Anti-humor is a type of humor that is not directly humorous, though anti-humor jokes often become humorous due to the irony involved in telling them. Listeners are expecting something funny, and when they hear something decidedly not funny, this ridiculous irony is humorous. Reactions to these jokes are often extremely humorous. Anti-humor also encompasses various types of pranks and hoaxes.

The most common example of anti-humor is the joke, "Why did the chicken cross the road?" with the answer, "To get to the other side." An example which illustrates this well is "Three blind mice walk into a bar. They are unaware of their surroundings, so it would be irresponsible to derive humour from their predicament." Another common type of anti-humor is the no soap radio joke, often used as a prank.

Anti-humor jokes are often associated with exaggeratedly bad stand-up comedians. One legitimately successful stand-up comedian, Andy Kaufman, had his own unique brand of anti-humor, quasi-surrealist acts coupled with performance art.

Anti-humor has at times spawned legitimately humorous jokes, such as "Why did the turkey cross the road?" "Because the chicken was on vacation."

Chicken jokes

This is not, by any means, a full listing of chicken oriented jokes, but it gives an idea how the joke can develop:

• Why did the chicken cross the road? - To get to the other side.
• Why did the lion cross the road? - It was stuck to the chicken.
• Why did the turkey cross the road? - The chicken was on vacation.
• Why did the dinosaur cross the road? - Because back then chickens didn't exist.
• Why did the chicken cross the playground? - To get to the other slide.

See also

• Meta-joke
• Non-joke
• The Aristocrats
• Shaggy dog story

External links

• SomethingAwful - Examples of Anti-Humor