this? is not funny

[somedaybitch]

Excellent TiVo practical joke
Thomas Hawk says: "Google Video has a homemade video up done by a bunch of guys who played a practical joke on their friend. They basically TiVo'd the Texas lottery show and then bought a lottery ticket for their friend the next day and played it back like it was live. The guy goes nuts thinking that he just won the Texas lottery and screams and yells and jumps up and down and hugs everyone. Hey, if not to give you the high of winning the lottery at least once in your life, what are good friends for anyway?" Link (Caution -- lots of swear words are uttered in the video.)

why is that funny? had my friends done that to me, that would be the last conversation we ever had.

and while i agree that the methodoloy was brilliant, i think what they did was nothing short of deliberately cruel. practical jokes like this are not funny. they're mean. and mean is not funny and i don't understand how so many people think that it is. the "Punk'd" bullshit with Michael Vartan, for example. the guy has a fear of flying. so Demi's husband decides that wouldn't it be funny to fake some draHma with the plane. Vartan refused to sign the release to air the ep. i would have beaten the little fuck to a pulp with a c-stand.


hat tip to boing boing.

Comments

[lvp3.livejournal.com]

I completely agree. People who think that shit is funny are whacked. Its ridiculous. Its not funny to make other people feel stupid.

[somedaybitch.livejournal.com]

for a couple of minutes that guy thought he'd won the fucking lottery. his money problems solved. that's no small thing to most people. the callous cruelty of that letdown is just stunning.

[lvp3.livejournal.com]

I agree 100%. I know personally I would be devasated and then livid and like you, I would never talk to them again. That is just wrong to put someone through that.

[somedaybitch.livejournal.com]

love the icon.

[hercircumstance.livejournal.com]

I spent the last year of college saying to my roommates, "Um, that is vandalism." There are fun pranks and then there are cruel and damaging pranks. I figure if it takes less than ten minutes to clean up and/or makes everyone laugh then great. Otherwise I am firmly against it. We did do some pranks that were good, ironic, silly, etc, but it was a pain in the butt trying to explain to them that being cruel and destructive shouldn't be fun. *would have been a legalistic god*

[somedaybitch.livejournal.com]

We did do some pranks that were good, ironic, silly, etc, but it was a pain in the butt trying to explain to them that being cruel and destructive shouldn't be fun. *would have been a legalistic god*

and isn't it inexplicably frustrating that they don't get it???? i mean, how can you NOT get it?

[simplystars.livejournal.com]

i hate those prank shows - Scare Tactics and the ilk of MTV. it shows kids that it's okay to be mean. that cruelty = funny.

call me old-fashioned, but i hope there's a backlash at those kind of people. hard and just as mean, and hit them where it hurts - their wallets.

[somedaybitch.livejournal.com]

i do believe there will be; the Universe is wise like that.

[raincitygirl.livejournal.com]

Good-natured pranks are one thing, like the time my brother got me a cap gun for Christmas (so very not what I wanted) and I tried to find something nice to say about the present, until I discovered he'd taped concert tickets to my favourite band to the back of the box. Something where you think you're disappointed and then you're surprised with a good thing, that's okay. As are surprise birthday parties.

And pranks which hurt nobody's feelings or property are okay. The engineering students at my university were (well, still are) famous for their pranks. Every year graduating class finds a way (usually using some kind of engineering principles) to get a junker VW Beetle into some totally implausible and very visible place. Like on the roof of the Dean's Office, or suspended from a bridge. Technically it's illegal, but nobody's getting hurt, the students are using their creativity, the local papers publish a picture. And in all the decades that they've been doing this, nobody's ever been injured while getting the Beetle where it's supposed to go.

HOWEVER, things like that are a far cry from exploiting someone's fear of flying, or making them believe they'd just won the lottery, or something else cruel. If the person you're pulling the prank on ends up feeling worse than before you started the prank, then it's not a good prank. This concept is not rocket science.

[somedaybitch.livejournal.com]

And pranks which hurt nobody's feelings or property are okay. The engineering students at my university were (well, still are) famous for their pranks. Every year graduating class finds a way (usually using some kind of engineering principles) to get a junker VW Beetle into some totally implausible and very visible place. Like on the roof of the Dean's Office, or suspended from a bridge. Technically it's illegal, but nobody's getting hurt, the students are using their creativity, the local papers publish a picture. And in all the decades that they've been doing this, nobody's ever been injured while getting the Beetle where it's supposed to go.

i agree totally. we filled a supervisor's car with crickets on the night we found out he got promoted; somebody tied a dead cat to the push bars of another guy's car and let him drive around like that for hours. stuff like that is silly and harmless. i like silly and harmless. hanging a VW from a suspension bridge, assuming of course the engineering is sound, is BRILLIANT and i would be lmao if it were my car.

this stuff though....exploitive, manipulative...that stuff's not funny.