Cynicism and jokes

In the masked society under totalitarian and autocratic rule, folk jokes are often the self-censored expressions of intelligent and discerning people—hinting, beating around the bush, equivocating, hesitating to speak, and changing the subject. Jokes originate from people having ideas, but their expression is not free due to speech control. Controlled expression is controlled thought. The timidity, ambiguity, and equivocation expressed in jokes, over time, become second nature and will mostly erode people's independent thought and courage, making them slick, opportunistic, and conformist.

Jokes and humor provide a rare perspective for observing how ordinary people perceive good and evil, right and wrong, in their daily world. Examining and researching what jokes ordinary people tell, how they tell them, and under what political and social atmosphere they tell them, is to understand from a special socio-cultural perspective what they have noticed, learned, and understood about the events happening around them, and how they have expressed or indicated it. In a cynical society where people generally wear masks, such information is always hidden behind layers of pretense, disguise, lies, and myths. The more this is the case, the more precious the true information contained in jokes becomes.