there’s an assumption that it’s education that should sensitize us to additional layers of potential humor. If that’s true, then education would be the new class when it came to comedy.

But I don’t really think it is. And here’s why. There was this guy whom I dated. He was wealthy, in an annoying never-had-a-job-or-done-anything-worthwhile sort of way. He was a Reedie. And his only mode of humor was the pun. The pun! The only laughs he ever got from me were the incredulous type. He failed to get the witty, the bawdy, the ironic, the sarcastic, the satirical, the parodic, the ludicrous, the silly, the anything but the pun.

I’m nearing the end of my erronious and unsubstantiated claims, have no fear.

Since this white boy had all the benefits of wealth and education, and a lifetime of leisure in which to enjoy them, I can only conclude that humor is related to mental aptitude, not to financial fortitude or expensive educations that daddy paid for. Anyone who would devote an iota of energy to the propagation of puns clearly isn’t all that apt.

So, I propose a hierarchy of humor, one in which the pun exists on the bottom, in the comedic ghetto, and all other forms of comedy flit around the top, with wry sarcasm reigning ever supreme. Those who flay us with puns shall be the eternal and essential Other.

And word to your mother, punsters…you will never have a Bakhtin-esque champion.

Not that I am speaking from experience, but this is an event that especially appeals to trust funders who are paralyzed with guilt and lethargy, as it gives them some “meaningful” “work” to do in their otherwise unoccupied time. Plus, it gives the polyamorous among them a break from the cognitive dissonance of buying carbon credits to offset their flights to see their multiple girlfriends.